I edited my profile with Thomas' Myspace Editor V4.4
Yelping, screaming, squeaking, and fluttering their way through sonic waves of feedback and mechanized drumming, Golden Valley's very own Melodious Owl are living proof that there is no cure for Dance Fever.
Formed on the long walk home from the bus stop in the Spring of 2003, Melodious Owl, taking their name directly from the pages of a Kurt Vonnegut book, started as an almost completely different band.
"It was pretty radical at first," says vocalist/keyboardist Wes Statler. "Jon was playing a drum kit he had constructed solely from cans, boxes, and other garbage along with an array of buzzers. Joe had a guitar with only 4 strings, and I was playing a scaled-down bass with merely 2. We had an old, plastic Green Bay Packers football helmet that we taped 3 or 4 microphones to for the vocals and a busted answering machine for recording purposes. We pretty much tuned all of the instruments to E and said 'go.' I think it started as just an opportunity for the three of us to throw our ideas around - a kind of experiment for the time being."
The end result of these first few garage sessions were the songs "Dad's Tool Rules" and "Baseball," a song that featured a radio tuned into an MLB baseball game in place of typical vocals. (The recordings have been buried, so to speak, until recently.)
After a "hiatus" that lasted the majority of the following summer, Melodious Owl decided to reconvene after a chance meeting at a Black Eyes concert. Sensing that a more controlled genre would be required for even minute appeal, the band acquired fully-functioning instruments, this meaning a real drum kit for Jon and fully stringed instruments for Joe and Wes.
The new incarnation of Melodious Owl yielded the dance-noise-rock of "Rock'n'Roll Preacher", "Hittin' The Waves", "Dance Fever", and even a cover of the Chicago Bears' "Super Bowl Shuffle". October 11th of 2003 marked the band's first live performance which occurred at the top of the stairs inside their high school at the time, Hopkins. The unrehearsed performance was met with mixed reviews including comments like, "Good luck with that!" and "Shut the f*ck up!"
Upon returning home and finding the results of their first outing somewhat disheartening, the band took a break to analyze their current state of being. Citing Jon's inability to drum, Wes' lack of control musically, and Joe's overly dissonant guitar parts as their primary flaws, the band decided to cut the problems and reorganize once again.
In January of 2004, the band reconvened in Wes' basement with Jon's newly re-discovered saxophone, Wes' sister's Casio CTK-530 keyboard, and a CD Joe had compiled of beats created on a drum machine. Aiming for a "harder version of The Rapture, yet with no less dance" the boys got down to writing. Shortly thereafter, the main riff in "The Church" was penned.
The lyrics were spawned upon Wes' discovery of a dilapidated Bible within the bass drum in his basement (however, they've got nothing to do with an actual church burning down.) Sensing that they might be on to something, the boys whipped up a few more digitized drum tracks and penned the songs, "I Like The Way You (Fuck Me)" and "Very Scared - 02/14/04" as well as the short-lived "Analog Killers". "I Like The Way You (Fuck Me)" eventually, upon becoming the victim of parental censorship, became "Touch Me" and, due to a shift in feelings, "Very Scared" became "Drive Me Sexy" and, even further down the line, it evolved into current crowd favorite "Andrew".
Over the course of the next month or so, the boys honed in their skills with their new respective instruments and debuted their reinvented and rejuvenated sound on the same steps where they had faced their critical doom months earlier. The response was much warmer this time around, and this was all of the motivation the boys needed.
Melodious Owl had evolved from the dilapidated experimental noise rock of months passed and into the dance loving, drum machine driven new wave powerhouse of Joe Berns on guitar and programming, Jon Kuder on saxophone and synthesizers, and Wes Statler on lead vocals and synths.
The boys continued writing over the following months, touching up the songs and recording their first official EP featuring the instrumental "Destroy Consumer", "Andrew", and "The Church".
June rolled around and brought the end of school and the group's final performance at Hopkins High as the three planned to switch schools for the following year. It was their most well received school outing to date, prompting students to join them in dancing, singing, and strutting their way through a truly (booty) moving set and into the future.
Then, on June 23rd, the boys in Melodious Owl received an e-mail that forever changed the direction of the band.
Geremy Jasper of Brooklyn based dance-punks, and Melodious Owl idols, The Fever sent Wes an e-mail asking to have Melodious Owl fill the open slot on their bill at the Triple Rock that evening after the sleaze rock two piece known as DFA 1979's cancellation. Needless to say, they agreed and the boys met immediately in Joe's basement wrangling a set list together.
They arrived at the Triple Rock and performed a blazing four-song set consisting of "The Church", the freshly written "Love Bandits", "Andrew", and a chaotic "Touch Me". The crowd, although small in size, was duly impressed. The five demos that the band had optimistically created to sell were gone in seconds. The Fever unanimously dubbed the boys as fantastic requesting them as touring mates and planning shows in NYC into the future. The boys met Melissa Maerz of the local culture paper, the City Pages, who would go on to write glowing reviews of the trio. The band won over the heart of local filmmaker Peter Rudrud who, with video pioneer Chuck Statler, would eventually go on to shoot the video for "Andrew".
From there, the boys won the local college radio station, Radio K's, "Battle of the Underage Underground" and an appearance on the station's live performance show "Off The Record". The band began playing to larger and larger audiences, with bands of increasing significance, to warmer and warmer responses.
Throughout the months to follow, the band penned "Stripe", "Analog Loving", and "Tell Me This". In the closing weeks of July, the band shot their first music video in a local dance studio for the song "Andrew". Roughly a month later, they performed their first headlining gig ever - a doubleheader in the 7th Street Entry on Sunday, September 5th - a performance that was witnessed and highly praised by none other than the bassist of Prog-Rock legends, Yes.
Currently, the boys are preparing to record their first full-length, to include all of the (relevant) previously listed tracks, as well as their newest titles "Who's Got Who" and "Dance Fever Revisited". Oh, speaking of which, the boys are also preparing to infect the world with the incurable, hip-shaking, bottom-wiggling, pop-and-lock-inducing ailment known as Dance Fever...and you're their first victim, so prepare to shake it in your dirty velour.
Bio by William Trevor
We know what you're thinking...
"OH MAN! NOW I HAVE TO SCROLL EVEN FURTHER TO LEAVE MELODIOUS OWL A COMMENT?!? NO WAY, DUDE!"
But, come on, that slideshow thing (minus that intense close-up of Wes) is kind of cool, eh? I feel like I've made our page into a teenager's fantasy.
