Like so many of life's unexpected developments, the story of The High Signs begins with a personal ad....
The time was April of 2001. The place was Washington, District of Columbia. A transplanted Buckeye named Joel, who had previously spent ten years rocking the Rust Belt with The Revelers, Cleveland's dapper demi-gods of Mod, was itching to find some musicians to play with in the D.C. area. It was either that or grad school, and the choice was clear.
Joel placed an ad in the Washington City Paper's "Consenting Musicians" section, and it caught the eye of one Timothy Stutz, erstwhile bass-player for Knoxville's favorite folk-pop kids, The JudyBats. Tim had been looking into playing some music and drinking beer...just like the ad said. Although Tim and Joel were from the get-go, and remain to this day, unable to spend more than five minutes in each other's company without squabbling like two seagulls fighting over a Cheez Doodle, they nevertheless became fast friends based on their strong and mutual affinity for beer and rock.
Tim introduced Joel to Nathan and Joe, two affable chaps and fellow lovers of beer and rock, and the four of them would meet every week at Atomic Billiards to quaff ale, talk about music and politics, shoot pool, and monopolize the jukebox. It was perhaps inevitable that someone would sooner or later suggest starting a band. As no one knew of any available drummers, the idea never really took off until Nathan, in his typically enthusiastic way, volunteered for the job.
While Nathan's enthusiasm is to be commended, it alone was not enough to change the fact that he didn't actually HAVE any drums, and wouldn't have known what to do with them if he HAD, having never played them before. Not one to be so easily deterred by such minor details, Nathan went out and bought himself a drum kit, and applied himself to the task of learning how to play them with characteristic determination.
Now, a band can't officially be a BAND until it has a NAME. Even if the most creative name a band can come up with is, say, "The Band", it's still a name. A few possibilities were kicked around, and all of them were met with eye-rolls, snorts of derision, and/or looks of utter incomprehension from various significant others. Then, during one of their weekly outings at Atomic, the jukebox happened to be playing "She's Tight" by Cheap Trick....
"(She's tight) She's giving me the go/(She's tight) She's giving me the high sign...."
Someone suggested "The High Signs", and that was that. Astute readers will recall that the "high sign" was also the secret sign of Our Gang's "He-Man Woman Hater's Club", and is made by placing one's hand beneath one's chin, palm-down, and waggling the fingers up and down. It should be noted, by the by, that none of the members of The High Signs are women-hating he-men.
The newly-christened band took up residence in Joe's basement, and after many a Saturday practice, had amassed a fair amount of original material. Joe, Tim, and Joel all contributed songs, with Joe on guitar, and Joel and Tim alternating between bass and guitar, a practice Joel and Tim continue today. The High Signs made their official debut a year later at a friend's backyard barbecue, for which they were paid with many tasty hamburgers.
TO BE CONTINUED......
"We will fly the pop flag proudly, wave it in the face of our enemies.
They may at first resist us, they will soon find out it's useless....
They may hate us in the first verse but they'll adore us by the chorus.
And we will show them that, it's not so bad."
Guided By Wire by The High Signs
