Interview with Eric Stoess, October 13, 2016

Chip Nold:All right, I'm talking to Eric Stoess. It's October 14th. Is it the -- the 13th today? I'm sorry, October 13, 2016. We're talking in my house in Tyler Park. And so, we're going to talk to him about his experiences in our Louisville scene. So, we'll start out with some personal information. When and where were you born?

Eric Stoess: OK. I was born in LaGrange. Well, born in Louisville, but I was raised in LaGrange, same house until I moved out. When it was kind of a -- it still had some soul. It had some eccentric people, and it was still a small town. Born in '65.

CN:So where did you go to high school?

ES:Oldham County High School.

CN:Okay. All right. So yeah, talk a little bit more about the LaGrange. I mean, I think it seemed that was really important to you.

ES:Yeah. Like I said -- gosh. In hindsight I didn't appreciate at the time how kooky some of these people were, and legitimately so. There was no irony, there was no -- these are just some characters that flow through, and it permeated, it seemed like, across the board. And so even the high school -- when the soccer team won state in '73, it was just farm boys. It was farm dudes and playing with 2:00-- they didn't have real soccer balls. And it was shit like that. And I think in hindsight it's like, "Goddamn, what got them into soccer?" These are just -- I know these guys. It's like my brother played. It's like all of a sudden, they're into soccer.

I can't help but make an association between that and who I gravitated toward in high school in LaGrange, because it was so small and the high school was small. You had the typical jocks, heads, and whatever, and the smart kids. I ran cross-country with a guy, John Armstrong, who lived in my neighborhood, and we gravitated toward each other and he was kind of that first best friend who was highly influential. And we discovered punk rock and music together. He was a couple of years older, and so he was able to drive into Louisville and drive to 3:00shows, and I would tag along.

But growing up in LaGrange, there was a level of acceptance. You would stand out as kind of like -- "Ah, there's the token punk rocker," or whatever, but it was okay. It was just kind of it was a natural kind of extension. It was all right and it wasn't. It seems like a different mindset now. Going out there, it's real weird and oppressive. But early and I guess the late '70s or early in 1980, I don't remember, the first kind of punk rock thing that I heard was the Ramones. 4:00John had an 8-track of The Ramones. That was mind-blowing. It's like, "What the fuck is this?" And we were listening to it going to school in his van and stuff--

CN:Did it take some getting used to for you? I mean, I could think of--

ES:No. I mean, it didn't, because Scott, my older brother -- it was interesting, what I gravitated toward from his album collection, which I guess would be typical. Or in my experience, those were the albums in the house. Mom and dad didn't really have some Beatles and stuff, but Scott was the one who listened to music. And out of this collection, to this day, I know what -- it wasn't the Zeppelin I was listening to or the Sabbath, which I kind of regret because I wish I had more of a rock basis. But I was naturally -- when I started listening to music when I got my first turntable I guess when I was in -- God, I don't know, fourth grade, something like that, it was Bowie, it was the Jesus Christ Superstar soundtrack. He had a Bee Gees record that I'd kind of hit, and definitely Beatles.

And so, there was something -- whatever, I guess there was something in the Ramones that -- it lent itself, it was like these are great pop songs the way they're done. And so, it wasn't -- and about the same time -- and then, 5:00listening to the Pistols and the Clash and the typical stuff, and then it would be getting NME, and John and I sitting in his basement with -- they would come in batches. I guess there were weekly. It's pouring through, and then it's trying to find well, shit, that sounds really interesting. And, trying to get some of that stuff in and really kind of branching out, exploring and just consuming a lot.

CN:So, this was a subscription to the New Music Express--

ES:Yeah, yeah.

CN:OK. Well, so how did you get records?

ES:Mail order, mail order. Yeah.

CN:Rather than the shops in Louisville?

ES:Yeah, yes. John didn't start driving till late. And so yeah, it was an ordeal to even get into Louisville. I grew up with mom and dad bringing us into Louisville -- we'd come into Louisville once a week, Friday nights we'd have dinner at The Cape Codder or at Mario's Pizza. And that was a huge event. And 6:00so, it really wasn't until John was able to drive and we came in and -- Disc Records was in Oxmoor. Alan Hall, I think, managed that. When I came in with mom and dad or something on the weekends, that's the record store we'd go to. I didn't know about Bardstown Road and anything like that.

And so, we also -- my brother was at UK and Cut Corner Records with Randy and Ted, the guys who ran that, we would cut school and go down there just to go record shopping and hang out with Scott and come back. But mail order, and then that record store was the record store that I would go to for the same things 7:00that I would read NME for me for. It's like, okay, he's going to turn me on to something good and we're going to leave with a shitload of records and--

CN:So, what are some of the records you remember learning about from that, that really made an impact?

ES:The early -- I mean, it wasn't Devo. I remember the early records, the first Talking Heads record, Devo, the first Police record. And then Television-- the 8:00New York Dolls. It wasn't sort of a linear thing, like this leads to this, this leads to that. It was more of, "Oh, yeah. What? You haven't heard? No, my God. Here, come here. Take this, buy this, and go home," which would be more maybe Television or Suicide, stuff like that. But then I was heavily into -- it wasn't really up -- I remember ordering SST records and more being label-centric. Like okay, if it's on SST, I'm going to get it. And always kind of, "Nah -- ah, this is great." And it's like, "Nah, this is not really great." It's like, "Wait a second," just because it's on there.

But definitely ordering records from overseas. It was kind of across the board. 9:00It could be Human League, or whatever, and it took a while to develop a -- well, just because this dude's saying it, it's like, "Nah." And it was kind of a hit or a miss. I think John was more of a purist, whereas I think I had a streak in me, like, "Well, no. I get the impression this is cool, so it should be cool." And it took a while to kind of get out of that or to be a little bit more judicious and -- yeah, it's not. I don't like it, I don't care if it's cool, it doesn't appeal to me.

CN:So, what years are we talking about here?

ES:I guess '81. '80, '81. The poster thing that Tim Furnish and those guys did was great because I was able to kind of get a timeframe, which I'm terrible at. 10:00It's like okay, Scott played with you guys at a park, and maybe at Swiss Park or something.

CN:Swiss Park, right. Yeah, Sun Splash or something.

ES:Yeah, and I remember that. I couldn't tell you what year that was.

CN:It was '82.

ES:Okay, '82. All right. So kind of those things, I remember, and then going to Languid & Flaccid at St. Francis, I think, some of those shows. And going to The Beat Club and what years that was even open.

CN:That would have been -- The Beat on 3rd Street, right?

ES:Yeah.

CN:Well, I remember that that's where I met you. That was like '82, maybe into '83.

ES:So that's how I would back it up from stuff like that. So, at that point, John's definitely driving. He didn't drive -- we were listening to this, or we were kind of listening to this stuff a couple years before he drove. So that's why it's '79, '80. When I was a freshman, yes.

CN:So, if you're cutting school and driving to Lexington, that suggests some commitment, right?

ES:Yeah, and that would have been '82.

CN:Willingness to get in trouble. I mean, maybe.

ES:Yeah, right. Right, minimally so. I mean, yeah.

CN:Well, I guess what I'm wondering is how important was it to you?

ES:Oh, it was very important. Yeah, yeah. No, this was-- a lot of it seems to be in hindsight. It's like to process what -- how did that serve my life, or what 12:00would have been different had I not whatever. I think that's kind of my personality is to consume. It's on and it's okay, there's a collector side to the brain. And I want to hear it, I want to just consume it. And I had been working, we both worked at my mom and dad's gas station. And I'd been working since I was 11. So, I had disposable income and that's where it went.

CN:It was nice your parents didn't just say, "This is the family business, so you'll work here without pay."

ES:No, no. I started out killing horseflies for I think I got a quarter a 13:00horsefly in the office by the old dudes who sat in there. But also, Scott played a huge role, because he was in bands before high school. So, he plowed that road, and I was solidly behind it. There was enough space between us, eight years between us, where I was definitely the little brother that-- not so close that it was like, "Damn, we hate each other. I'm so annoyed that we hate each other." He was my role model. And because that's the place that I was sort of coming from, I wanted to be around his friends. It didn't matter if they -- I would always get -- I would come out in pain because it would be like, "Oh, let's trade licks." Okay. And they just kind of -- they'd kill me. But it was okay, this is cool. There's something going on here.

And so, Scott's in a band, so there's always musical instruments around the house. And his room was off limits, and of course I was in there all the time, and so he had all this magical stuff, these little two-headed cabs and stuff like that. But also, I remember his -- firing up, he had a Sun -- two cabinets with two 15s in each cabinet and this enormous Sun head in his bedroom. I'd get out his -- he had a '64 Gibson SG cherry red, and God, if he knew I even looked 15:00at that thing. It's like I never caught, but I would get that thing out and just -- I couldn't play for shit, but it's like, "Oh, this is cool. I like making this noise."

And so, at the point that John and I, in '81 I guess, whatever, are sort of starting to explore this, it was kind of all across the board. We did a fanzine. And then that was about -- the fanzine came a little bit before John started coming to Louisville, and he became friends with the Your Food guys. So, we were doing the fanzine, and then John and I would play music and kind of make up songs and have that pretend band and record on a little recorder.

CN:What did John play?

ES:I think he had a bass. He played a bass.

CN:I never knew he played. I remember him doing a fanzine.

ES:I don't know that he would say that. It was more of just like okay, we're sitting in my bedroom or in his bedroom and it's okay, play this and that sounds cool. It never actually evolved into something that either of us sang or anything like that. It was just making noise and it was kind of getting that fire lit. And it was just kind of a natural progression it seemed like for me, coming from sort of following in Scott's footsteps. And thankfully, it veered off from Yes and Uriah Heep and stuff like that to what John and I were kind of listening to.

CN:So, when you came into Louisville and you started going to shows and meeting 17:00people like Wolf and John, what was your impression of them?

ES:The difference is between John and I, I always felt like an outsider, that I wasn't weird enough or I wasn't fucked up. And this is all in my head; that wasn't coming from anybody, but it's like I was definitely not prone to meet people and want to hang out with them. And it's just not my personality, it's not my nature. And so, I grew up with the handful of guys that until well into my 20s, that's who I grew up with and those were the guys I hung out with. And 18:00after John kind of left the group, then we were doing a fanzine, the Kingfisher thing. And so, I guess it's unfortunate that I never -- well, I don't know. Whatever. I didn't meet -- going to those shows and stuff like that, I remember going to some stuff at I think Bigelow Hall, maybe?

CN:Yeah, there were shows there.

ES:Yeah. The band -- I can't remember, it was the band that maybe Abromavage was in it, one of his early bands. And I remember the guy singing was in a dress and there was a fight afterwards. One of the guys had to take up for him, and -- it was kind of like a movie. It was really exciting, but it was like yeah--

CN:That happened with Charles and the Dickbrains.

ES:Where was that?

CN:That was at a party in Irish Hill. You know where that is?

ES:Yeah.

CN:It was a house party, and it was The Babylon Dance Band and the Dickbrains 19:00played. And Mark and Kenny Ogle were there, for sure. Kenny Ogle was his friend who was the first lead singer in Malignant Growth. But yeah, and so somebody -- the kids in the neighborhood when we were loading up -- what happened was somebody fell off the roof. And so, the party ended, and Kenny Ogle kept saying, "The 'ludes saved them, man. The 'ludes saved them, man. Do you think they could have had anything with them falling off the roof?" But anyway, so Charles had worn a dress, so you can imagine Charles, so red shift dress. And so, these neighborhood kids started to want to mess with him. And then Kenny, who knew how to fight, really--

ES:Stepped up.

CN:Stepped up. But so, it was some combination of early Louisville bands.

ES:What year was that? Would that have been '77 or '78?

CN:No, that was '80. That was like Derby '80. But--

ES:I don't think I was there at that show in 1980. That would have been too early. Maybe I heard that story. But I remember --

CN:It made such an impression.

ES:It did, but...

CN:Maybe there was another occurrence, but that's the famous story.

ES:Okay. There was something -- but in my mind, what I remember was definitely somebody -- it was unusual for me to see somebody in a dress, like a dude in a dress. It's like, "Oh, that's pretty great." And then also it was unusual for me to see a fight. So, it's this level of violence with some redneck. Definitely, I understood that, because I mean -- you got that in La Grange, people's fear, kind of, aggression. But it was just I was just kind of witnessing it, whereas I 21:00think John, kind of like, "Oh, this is a cool scene," and he was more prone to click and make friends and kind of be a part of it. And so I enjoyed coming in. I remember the Languid & Flaccid, and it seemed very cool. The kids there seemed really cool. Yeah. But it wasn't something-- like I enjoyed going, but I would just want to go back to my nest, my safety zone of whatever back out there.

CN:So, John Armstrong was drawn into it more than you.

ES:Yeah, yeah.

CN:Because my memory is the two of you coming into The Beat sometime and you had -- was it always called -- how did the name change?

ES:That name changed, it was Current Month was the very first thing that we did, and so it would be named after the month.

CN:Okay. Well, it was Current Month, the one with the dialogue between the Caspian Sea and the Black Sea? And we all just thought that was so great. Everybody was really enthusiastic about that. So okay, so then-- so fanzine was going on. So, what was your first band?

ES:The first band, it was a high school band, and John had already graduated. And just doing covers, doing Black Flag's cover of "Louie, Louie," in that style, and I think a Devo song. And I can't -- I don't remember what else, but it was one of those kind of stupid, shitty little things, we're getting together after school. And the guys -- I played soccer with two of the guys and couldn't sing or anything. It was more of just an excuse to kind of get together and be goofy.

CN:And what were you playing?

ES:I was playing bass. And never -- and I think-- I don't think we even played a party or anything, it was just -- the guy who was sort of spearheading it, who played guitar, whose house we went to, really didn't like him. That didn't help. 24:00And he's picking the songs and it's like okay, but we're kind of going along with it.

CN:What was it was called?

ES:The A Regions. Didn't name it.

CN:What does that mean?

ES:I don't know. I don't know, The Anal Regions? I can't remember. But it was that level of kind of-- humor. But in the first band, the real band with friends that actually, "Okay, we're writing songs," it was Bo. And that, I played guitar in. And my friend Tim sang, and Don played drums, and then a guy I went to high 25:00school with played bass.

CN:What are their last names, just so we got them for --

ES:Oh, sorry. Tim Barnett sang. His real name's Foster Barnett, sang. And Don Kaufman played drums, and Glenn Fulmore played bass. And the name of the band was Bo with A Gun. And the reference was a guy, Bo Simpson, who grew up in LaGrange, went to high school, he's a few years older than us. Kind of was sort of low key badasses, kind of cool but prone maybe to get in trouble and stuff. But he was a cop, became a cop, at LaGrange, maybe sheriff or something--

CN:Oh my God.

ES:And so it was Bo. Bo was his name, Bo with a Gun. And I remember getting shit because -- and then we just shortened it to Bo and -- I don't know, just somebody making a comment and it took me by surprise, like yeah, it's kind of lame, ripping off Bodeco, I guess, or something like that. "What? No, no. What?" 26:00Anyway, but --

CN:Okay. So that was the first band that you really wrote songs for?

ES:Yeah. We wrote songs. Yeah. And yes, we wrote songs. That's when we started coming in, and kind of meeting people. Because we came in and we were playing at Tewligans. I remember they let us play during the week. And I'm not sure if we were 21. I'm pretty sure we were under 21 at that point. And it was at little loosey-goosey, a little more frontier back then--

CN:It's a great tradition.

ES:Right. And nobody would be there. But the bartenders loved us. I think Byron Hoagland may have been, and Scotty Haulter. And I can't remember the other people, but they thought it was hilarious. Because we definitely had introduced 27:00-- and it was all for our entertainment, our purposes, and it just grew. The shtick grew, like Tim doing Nipsey Russell poetry between songs. And it's not for a purpose of entertainment other than just it would just crack us up. And it was so elaborate. In practice it was as much fun, "Oh my God, let's make this board and spin it." And then you've got to do the Nipsey Russell, whatever, and there was just so many-- not in-jokes for the sake of in-jokes, but stuff that made us laugh like-- Milton Metz, and -- we loved, respected. l love Milton, but we would listen to him often. And we would call in a lot. And not -- and respectfully, it would be joke calls, but it's not disrespectful. He didn't know 28:00it, but he had the guy, Cappy somebody, who was a flag expert on there very regularly, and that was gold. When he's on there, we're glued to the radio and we're calling in asking questions about flags, right? And so that shit would end up -- Tim's going to throw that in, just for our -- he knows we're going to pick up on it and it's going to make us laugh. And so, it's that element of music. And there was broad enough stuff where the guys, Scotty Halter and them, would laugh too, get it. It's like, "Oh my God, you've got to see these guys, these just kids from LaGrange, these goofy little whatevers, coming in."

And because we were happy to play whatever, whenever, no money, they would fill those weekday slots. Like, "Hey you guys want to play next Tuesday?" "Yeah, sure." And eventually, the guys who came -- I guess they were more friends with 29:00John Brunner and maybe the Folks on Fire guys, Bruce Linn and Tim Linn and a good -- through Byron. And so, we kind of -- they came in, and we kind of clicked. They got -- it was kind of a sense of humor thing. And then after high school, I was going to JCC with John Bailey, and that's when John and I kind of clicked and then became friends. And Daughtry, Ben Daughtry, was going there. And so it's all kind of a collusion area. It's like, "Oh gosh, these guys are great," and so started hanging out more, kind of getting a little bit more familiar with Louisville and the scene, I guess.

CN:I'm going to go back to Bo and that sense of humor you had, because I think it's really interesting. I think it was one of the things that I really 30:00responded to from you guys, sort of there in the Current Month thing I was talking about with the -- "Did you watch the Cats last night?" Mr. Catsby or whatever, whatever it was. And it reminds me a lot of something that was just kind of that early '80s thing I kind of associated with SCTV, where you're really focusing in on these things you noticed in popular culture that are so weird, and you don't know, I mean, it's almost like - well maybe you do -- I don't know why they're funny. And the thing I go to is there was a mock-up you had in a Kingfisher of a nonexistent movie produced by the Globus Brothers. And 31:00the thing that just cracked me up was at the bottom -- "and Burgess Meredith as Micah." It was just beautiful. I mean, that was just like -- I just saw that, and I thought it was just so funny and perfect.

ES:That was my favorite thing. And going back and looking at that, it's kind of worthless. The reviews and shit, it's like, "Man, what? Oh, man." But I can -- that is still gold. That still makes me laugh. And that's exactly it. Barnett had -- we had -- I had an NME subscription, Barnett had the Variety subscription. From what -- he wanted to be a screenwriter. From when he was early, early in high school, that's what his deal was, movies. And so he had 32:00pile after pile of maybe Hollywood Reporter and Variety and had all these Golan and Globus ads and stuff. And it would just crack us up.

I mean, Mickey Rooney in these roles that you've never even heard of. To this day, it's like, "If that movie exists, I don't know where," but to put that together, that was an extension of -- it's the same spirit of the band. Yeah. And I think one of the regrettable things is -- and definitely I'm at fault on this one. And I don't know why. I'm sure with -- could probably figure it out psychologically what the problem was.

[OFF MIC CONVERSATION]

ES:So, the gang mentality that we had, that was just kind of the condition. 33:00We're into these specific references. And it's just natural and it's a language we speak. And we've grown up together since kindergarten, and so those bonds -- and being out at LaGrange -- not being a part of the scene, coming in with John and I out of Tim and Don, and definitely Glenn, who was -- he's just kind of a square dude from high school. But Tim and Don and I, who would hang out with a couple other friends, it would be Saturdays at mom and dad's gas station, they'd be up there all day. Mom and Dad would go see the Cats play, we'd have the run of the store. And it was great. And it was fun. And then we're going out Friday, Saturday, and going to the Vogue and seeing -- it's so insulated. And so the 34:00band and the fanzine that grew out of that, it's operating from that platform where it felt like we're definitely entertaining ourselves, but let's bring it to Louisville. And the things that -- and John kind of -- I think John wrote some stuff for Kingfisher. So it was still kind of a crossover--

CN:John Bailey?

ES:John Bailey, yeah. He would feed stuff, which I was happy to print it, but I 35:00remember it's like some of the jokes I didn't understand why they were funny. It's like, "Oh my god, that was not cool." And so, I'm representative of that fanzine, and so I'm the one who gets the reputation, like, "What an asshole." It's stuff like, "Maurice is going to change their name to More Rice," in the gossip column. I didn't even know, I'd never seen Maurice, don't even know who's in it.

CN:Oh, oh-- oh, two oriental guys--

ES:Yea. And John's being -- of course he's not racist and it's like -- but he's probably not going to put his name by it and it's just going to be some anonymous thing in the gossip column. It's just a little diggy. But it's kind of set up an us-versus-them thing in that I'm getting hate mail from-- Nedelkoff is 36:00doing a fanzine and Sean Garrison was doing the fanzine at the same time. I remember it was striking nerves unintentionally at first.

I remember, right, going to see The Church in Cincinnati at Bogart's, and it bummed me out that these kind of cliché punk rock dudes were slam dancing at a band that's like -- it's not, "What? What are you doing?" It's just distracting. And it was just real forced and whatever, and so I'm kind of mocking that. I use "Rat" as one of their nicknames--not intentionally. It was not-- whatever. And so, then Sean lets me know about that. And, coming from that insulated place out 37:00in LaGrange, it's like I don't give a fuck. So, I'm going to fire right back and be, "Okay, I am an asshole. Fuck you." And it's just unfortunate. And it's like being drawn into that kind of the negative part of any scene, drama or whatever, it's like, "Oh my God," and then not even realizing that. That's the unfortunate thing.

So, then you have people who were kind of writing to me and, "Oh, that's hilarious," and, "We don't like that guy," and whatever. And it's like okay, "We want to come out to meet you." And it's like okay, and it's like, "Hey, wow. I don't really like you guys. This is super awkward. I just -- yeah, don't come out again." But anyway, that insulated kind of space, I think, it definitely 38:00informed Bo and Kingfisher. And even when we were more -- coming into Louisville and just kind of, "Okay, now I know people in bands in Louisville and whatever," we still maintained that, to a certain degree. And even into Lemonade Hayride, which is what came after Bo.

CN:Well, yeah. That is interesting. That's something that -- I mean, you've hit on a couple things that people haven't talked about yet. But people have talked a little bit about having that in-group group of humor, like The Babylon Dance Band was like that. We had our way of joking and our running bits. And that's 50 percent of the fun of being in a band is doing that, right?

ES:Sure.

CN:But then the other thing is everybody's been so respectful of everybody else, and they should be. You look back on and you think, "Man, they're trying hard, and they make great music. Maybe we didn't get along, but I was a 20-year-old asshole, so." But you really do capture -- I mean, there's a lot of sniping back and forth and people getting pissed off over minor things or misunderstandings. I'm really glad you brought that out, because that is really part of the atmosphere.

ES:Oh yeah. Yes. But again-- yes, I totally agree with you. The thing that I don't cut myself slack for is how aggressive and what a dickhead. It was purely sport dickheadedness. To say something about Laurice Nemetz to Nedelkoff? Like, 40:00what the fuck? What were you thinking? What an asshole. To this day it's like, "Fuck. That's a different dude." Thank God. I can look back, but the 19- or 20-year-old had no problem, like oh, how quickly can I piss this dude off or get a "fuck you"? It's like, "Where did that come from?" Because it wasn't the other guys. It was whatever I was working out, and it's unfortunate.

But then of course, it was also the typical kind of -- I guess you're talking about the competition or the little misunderstandings that grow into -- and had I known the people, never would have happened, never would have happened. But 41:00because I'm out there and it's like I'm comfortable here in my gang, it's much easier -- it's social media.

CN:Right, right.

ES:And thank God, you grow up and you evolve, and -- thankfully. Will Oldham and I exchanged hate mail and we're very good friends today. Nedelkoff, I can send him an email and everything's fine. And Sean, I see him out, it's fine too. It was great the moment that the three of us had to show up at the scene. They were doing an article -- I think it was Puckett, maybe -- was doing article on fanzines. They wanted to do a photo shoot. It was the first time, it's like -- I'm aggressively-- I want to be the -- I'm going to show up looking like Edwyn Collins. My hero, Edwyn Collins. "Oh fuck you and your hardcore rock." "He's 42:00punk rock, he's as punk rock as you are. Fuck you." "Okay. What?" That was the attitude, showing up and it's like, "Oh, these guys are all right."

CN:Yeah, yeah.

ES:And when I showed up, I remember Sean -- it's like holy shit, this is the guy at Disc Records in Oxmoor, I had a Killing Joke shirt on. One of those trips in with Mom and Dad, I'm going to go to Disc. And I had a Killing Joke shirt, t-shirt, that would -- dad didn't even like, "What the -- what, what is that? Take that off." "Don't worry about it." And I remember Sean coming up to me in Disc records and like, "That's a great fucking shirt." I was like, "Oh, thanks."

CN:Well, the other thing I'm inserting, I'm not being a super objective historian here but because I knew you back then, the other thing that I perceived--and I wonder how you feel about it--is that you guys, it wasn't just 43:00a sense of humor, it was an aesthetic. And you took it really seriously. And I remember -- and just really lived it. I mean, I remember you were really into groups like the Smiths. I'm trying to come up with a good instance of it, but I just mean that -- and I think that's something a lot of young people go through, right, in your late teens, early 20s? It's the first thing that you can start to think you have a purchase on, and it's tied up with your identity and it's tied up with your intelligence and your creativity too, right?

ES:Yes. And you're right. That Morrissey aesthetic, it's something that clicked. I loved it, I loved the guy was so arrogant and just so-- Oscar Wilde, so sharp, and it was just a "fuck you." And what they're playing is so great. To me, it's like oh my god. And the guys that I worked with at Hawley-Cooke, they would just not -- they just couldn't fathom. It's like, "What the fuck is this?" And it's like definitely rock guys. And it's like that just made me love it more. It's like, "Oh, this is awesome. I love it."

And it's just a fuck you. It's super melodic, and there's nothing "rocking" about it. And there's certainly other bands. I loved The Jesus and Mary Chain. 45:00There's something similar. And Orange Juice and Edwyn Collins, or even The Go-Betweens, Forster and McLennan. There's something attitude-wise that I always clicked in on. And I didn't necessarily translate that well in that I like it -- and it's not an aggressive thing. To me, that was punk rock. I think part of the deal was I always resented somebody conveying to me that, "No, this is punk. That's not."

That would drive me nuts, and kind of still -- I've grown to accept it, but it's like, "No, what?" This is formative years of John and I sitting in his basement. This is all fucking punk rock. This is -- whatever you want to label it, this is 46:00-- Eyeless in Gaza, or Pere Ubu, it's like yeah, it's punk rock, what do you mean? Devo is not punk rock? Of course they fucking are. It's subversive, it's whatever. And the Smiths and even carrying on, it's like -- but by that time, it's like, "Oh, they're boxed."

It also was crippling though, in the way I'm talking about the Bulls. So, Bo -- there was a crossover there. I was playing bass in the Bulls and guitar in Bo. And because of the relationship with John and-- that mentality, that kind of gang mentality-- not crippling, crippling is not the right word. But I think it definitely limited my experiences. It was a handicap that, in hindsight, it's 47:00like well, when I listen to the Bulls stuff, it's like no, that's great. It really was good. I'm very proud of that of, even though I was just playing bass. But I remember there's a couple of songs that I wrote on the bass, and I can listen to them. And-- there was the pressure -- it's kind of like a protective or a cult sort of thing, whereas you can't leave, you can't leave the cult. And I think when John left the cult, I resented it.

CN:With John?

ES:John Armstrong, John Armstrong left the cult. Rightfully so. But there was a little resentment towards that. And maybe that also didn't really motivate me to 48:00meet people or hang out, not that I was wanting to do that. There wasn't an urge or desire. But it was harder for me, I think, to branch out, and it took maybe even leaving, eventually kind of grown man combination of stuff. But getting out of that, everybody kind of going their separate ways and kind of growing up a little bit and then branching out. But during that period, there was definite influence, like I was very sensitive to how things were perceived among that group with Eric Day by that time had moved into town, so huge influence. Just a real bright, kind of a huge influence on me and burned out really quick. But--

CN:And he'd moved to LaGrange?

ES:Yeah, his dad was a minister at our church. He had a younger brother, and he was the stereotypical preacher's kid. He was such an -- I mean, he was so an ass, really funny and very acerbic. But also definitely into music and--

CN:He never played, did he?

ES:We had a side project that he sang. He wrote lyrics.

CN:I'm sorry, I never heard of that.

ES:It was The Memphis Blue Tick Club. What's the name of it? I think we did actually play out at a party in Oldham County one time. But yeah, his very, very funny at the time, lyrics. I remember one song about how tough it was to be 50:00Hitler's son. But he meshed really well because he had the same thing that you're talking about, the quality of the SCTV observational, which huge SCTV fans. But for whatever reason, that clicks and it's funny and it's highly entertaining, and it's minutiae and it's just, "What?" I would expect a typical response like, "What? Why?" And it's like, "I don't know, it's just funny." But it's the same thing, to be watching TV and make an observation that Andy 51:00Griffith -- had a list of like, "Oh, Andy Griffith had terrible breath, bad breath." A list of -- and it would be just sporadic, it would be a running joke, it's like, "Oh, yeah. No, no, Dick Gregory? Terrible breath." Stuff like that.

But yeah, and then when we were playing, he would always -- he would come in after work. Like he got off at -- he worked third shift or something across the bridge at a plywood pressing plant, this place that made plywood -- and he would get off and come to, if we were playing, he'd come to the show. And when he came in, he's already drunk. And it was always you knew he was going to get on stage and sing something. And there was some cover, I think, that he sang. I can't remember what it was. But that was with Bo, I believe.

CN:Okay. Well, so let's get the Bulls and just be as uncomfortable as we want to be. No, no. So how -- because I was the last person to join. How did you and John -- you said you met at JCC. How did you start playing together?

ES:So, we met and became good friends. And John would have those dance parties at his house. Sometimes Ricky Feather would be there, which was amazing. And it's just kind of -- you know John. John has his world, and it was fun to kind of like -- John and Sue -- visit that world and Ricky Feather. I know that, of course. I saw that guy in, aw shit, what was that first band he was in?

CN:Falconneti?

ES:Falconneti, yeah. And it's like scary and Falconneti, I don't know. It scares me. I like it, but it's like now he's here and he's got his belt off and he's using it as a whip. Still scares me. I'm definitely late teens or early 20s. But 53:00it was fun. It was cool. And so, my girlfriend and Don and Tim and friends would go over there. So, the LaGrange contingent would go over there. And that's how we started hanging out. And then John is a huge Meat Puppets fan, and he had some songs that he wanted to play. And so, I started playing bass. I think we got together at his house, I think. He just mentioned it at school, like, "Do you want to listen to these songs?" or whatever. And I liked them a lot, I liked the songs. So that that's how that started. And he obviously knew Charles. And then I remember he was really excited that you were singing. It was kind of a big deal.

CN:Because I really felt like I really kind of wedged my way in there. I was really--

ES:No, no. I do remember that. And I didn't quite get it. It's like okay, I'll take your word for it. I like The Babylon Dance Band, it's like, yeah, okay, cool. That's great, I'm excited too.

CN:Okay. So, all right, so just tell me your memories of I guess what -- were you in the Bulls for a year, year and a half, maybe? What are some things you remember about it?

ES:I remember you all coming out and us practicing at the gas -- the garage, which was really cool.

CN:That was great.

ES:I really liked that. And I liked the fact that-- I liked the fact that-- I 55:00didn't have to adhere to anything. I mean, it wasn't the type of band like -- I remember John -- "Man, can you make that Rick sound like a Precision or P bass?" "No, I can't. I don't know, let me turn this up." It's like, "Whatever." But I remember us playing at Tewligans and the crowd that would come see the Bulls was very different than the crowd that would come to Bo, it seems like, in my memory. Or it's definitely more the known entities of the scene of the Louisville rock scene had been around forever and it's like -- and I remember wearing -- we had our own style. Or Eric, particularly. So, we would go thrift shopping and I had a turtleneck, short-sleeved turtleneck on, like a '60s thing 56:00and some bouffant and whatever. It's like I'm going to dress up, whatever, this isn't really dressing up for me. It's like yeah, this is kind of what I wear. It's like getting some shit from James Barber, maybe, or somebody. Like, what the fuck? And it's kind of like -- I liked it but was self-conscious, like, "What? I guess yeah, okay, some fop." "Who's that? Who's the fop on bass?" That's kind of how it felt. But that's okay. It was just more of it took me a few years to get, "Oh, James Barber is hilarious." Or somebody like that. But that's where I kind of started seeing people that I hadn't seen before. And okay, so they're with that group. They came out of that. This person plays in 57:00that band, and they're kind of associated with that band. Or that's a Kinghorse kind of deal. And I remember just I really liked it, and it was a weird, weird time. It was a weird time for me.

And particularly in hindsight, years later, "What, what the fuck was going on?" I remember going and purging my album collection and going and getting rid of The Birthday Party records I had and The Jesus and Mary Chain. It was this kind of weird religious sort of resurgence. I grew up in the church, but certainly, 58:00it was rote. At a certain point, I get out in the world and it's like -- either it's true for you or it's not. And I was definitely taking a path. It's probably not, but I'm not giving it a lot of thought. It's like, "I'm not sure about this," but I wasn't at the point where I was really questioning that. Okay, now I need to validate it. Do I or do I not? This is what I was indoctrinated in.

Now, I might have to step outside of that and, "Wow, check this mythology out." You sure? And it got real murky. And it may have been a little bit scary, kind of, for me. And because I had my ties with Eric were so tight, there was a point where he kind of, for whatever reason, you got the family dynamic. His dad, super smart guy, but the preacher. It kind of branched out. Whatever the end 59:00result was, we need to be more serious about Christ and the church. It's like okay, you're right. You're right. And--

CN:So that really was a resurgent thing for you.

ES:Yeah, yeah, it was. It definitely was, because early, I did not -- I mean, again, I was raised at the same church, the Baptist Church: Sunday, Sunday night, Wednesday night, for my whole life. Baptized twice just because I didn't think the first one took. And then in high school, it's more it's a social thing. Went there and it was fun, and then Eric. So we're all in church, we're sitting in the overflow section and doodling and passing notes. This is what you do. It's a social thing.

That's where I got -- I think I got laid the first time at church. So, there's a lot of things associated with that. I skipped choir. We were supposed to be 60:00performing. And boy, this is really off tangent. Sorry. Yeah, no. And a girl, an older girl that I had a crush on, we had come back from church camp and kind of hooked up there. And so, the youth choir was supposed to be performing. And instead of going in performing, I'm like, no, no, no, okay. We're making out and whatever, fooling around. And I remember dad is going ballistic, like, "Where were you? You weren't up there."

But anyway, my point being that yes, this church was -- and again, it's small-town LaGrange. That's what you did. That was the social kind of epicenter, 61:00and it was always there. And then yeah, there was a point where Eric was dating--he eventually married her--a girl that I introduced him to because I had a class with her at JCC. And she was very, very, very heavy Christian, very serious about it, and beautiful. But they started dating. I think that was kind of what triggered it. And so, I kind of followed along, purged the records, which is always a real regret. And that contributed to me quitting the Bulls. It sure did.

CN:So, let's talk about that. Because I'm going to say as the lead singer and lyric writer and front man, totally -- I mean, grew up in the Presbyterian Church, but by that time -- and the other thing worth saying is so you were born 62:00in 1965, so I'm 10 years older than you, which is a big gap. John and Charles were young guys when I met them, and they're sort of in between us. So, I just really took it for granted that everybody in that scene was a secular atheist like me.

ES:Right.

CN:I truly did, and it's something I thought through. I'm probably slightly more theistic now, but in a very agnostic way. But back then I was just -- I didn't it see, and everybody I knew was much the same way. I'm trying to think of anybody aside from my family who was very involved with the church back then. And so, my recollection -- so this led to this friction. And so how did it feel 63:00to you? How did it manifest to you? What was it that you felt uncomfortable about?

ES:Okay. In hindsight, that was only part of it. What I referenced earlier was me leaving the cult. So, you got these guys that at that time -- would I know what the motivation is? Absolutely not. Would I give it a thought what the motivation of my friends who I play in a band with that are kind of mocking this other band? They're probably a little bit jealous, just like I was of John branching out, leaving, making these new friends. Well, here's Eric playing in this other band with these guys that we were a little bit more legendary in 64:00Louisville rock, right?

CN:Hah. Yeah, right, whatever.

ES:Well, you know what I'm saying, that's a legitimate thing.

CN:But no, sure, sure, sure.

ES:Your Food and Babylon Dance Band, it's like yeah. And coming from LaGrange, it's like yeah, we didn't have that appreciation, but then I'm a little bit more familiar with it, like oh yeah, okay, I get it. And I kind of knew Your Food and it's like whatever. They were even less so, and so I've got those friends that -- you know, gentle mocking of the Bulls, not being assholes about it, but still, it's like you're getting that, you're getting a little bit of that. And it's like, "Okay, guys. What's wrong?" "I'm having -- it's fun." "Yeah, okay. You're cool now," shit like that. So, that informed it a little bit. And then when that -- it does seem like a period that was so delusional for me. I can't 65:00explain it. It's regrettable, but it just seemed like I was going along under somebody else's volition. It's like the guy that, in my estimation, he's older, and he is so cool, and he's met Andy Warhol. He went up to The Factory and--

CN:Who?

ES:Eric.

CN:Oh, I didn't know that.

ES:Because he wanted to meet Andy Warhol. He had all these adventures and it's like, "Holy shit." And now that guy is like, "Man, I'm not telling you what to do, but I really wanted to be serious about blah blah blah." It's like, "Yeah, whatever." So, I think both of those -- I have to think that because I can't imagine that even -- and it's hard for me to put myself back in that time. 66:00Because the whole thing was upsetting to me and embarrassing at a level. And I'm not sure at that time that I recognized it, that this is kind of so fucking lame, you know? It was years after that, it's like, "God, that was fucking lame. What was that all about? Let me figure this out."

And I think it just worked up into -- whatever it was that worked up, it manifested itself in like, "Yeah, I'm quitting that band," in a real weird kind of fucking way. And then I'm destroying my Birthday Party records and my Jesus and Mary Chain and going through my record collection, anything that would be perceived as anti-God or anti-Christian, getting rid of it. It's like, "Wow, 67:00that's weird. That's fucking weird." My books, getting them out of the house. Man, you need to start rethinking what you're putting in your brain. Thank God it didn't take. Eric died of cancer, Jesus, two years later, maybe.

CN:I remember, so young.

ES:And that was weird. So that was a real, real weird, weird time. That was a weird, weird time in dealing with my best friend having no tools to deal with that. At the end, ultimately it was almost like I was just pissy, like withdrawing. And so that kind of wore on me.

CN:Now, his illness hadn't manifested itself during the Bulls?

ES:No, it was post.

CN:I didn't think so. But still, that's got to be so traumatic. Well, I just wanted to say it for the record--I think I've said this to you before--this 68:00thing that you specifically said to me was it bothered you that the one song was called, "All Fucked Up." And so, I took it a little personally, because actually I thought the song was sort of written from a moral standpoint, and because it was about someone who had gone through a tragedy and was totally just not able to deal with it. And sort of trying to sympathetically get it into his head. And the thing I regret, and I think I've said this to you, is I realized when you said it, it was so outside of my experience that I know -- and I think more than once, I ribbed you about it in front of you, over the microphone, between songs, 69:00I mean indirectly to some people-- and that's just a total dick move. There's no way that I can rationalize that, "Well, yeah. But you see, what I was really getting at--" But you know, it's fine--

ES:It's funny, I disagree. My gut response to that is, "No, no you should have! Fuck, yeah. What? No, you don't let this --"

CN:Well, I don't know that you air your dirty linen in public. But I stood behind it, and I think you said sort of like, "I hate to have this song I wouldn't want to play for my parents," just because it had that word and the word was in there, I wasn't going to change the word. It's funny, people get -- 70:00I mean, I've had people I would never imagine object to a word like "goddamn" in a song. It's sort of funny. But at any rate, so -- and the thing that I perceived is the other thing you're saying. That was your group. That was the guys to whom you were joined at the hip, the guys in Bo, and Eric, and the whole thing that was there.

But I guess the other thing I'd say, even though this isn't my interview -- but it reflects of what you were saying -- I remember so vividly the atmosphere of those early Bulls practices, like you say, in the Shell station. And those early songs were named after people who lived out there-- "Sonny Love" and "Emery Varble." I think that there was something to me that was sort of very attractive and sort of interesting to try to get into it sometime. And it is funny, there 71:00are lyrics like "sinews like the tail pipes hanging from the walls." I mean, that was right there in front of me. Or "My Mustang," I guess. I think that was one of the last songs we wrote when you were in the band. But at any rate, okay. So, we've gone through that--

ES:And just my last point about it is, one of the reasons -- I mean, it's a mixed bag. I've already made that clear and I guess I'm done, we're done. "I never knew you, and if I randomly see you, I'm not going to be like 'Shit, fuck.'" But it's regrettable in that there's -- from here down to here, I wish I had those fucking seven inches and albums back -- or sorry, down here -- I wish I had those back. I really do. Thank God, my books, I think I just stuck them in the attic, and I brought them back down. But those are gone forever. To up here, 72:00it's like God, what would have happened had I stayed in the band, in the Bulls? Because in hindsight, where you have that years-long objectivity that comes from that distance, that's when it's a fair assessment to me. And it's like oh, my fair assessment is like, "God, those are great songs." That was great. The live tapes and shit, it's like, "Ah, I wonder what would happen if we had put something out." I know, I'm just saying that -- and amongst that, it's like, wow, who would I have-- what relationships would I have had had I not been that kind of cultist dickhead? Who would I have met and had interesting experiences with? Not that I have regrets of my experiences, but it definitely -- it's a handicap. It was a handicap. And it had positives. It was nurturing and it's 73:00great to be with that acceptance and have that degree of the common language and sense of humor and stuff and how that shaped me. So, I guess it's a balance. But anyway, I would point out that it was a weird time and--

CN:But that's an interesting question, what would have happened, for sure. So then, when does Bo become Lemonade Hayride?

ES:So, Bo-- we started getting some really good shows, opening up for really big 74:00bands, bigger bands --

CN:Like who? I don't remember.

ES:I remember the -- we didn't open up for them, but I remember the Violent Femmes came over. We were playing a Violent Femmes after-show party and they came over and played our instruments, and we got to play with them. And the guy that was in -- Jesus, I think he was the drummer for Public Image Ltd.

CN:Martin Atkins?

ES:Yes. He had his own band. I remember opening up--

CN:Brian Brain? Was that what it was called?

ES:Yeah, maybe that's it. And he and us -- at least I played percussion with him.

CN:That's great, that's so cool.

ES:I mean, just drunkenly he was inviting whoever. It was just like this drunken party. But just kind of that level. I mean, bigger bands. I think Gordon Gano 75:00toured maybe -- I don't know why I'm stuck on Violent Femmes. But it just seems like yes, we were getting some good slots. And I think that Glenn wanted to move on. Maybe he was going away because his job was taking him out of state or something, the guy who played bass in the Bo. So, we were faced with okay, what are we going to do? And Tim worked at Hawley-Cooke, and Rachel Grimes worked at Hawley-Cooke when she was in high school. And so, he knew Rachel, and he was like, "Well, Rachel, a friend of mine at Hawley-Cooke plays keyboards, and maybe we can do keyboards instead of bass," and it was like sure, okay. And we got together, and she clicked.

Talking to Rachel though was funny because I don't even remember it. She 76:00remembers she was very nervous, and she felt like this is-- not an interview, but it's like, "Am I going to fit in with these guys?" whatever. And she did. And so, she's kind of-- I think the songs sort of elevated. The Bo stuff was more just of kind Gun Club-y, definitely was listening to a lot of Gun Club. And pretty straightforward, I think, kind of blues-based rock and Gun Club-esque. But we kind of started doing a little bit more complex songs, maybe more R.E.M. or Let's Active kind of southern pop stuff. And Rachel's such a good musician, obviously.

And then Bob Ross, who we knew from-- he kind of hung out with Ben Daughtrey, and the Folks on Fire, that kind of contingent. Fancy Pants, I guess. He played bass. And so that's the beginnings of Lemonade Hayride. And we practiced out in 77:00LaGrange and--

CN:So, Rachel was not from LaGrange?

ES:Nuh-uh, no. She was from Louisville. Went to Collegiate and we got to -- she took us to prom with her, Don and Tim and I. That was fun. And we had started playing with the -- do you remember Led Pelvis? Did you ever see that band?

CN:I remember them. I'm trying to think. Was that somewhere in that Fancy Pants continuum?

ES:Yeah, it was. Fritz Simlick played guitar, and Tim Linn played bass and John Brunner played drums and then David [Helm]--I can't remember David's last name--sang. But they were great. They were really, really good. Simlick, Fritz, he was steeped -- I think Queen was maybe his -- the guy Brian, what's his name, from Queen? He was a big fan of his

CN:Brian May.

ES:Yeah, Brian May. So, you got this -- and the singer, definitely coming from a 78:00Zeppelin, Hendrix kind of vibe but very melodic, kind of with Tim and kind of art. But anyway, I always thought they were a great band. And so, we played with them a lot and hung out, started hanging out with them outside and stuff.

CN:Were you primarily playing at Tewligans, or--?

ES:We were playing everywhere. I remember playing at Dutch's and having to do two hour-long sets, maybe more. It was crazy. And so, I remember us learning covers to pad out the sets and -- yeah, we would play anywhere. We played at Rudyard a lot, and Tewligans. We played in Lexington. Huge Mr. Big fan. We 79:00actually did a cover of theirs and--

CN:Great version of it.

ES:They used to -- yeah, so we played at -- there's a club in Lexington that we played at least twice, I think, and I can't remember the name of it. But with Mr. Big and then Led Pelvis--

CN:Was it LMNOP, or was it--?

ES:It may be, Café LMNOP. Maybe that's what it is. But yeah, we were going to school here in town, everybody was, U of L or JCC, and so everybody was still here and -- I was actually living in LaGrange. And then near the end, Don was going to UK and coming back and forth for practices and shows, on weekends and stuff like that. And then we went through a couple of lineups -- Bob didn't work 80:00out at some point, and we kicked him out. And then a guy named Johnny Johnson, who's -- he was from Lexington. Really, really good guitarist. I knew him through my brother and kind of that scene, and he moved up here and played guitar and I switched to bass. And --

CN:So, what's your recollection of what the atmosphere would be like when you played then? Who's the crowd? What are people into and excited about? Do you have a recollection of that?

ES:Yeah. I mean, the shtick stuff kind of maintained. It streamlined. And so, it was more down, but it kind of evolved where it was sort of part of the show. And not in an obnoxious level, but -- and being judicious about it. But like the 81:00Coctails -- you remember that band from Chicago?

CN:I don't really know them, but I remember the name.

ES:You remember the name, okay. Or Fancy Pants. It was more kind of just good time, not exactly party time. But that's what I remember about the good shows. It was fun and it was-- I don't know, the crowd -- it definitely -- I remember just real, real thin. We played so much that it wouldn't maintain a crowd, and it just seemed like if it was perceived as a fun show, there would be a good crowd and it would be a fun show. But I think we did a cover of "25 or 6 to 4," 82:00the Chicago song, and stuff like that. It was kind of jokey. But when we were serious -- and I remember we played at The Vogue, and I didn't know David Pajo. I knew Slint, and I had seen them. But Pajo complimented me on specific guitar stuff, and it's like wow--

CN:That's so cool.

ES:Yeah, exactly. That's what I thought.

CN:He played drums for the Bulls once.

ES:Is that right?

CN:Right at the end, when Britt was -- Britt had become our drummer because Charles had moved to New York. And Brett couldn't do it. And Pajo practiced with us for a week, and man, he was good. He was a good drummer.

ES:Is that right? Wow.

CN:Yeah. But anyway, okay. So really-- I mean, the type of music, this is the 83:00scene that sort of comes out of punk rock, and you and I both feel this allegiance to that as our version of punk rock is what we were doing, no matter how anybody else would categorize it.

ES:Correct, it wasn't contingent on style.

CN:Right. But the variety of music being made and maybe the variety of people too has changed. I just wonder if you have any reflections on that.

ES:What do you mean?

CN:Well, I'm just thinking about -- I think this is a really interesting phase of the scene, and I'm trying to almost get a -- so we're talking like '86, '87, '88, around there. You look back on Slint and all the stuff going on that seems like this real creative flowering.

ES:Right. Generally speaking, it just seems like the crowd was a broad, not 84:00cliqueish -- but I know the individuals that would always come, and there was an association. Well, Shannon dated John, and they would come. And then she had this circle of friends, and it was like this kind of Folks on Fire, Fancy Pants kind of fun, arty, maybe dance, which is cool. And that was more of the fun times.

And it was contingent on okay, if we play with some of those bands or the Coctails or somebody like that, we would fit perfectly. It was a fun night. And it's like okay, so we're doing whatever, Nipsey Russell, and our songs that were much more -- it was pop, it was nothing even remotely like oh, let's get some people to dance. And sometimes they would, but our covers were kind of funny, with the Steve Miller "Big ol' Jet Airliner" and stuff like that and people 85:00would respond--

CN:Oh man, that must have just -- the first time you heard that, that must have really knocked your socks off. I can literally put myself in the position of hearing you do that--

ES:And people -- that's kind of what they responded to. And it seems like they would abide the other stuff that was more-- a little bit more layered and true to what I'm filtering out, what I'm writing, I'm listening to, and here it comes. It's Echo and the Bunnymen or whatever. Mostly it always felt like well, it's not necessarily stuff that -- like this isn't what people are listening to or whatever. So, when I see other bands or whatever, I'm not hearing what we're 86:00doing. There's a little bit of it, like Mr. Big, I always felt more of a musical kinship with them. Like what Greg wrote and Sean and the way they put together songs and what they culled from. And then we had -- but there was another aspect where we were opening up for Low, maybe, or some other bands.

CN:I don't know that band.

ES:Low, the Minnesota Band, Low.

CN:Uh-huh. I mean, I've heard the name.

ES:They're kind of a more somber, kind of serious. And Miracle Legion.

CN:OK, sure.

ES:So, big touring bands that were there, and it's like, "Well, this is kind of serious, whatever." It's not kind of party time.

CN:It's just us Louisvillians here.

ES:Yeah. And we recorded -- that's where it kind of started. Stuff happened that was -- it wasn't the goal. The goal was that we were all friends. And we did fanzine and then well, we're doing music. It's an extension of that friendship and how we're hanging out and what we're doing. So, anything that came from that was more kind of a surprise, or there was no goal, there wasn't any long run, it was just like, "Okay, we have practice next week." Okay great. Well, Johnny's 88:00not working out, I want to move back to guitar, and Rachel, she can play bass. And so, we recorded with Mitch Easter, right. Went down there and did four songs, and just as an experience, that was awesome. So, I'll always have that.

CN:Talk about that.

ES:Just what a great guy -- I mean, I was a huge Let's Active fan and big R.E.M. fan and -- you know, as a producer. And it's like I'm a Mitch Easter fan. From interviews and stuff like that, I saw the sense of humor, smart guy, whatever. And so, it was kind of a big deal. When in fact, it was like well, yeah, shit, he's just like anybody else, like Albini. Yeah, he'll record you because that's what he does for a living. You pay him and he'll record you. Same thing. Got the studio, that what's I do. But we went down and recorded I think four songs with him. I think so, yeah. And because we had the money and recorded a mix and just 89:00stayed down there -- and it was great, it was--

CN:So how many days were you there?

ES:I think three, three days. Over the course of Friday through a weekend, maybe. But as a host, he was great. I think we slept at the studio, and it was set up like you could do that. And I think -- I can't remember now, but I remember his dogs being in there and him leaving for a long period of time and us taking pictures at the board, just whatever, stupid kid stuff. But it was just a great experience. It was--

CN:And you were pleased with what you --

ES:Yeah, yeah. Yes, yes, definitely. Bob Ross was in the band. That was the 90:00first lineup. And I was going to England for school. And so, I had this, and one of the things I wanted to do was I wanted to go visit the offices of the record labels I really liked, like Creation and 53rd & 3rd Street, the Scottish label. And so, the cities that I was in, studying, I had this Mitch Easter tape, and I had the packet, whatever, the press kit. But more so, I just wanted to get in, just kind of check it out, like oh, this is cool, and maybe meet whoever behind the label.

And so, I went, the guy from the Pastels had this label -- and I think they're in Edinburgh, but -- and that's who I wanted to meet, Stephen Pastel. And I go in, and it's in this kind of building. Every room is sort of a different thing. It's a different label or people in there packing records. It was very cool. But 91:00he wasn't there. And the guy that stopped me was like, "I can give him a message," or whatever. It's like oh, I just had this tape, and he's like, "Oh, what tape is that?" And he's like, "I have a label." It's like, "I'd love to. Can you leave that with me?" And it's like sure, and so that steamrolled, that's how the record came out, on the Scottish label from -- his name was Brian Guthrie, he's a brother of Robin Guthrie from the Cocteau Twins.

And it's just funny. Okay, so recording with Mitch Easter and then this sort of anomaly happened. And I end up talking to Robin Guthrie and Liz from the Cocteau Twins who were visit-, we're having Sunday dinner at Brian's house. It's little things like that mean so much. That's so cool. It's cool for me. He was really cool to talk to. Anyway, just him making fun of his brother, he's like, "Oh, 92:00he's a gangster. You'll never have an album out," with a Scottish accent. He's like, "Did you pay anything?" I'm like, "No." He's like, "Don't pay him anything." Yeah, whatever.

There's things throughout that time that, looking back, it's so weird. That, going over and getting that thing happening. And then I remember Eric Day and I, we would go to Chicago to see bands. We went up to see The Smiths, Echo and the Bunnymen, and stuff that, and just running into Morrissey on the sidewalk, or the guy, the bassist from the Smiths or Echo and the Bunnymen's riding his bike in the park and getting pictures with him. Just odd little things like that, running into people. And just seemed like that kind of started happening in Lemonade Hayride to a certain extent-- things happening that led to other 93:00things. And none of it was thought out. It's just this is a cool aspect of the band, which carried over to Hula Hoop. I guess that's what I'm setting up, because that record came out, finally, and it was predominantly available over there.

And I became friends with these guys who were big fans of that who wrote to me, who turned out to be in these bands--a band called Hood and a band called Boyracer. And Stewart from Boyracer is still one of my best friends. And that just opened a whole door when Hula Hoop started. We had that relationship established because it was at the tail end of Lemonade Hayride. The same thing 94:00kind of happened, of really cool things that were just kind of icing on the cake. Because what was fulfilling about the band was being in a band with your friends, very good friends. It wasn't being in a band for the sake of being in a band and just playing.

And Lemonade Hayride ended because Tim had met the girl who he eventually married. And Don was kind of serious with his girlfriend. And so, Tim I remember stopped writing lyrics at a certain point, just not into it. So, I was writing the music and the lyrics and kind of maybe trying to keep the band going. God knows, that's my perspective. And so, Rachel, I remember booking a tour, which 95:00would have been disastrous, for sure. But the work involved before Internet of setting up shows and shit on the phone in Minnesota or whatever, this is a little weeklong thing. And I had it set, and the guys weren't really saying anything, and at the point where it's like, "Okay, here's these shows. These are all confirmed." And it's like, "What? Why are we doing this?" and kind of like -- and I guess it just -- it hurt it. It's like, "Fuck, all right."

CN:For sure, you've gone through all that trouble. And you got excited about it, right?

ES:Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely, totally excited just for the sake the experience of going out and touring. And it's like, "No." And they're rationally saying nobody's heard of us. Nobody's heard this record. I was like, "No, no, I'm sending it to the radio station." Yeah, totally-- stupid. But I'm a 96:00Pollyanna. And so that was it. And Rachel kind of-- she was on my side, I guess. Or she was into it. Like it doesn't matter, it's like, "Yeah, yeah. That'd be fun. Let's go touring." And it just kind of fizzled out. Okay, I'm not motivated to write the lyrics and the music and everything else. And so, we just kind of stopped. And there was no acrimony, but it was just like -- and I was working with Chuck at Lily's, who's the guitarist for--

CN:Chuck--?

ES:Geisler.

CN:Geisler, yeah.

ES:And he would always say he's never met a stranger kind of dude. He found out I played music, he's like, "Oh, man. I play music too," like, "Yeah, yeah, right. That's cool. That's neat." And eventually it was kind of like Hayride wasn't doing anything, he's like, "Man, we should get together." I was like, "Okay, sure." It's like, "Wait a second. No, these are really good." And we started playing and it was some of the songs that Hayride, near the end, had done. And I remember we recorded at the station some of those songs.

CN:The station?

ES:At the service station. And so, I had a bunch of songs that really we didn't even play enough to develop them. That's kind of what we started with in Hula 98:00Hoop. And he was good friends with Stephen Jones, who played drums, and I obviously was good friends with Rachel. And so had the bassist and the drummer, and then that's how Hula Hoop started.

CN:So, Rachel's playing bass?

ES:Yeah, Rachel's begun playing bass in Hayride near the end, where it went back to a four-piece. I was on guitar, she was on bass, and Tim sang, and Don played drums. And so, when we started getting together with Stephen and Chuck, that was the lineup. But Chuck and I got together for a long time, just in my apartment for several weeks, it seems like. I think a couple of months, maybe, of working up the songs just between us on guitar. And he had some, and he would sing, and I had mine. And then we started getting it together and I met Stephen and really clicked. It felt really good, it was very comfortable. I liked hanging out with these people. And that's what it turned into. We'd practice and Stephen had a boat. We'd go in on the river after practice. So, it was Rachel 99:00making cookies for everybody and just hanging out. It was fun. It was a lot of fun.

So, I feel fortunate in that -- that that kind of -- there was no design or goals or anything. We're going to do this and then we're going to do that. It's just kind of let's play some shows, and now, okay, we have enough money, let's record and--

CN:So, what do you think is the difference between those two bands?

ES:The difference is that it was predicate -- Hayride and Bo, that whole period, 100:00it's predicated on that tight-knit sort of -- I keep saying "cult," but there's got to be a better word for it.

CN:I think "gang" is fair.

ES:Yeah, gang. Growing up and the focus wasn't necessarily the music, it was just another thing, like the fanzine and hanging out and so on, so forth. We got the music and okay, we got this shtick going on. And so, it was kind of spread out and predicated on that kind of intense secret language or in-jokes and 101:00everything. There was focus on that. And so, getting together with Stephen and Chuck, it pared down, it kind of -- all that stuff went to the wayside, and it was solely what -- what I think was really gratifying and fulfilling in that it was just fun hanging out. It was reliable, solid people hanging out, and the focus on the songs. And I think also it came at a time where-- by that time, I think the songwriting was continually getting better. And having Chuck, having that level of contribution to the songs--Rachel doing her bass lines and Stephen, very competent. Not that Don and Tim weren't competent, but it's just the musicianship was a step up. And creativity, maybe. It was kind of spread 102:00out. It wasn't just me writing the songs and then somebody writing the lyrics. It was a little bit more fluid or more relaxed, I guess. And their influences were a little bit broader, which I think worked to our advantage.

CN:So, it seemed to me -- if I were going to say an "Eric Stoess sound," it 103:00seems to me you like poppy songs but with a pretty sharp guitar sound in them. I mean, it's never going to sound like a Tommy Roe song or something. And was that there in Hayride as well, or--?

ES:Yeah, it was. It really was, yes. Particularly -- even in Bo, I'm always drawn to a distorted guitar. And I like clean kind of jangle. But near the end of Hayride, it was the stuff that wasn't recorded or that we didn't play those near the end that I kind of finished up and stuff. It's sonically pretty much more like Hula Hoop in that sonically more interesting, maybe, or more noisy and 104:00a little bit more muscle in it. And yeah, I definitely-- I played through an Orange amp 212 and I played a Les Paul, and Chuck always had a Fender. And that was interesting. I think that that was neat, the sonic -- the actual sound of the band and what we played and the--

CN:How would you characterize it?

ES:I think it's pretty open. It worked well in that Chuck's songs, he played generally rhythm and sang, and mine I played rhythm and sang. I'm not a great guitarist and Chuck's a really good guitarist. But I think that I'm creative. 105:00And what I enjoy doing is the sonic aspect of it. And so, when I'm playing it's more of a foundation, I think, in kind of a simple platform. And then Chuck would do something very interesting and pretty. There's some pop sensibility in it. And the bands that we were listening to kind of had that. I mean, Stereolab and Sonic Youth and everything -- it's across the board. He was a big NRBQ fan. And it was just a good mix. I mean, my sound, I definitely like a open, distorted-- I don't know. But definitely, always with the pop foundation, I guess, a melodic foundation.

CN:I want to go back to the Lemonade Hayride record for just a second. It seems very odd to me in a way that you -- and I realize it was you ended up with one out of a whole assortment, but this is sort of a focus that I know you had. What was it, do you think, about saying, "I want to get on one of these UK labels," when, like you said, back here in Louisville it'd be hard to get a hold of?

ES:Here's an important thing to consider is I actually didn't think there's a chance in hell anybody's going to put it out. I really didn't, over there. What I wanted to do was contact and I really wanted just an excuse to go in. And in my head, "Well, you can just go fucking visit. You didn't need to bring something." But on the outside chance somebody wanted to put it out. And I 107:00visited Sarah Records and they sent a nice reject letter, and that's cool. But it never even -- it didn't even occur to -- that wouldn't even have occurred to me, like, "Oh, if it comes out over there, it's not going to be really available here." I just assumed nobody would buy it anyway. I mean, we put it on a cassette here and sold them.

CN:So it's that same--

ES:It's the same record that --

CN:-- with "The Proposal" and--

ES:Yeah, yeah, exactly. Right, right. And yeah, we definitely had product here, but it wasn't -- I guess we just sold them at ear X-tacy, just put them in record stores and stuff. And God knows if he sold -- I don't know. I have no idea. But it was cool enough that these kids who were eating up a lot of American music got it, and thankfully it got us over there. We toured a couple 108:00of times and--

CN:So, you toured in the UK?

ES:Yes. Hula Hoop did.

CN:Okay, that's great.

ES:Yeah, yeah. That was great.

CN:I'm envious of that, for sure.

ES:Well, we did it. We did two Peel Sessions, which paid for it.

CN:You get paid for a Peel Session?

ES:Yeah, absolutely, man. It's government, BBC.

CN:How nice. Oh, man. It's not just the prestige.

ES:No, no. And you get paid by the minute.

CN:You should say this is John Peel, the famous British DJ.

ES:You get paid more for longer songs. And so, we didn't know that the first time. We figured it out and so the second time we went over, every song had this big rock ending that carried out. It was ridiculous, but for sure we were adding -- "It would be worthwhile, guys, if we can add 30 seconds to the four songs across the board. This is this many hundreds." And it's like, "Yeah, okay. Do it."

CN:That's great. So, these tours were when?

ES:'92 and '93. Okay, so John-- do you need me to start on the Hula Hoop trajectory, how that kind of--?

CN:Sure, yeah.

ES:So, we started playing out and playing a lot of that kind of poppy Hayride. And it started to kind of morphed into what Chuck and I and everybody's more of 109:00an influence, which was-- Jon Cook put out the first single. And that was distributed in England. And Peel, I guess, I don't think he himself goes to buy them, but he has somebody that buys records that goes down to the shop or whatever and buys them. So, they bought that record. He played it on his show and was very favorable about it. Stewart and Richard and all those guys who listened to Peel every week, whatever, heard that, and they had already -- I'd send them cassettes of the stuff and we were exchanging cassettes and stuff, so 110:00they knew -- they called.

CN:This is Stewart in Boyracer?

ES:Yeah, right, those guys. And so, they called immediately, like, "Man, Peel played your single on his show." I was like, "Holy shit." And I wanted to get -- it's like, "Did you make a tape of it?" They're like, "No." I wanted to get a copy of it. So, I called the BBC to see if I could get a copy of it, and the woman who answers is like, "Hold on," and she puts me through to Peel himself. And he was like, "No, we're not set up to do that," and he started asking about the band. He's like, "Well, are you all coming over here to tour?" And of course I was like, "Oh yeah, yeah, we're coming over later in the year." He's like, "You should stop by the studio. I'd love to do a session."

CN:That's so great.

ES:It's like, right on. And so it's like, "Hey guys, what about going over there?" And Boyracer were on -- Hood weren't a big -- they weren't that big. 111:00Boyracer though was on Sarah Records, which was a pretty big indie label over there. And so, they had a name and they were getting big about the same time. And so they were able to set up a tour, and we went over and played with them. It just worked out.

CN:So how long was the tour?

ES:I think two weeks. It wasn't every night or anything, but I think we were over there two weeks.

CN:What kind of reception did you get?

ES:It was polite. We were playing in pubs and stuff like that. So, it's kind of contingent on those guys, people who come that wanted to see them. And they're very polite and reserved. I remember that. Attentive and clapped and-- and we sold some t-shirts and stuff.

CN:Compare and contrast to playing in Louisville.

ES:My God, an apples-to-apples show where you got a lot of people showing up at Tewligans tonight and much more -- I mean, much more raucous, much more banter, much more--

CN:Which is more raucous, Tewligans?

ES:Yeah, absolutely. A lot sweatier. I remember my favorite shows in Louisville at Tewligans, it would end up -- Jason Noble and Jeff Mueller dancing on stage. If we played with Rodan or something. It was just good vibe. And I remember 113:00opening up for Evergreen, a show where Sean came out in a devil costume. There was a level of excitement and sort of anticipation and drunkenness. They were-- very rowdy and just -- it may have been different in that if Pavement or somebody drawing that kind of crowds, may be different. But even on the decent -- the room is a small room but it's packed, and the dude from the Pale Saints, or people that I knew, bands that's, "Holy shit, that's so and so," they're there, it's just like everybody's clapping and paying attention. We're a rock 114:00band, it's like wow, okay, that's not--

CN:That's weird, especially when they're actually, like you say, being attentive. That's odd.

ES:Yeah, no. They're enthusiastic between songs. There was a show that we played with this Australian band. We played a couple shows with them and Boyracer, and those were rowdier for some reason. And maybe it's because the Australians were drunk and rowdier--

[OFF MIC CONVERSATION]

CN:So where were we?

ES:Talking about playing in England and--

CN:And you said the Australians, it was a little wilder with the Australians.

ES:Oh yeah, sorry, sorry. We were comparing and contrasting the audiences. Yeah. It was just more reserved. And none of our friends were there, but yeah. 115:00It was the perception also that, well, if you were from America and we're touring over there, then it's somebody. And that was weird. That definitely -- for us it's like, "Oh no, we're not -- trust me. No, we play lots of shows where nobody fucking comes." So that was weird, that was really weird. You can tell, "Wow, why are you even nervous? What? Okay." "No, we're nobodies." So yeah, we did that, and then -- it's weird in that these were just neat things that happened that were special to me. It's cool. People who know John Peel, 116:00definitely, so they know it's cool.

And that's neat. But ultimately, that was just so -- I was such a fan of his for so long, and I love The Fall. And he loves The Fall, and it's like that association and just all the bands that I know of kind of relative to Peel--not that I got to listen to it--but it just seeing -- whatever, his stuff referenced, see him referenced. And actually to get a Peel Session. And then you come back and -- it's not that that was something that -- thankfully it's not coming back and like, "Oh, we're huge in Belgium. We're somebody. We got a Peel 117:00session." That was so 180 degrees of what we would mock, we would totally -- like to somebody who did that, that would be called oh my God, like eye-rolling, like, "Yeah, great. Did you do the Peel Session? Awesome, that's cool. So, you're somebody."

So, it was just special to us. And it wasn't for a purpose, it wasn't a tool to come back like hey, try and get a record deal. That kind of bullshit would make my skin crawl, or ours. And so, we come back and it's like, "Okay, that was great. Now what are we doing? Well, we're going to play this show," and nobody comes. Then we're going to play this show, it's like, hey, good crowd. It's just the normal stuff.

CN:So, you didn't feel -- there's this great experience that's like a significant experience that somehow seems it's leading upward, and yet your 118:00experience of it is--

ES:Sorry, it's not. No, I don't think that it would ever be interpreted as leading upward. It was just like -- no, no.

CN:OK, I see. I put my own thing on it.

ES:No, no I hear you. It's more of like, "That was great, and I wonder what the next experience is going to be." John put this 7-inch out, that was awesome. It's like God, that's so cool. That is so fulfilling. That's why I'm in a band, part of it is like we've got the 7-inch. It doesn't matter if it sells, really. Hopefully he made his money back, I guess he did, but then we just start -- we just put out a lot of records. We had a lot of 7-inches out. There was a label over there that put the first record out. That was in England. And then we did a 119:00cassette here of that record. And then the next year we went back and did another Peel Session and another tour.

And it was awesome. It was just disaster -- the second one wasn't disastrous, but I remember reading a comment or some quote by Thurston Moore, something talking about everybody's first tour should be disastrous. And he was referencing Redd Kross' first tour, which was -- just reciting all these first tour horror stories. And this wasn't our first one, but it was so interesting. We actually had a van.

Boyracer's manager was a guy who was a tour manager for the Swans and tour manager for all these bands and one of those guys who had a lot of stories, he used to be a male prostitute. He was one of the grossest, grossest dudes I've ever met. Very, very funny but very interesting. And yeah, we were driving 120:00around the country in this van. The floorboards were rusted out so the exhaust would come in. It's poor Rachel with three, six, seven guys in this little tiny Ford van. It would just constantly break down.

I remember nobody could get -- only Chuck and I, it was always like can you guys -- nobody else could work on it. And I guess I knew we both knew something about engines, and we would get it going again. But we were in France and-- just so many little instances. They couldn't get it started, and we were staying with some friends of theirs in Paris. And couldn't get it started next morning, some dude's walking down the sidewalk. It was a Sunday morning; he had a nice white shirt on and he's looking. And we don't speak French and the guys were talking, and he just got in the engine, he's working on it, got it started. Just stuff like that was cool.

And playing for these farmers in France, like this bar, the farmers would come 121:00in with their rubber boots and stuff, for whatever reason. That was a great experience, to be able to travel around and be near an emotional breakdown at the end. I have it on video where it finally gave up the ghost and we're getting towed back to home base and everybody's just shut down. You can see it, it's just, "I just want a hot bath."

CN:I didn't realize that -- when you said a tour, I thought it was just in England. But it was in Europe as well?

ES:The first one was just in England and Scotland. And then the second one was, yeah, we went -- we played in France and Belgium and England. It was short. It was not a lot of shows.

CN:That's so cool.

ES:And again -- we played, the show in Belgium was huge. It was in this airplane hangar. They weren't there to see us, but it was packed. They would have rock bands and then it was a disco after the -- that's where most of the kids were there for that. But it was great. It was hilarious. We were playing to a very large crowd, and they were a little bit rowdier. And the Mafioso guys we had to chase down the next day to get them to pay, it was super weird and just kind of fun.

And it's all small scale. It was just a few shows. And it was just special. And we played -- here we got to play at CBGB and Brownies in New York. And we toured with a band called the Dambuilders, which were really nice guys. Just three or four shows, I think.

CN:So, at this point, what are you doing? I'm assuming that Hula Hoop was not your source of income?ES:No, no, working at a restaurant. I was working at Jack Fry's and Chuck was working at Lily's and Steven was doing that pizza, that bar that -- Anthony's by the bridge. He was managing that.

CN:So, then Hula Hoop lasted how long?

ES:That's a good question. Rachel left to join Rachel's full time. She was playing in both bands for a while. And then we continued on I think until '95 or '96. I think, yeah. A friend of mine -- there's some bar in Cleveland that just closed down, and it has been around forever. It was very important to that city. 124:00And a friend of mine who put a single out that lives in Cleveland sent me a thing saying, "I think you all's last show was here." And it was '96 or '97.

CN:Okay. All right. So then did you do music? I know you have done music after that, but did you do music immediately after that, or--?

ES:No, no. We just stopped getting together, it just, it was -- I was married. Well, we all were married. And I think it was just kind of music wasn't really that important right then. And then Stewart and I, we always have done music and 125:00exchanged stuff through the mail when he lived over there. He lives in Arizona now. And we've released a lot of stuff. And that's what kind of came next, I guess, after Hula Hoop. Because I could just continue with that, with recording with him and releasing stuff. And then we went over and toured in England.

CN:When was that?

ES:Late '90s, I think. '98, '99.

CN:Yeah, so I heard that you were in Arizona some part of the time and that's -- yeah.

ES:He and his wife ran a ranch for her father, who's an artist. James Turrell. Do you know the guy?

CN:I don't. I saw something about it, that's he's some pretty big deal out there.

ES:He owns so much property because his legacy project is a dead volcano. It's a 126:00lifelong project that he's done all kinds of stuff inside, it's really wild. But on that much property you have to be a working cattle ranch. And so, Stewart and his wife, Jen, ran the ranch until just -- I think he's buying them out this year. Though yeah, I went out there and would visit them and we'd go out. They're out in the desert and we go out in the bunkhouse under solar power and record. It's fun.

CN:That's cool. This is great in terms of your biography. Let me see. Is there anything else I wanted? One thing I was just looking up was mainly looking for 127:00sound clips to listen to. But I saw that there's an interview with you in Never Nervous. And you were saying -- I think this was about Hula Hoop. Maybe it was about Lemonade Hayride. You said, "I feel like we were looking toward New Zealand and Scotland rather than Chicago or DC musically and aesthetically." Tell me what you mean about that.

ES:Yeah. That kind of was both, but I think I was talking about Hula Hoop. The bands that I really like -- a lot of the bands that I really like were out of New Zealand. The Verlaines is one of my favorite bands, and the Flying Nun label. So, most of -- the Bats, The Clean-- that I just listened to so much of 128:00that. And then Postcard Records back in -- well before Hula Hoop, with the Go-Betweens and Orange Juice and Josef K, that was a huge influence, those bands and that label. And it's the aesthetic of that label.

CN:Which you describe as--?

ES:Foppish guys who are punk rock, like Edwyn Collins. And doing their thing and with an eye towards -- kind of patterned it off of Warhol and the Factory, the Velvets, but influenced by Creedence and not pretentious at all in doing their thing. And culling from disco and soul and Creedence, and Velvets, and all over 129:00the place and just putting it out. And it's just there was something so cool about that label and those guys and the music that was Josef K, Go-Betweens, Orange Juice. And not just the music but the -- I just thought everybody, that those bands were so cool. And so kind of the same thing with the Flying Nun bands. It just seems like it's such a small community and they all know each other. And there's another label from New Zealand called Xpressway, and it's a little bit more noisy experimental stuff.

But yeah. And Hula Hoop I always felt like that, that the Louisville sound maybe -- I mean the cliché of -- I guess the stereotype of the Louisville sound, it 130:00seems like it's associated with Chicago, which I don't buy. Because to me, if you say the "Louisville sound," it's like well, the Louisville sound is so disparate. My favorite bands, it's going back to the Babs, King Kong, Mr. Big, Drinking Woman, Will Oldham. It's like there is no real sound other than it's so creative and so different. And so, I was never drawn necessarily -- and maybe I didn't give them a chance. I mean, I love Rodan and Slint too, and to me they're different. But there's so many bands that I hear that I can kind of -- well, they could be on-- there's a Chicago or --

CN:Touch and Go.

ES:Yeah, kind of Touch and Go or DC. It's just something I've never been drawn 131:00to. And I didn't -- I had an appreciation for it, it's like yeah, Jesus Lizard, okay. But it's not something that influenced me or that I'm real drawn to. Or Big Black. And I definitely listened to a lot of Dischord stuff, but it didn't take -- even when I was that age, when I was the age of John, John definitely dug a lot of that real hardcore stuff, or just the Dischord stuff. It never--

CN:Right. That was never your thing.

ES:So that's what I meant, that I think that-- I don't know actually what my point was other than it wasn't important. I just liked writing music and playing 132:00it. And it wasn't important if a lot of people came out or they didn't. And we were fortunate that we had good friends like Jon Cook that really liked the band and keyed in on kind of what we were doing and had a little bit more maybe broader taste. And that was cool. But we were never going to pull in hundreds of people in the city, just because I don't -- for whatever reason, it's just -- and it wasn't important that that happened. And that's fine.

CN:Something else I just wanted to ask you, because I think she's such an interesting figure. You talked about her a lot, but I wonder if you could tell me a little bit more about Rachel. She's such an interesting figure.

ES:The working man's Meryl Streep. Fuck, Rachel. She is-- God, I've known her since high school, which is weird. I knew her. So, she's younger and it was just always the little sister kind of vibe. She's a great musician, obviously, and very funny, very smart and kind of the warrior of the band. But the thing that was great, she rolls with the punches. It's funny to me. A friend of mine was 134:00talking about Rachel and saw her at the memorial and was -- I guess a common connotation is like oh, Rachel's a -- fuck, I don't know. She's not going to get her hands dirty or -- it's very-- up here. It's like oh no, no, no. What? No.

CN:She was in the van that's leaking carbon dioxide and--

ES:Oh yeah. And I mean, living on the farm. They've lived forever, she and Alec, in the log cabin with no whatever while they were getting there. She's very tough and--

CN:Well, just thinking -- I mean, it's interesting that the music that you made with her is so different from the music that she's known for. But maybe there 135:00are commonalities that you see that are below the surface.

ES:Well, I don't know about commonalities. I'm not sure. I think they're two different things. I think she liked a lot of the stuff that we were listening to back in the Lemonade Hayride stuff. She's listening -- she can listen to The Fall or whatever and appreciate it, and so she was right there. And then in Hula Hoop, for sure, she got it. We were all in sync, and so what we're pulling from musically is right in a big bowl. Jones is the classic Aerosmith, classic Sabbath kind of -- that guy. I don't know if we were listening to that. But her 136:00heart and what her forte is is definitely on the Rachel's, more of the classical and the -- what she's doing now.

I think that's always been. It's just that there was room maybe in her life creatively to play pop and rock and punk. She had a lot of friends in those bands, in Crain. And we were friends with those bands and those guys. And I just think at a certain point, she followed what her forte is, what she's into.

CN:I just wondered if you--

ES:I'm not sure about commonality though. I--

CN:Sure. Well, if there's not, there's not.

ES:I don't think there is. I don't think there is. I think it's a different animal and just intrinsically more fulfilling to her, which is what she's all about.

CN:Okay, that makes sense. Anything else about any of your contemporaries, anybody else? You've talked about people as we've gone along, like Mr. Big or Fancy Pants or whoever. Is there anybody else who you think is worth saying a few words about?

ES:Oh, man. I forget just how great Evergreen are. They just are so good, or were so good. It was one of those bands -- I always kind of think of it in magic 138:00terms. King Kong, for me, you guys, Mr. Big, there's something that for me, what it means to me and my ear, it's elevated. It's not relative to Louisville. This isn't good -- "Oh, this is a great Louisville band." Well, this is a great band. It doesn't matter where they are. I love this song. I love this music. And Evergreen were right there. And I only thought of it because Britt had some DVDs of live shows, and I was copying those. And it's been forever since I've listened to them, really, or seen them, and it's like--

CN:I don't know that band hardly at all.

ES:It was the period where -- there was a period -- and most of the songs on the 139:00one record that came out in a single. It's just wow, what a -- I'm glad that was captured in Louisville. And otherwise -- and God, I know I'm drawing a blank. Those are just the people off the top of my head. But it seems like in Louisville, there's always good bands, solid bands. It's just they're hitting a level. Rarely do I remember seeing a band like, "God, they suck," from Louisville. It may be a band the worst I could say is, "Fuck, I'm not into it at all." Unless there's some real assholes. But for me, it's just, "Okay, that's a Louisville band."

And it's not sound-wise. It's like okay, yeah, they're nice guys and okay. But 140:00you throw it on or whatever, and I have no reference point, it's like, "Yeah, no. I'm not into it." It's just there's so many of those bands, and it makes the bands that I think are just really special. I mean, Slint obviously and just the one-off band. And Drinking Woman, I've always liked them. And I love that a lot of people are still putting out stuff. I just don't hear it. I don't listen to it. I don't pursue it.

CN:I got out of it, so. This isn't about me. But anyway, I don't know if there's anything else you want to add or something you think we didn't touch on?

ES:I wish I had a better memory. I wish I could convey it. I feel like it's -- I don't have such a good memory for what the scene was like. And I told you when you said there's that mid to late '80s that -- it's like God, to even put myself back, like what bands or -- was that Poor Girls were around then?

CN:I guess.

ES:Exploding Veils. Is that later? I can't--

CN:I forget them, but--

ES:And then there's the band Nitrous. I remember it was Ed, the guy who had the record store on Bardstown Road--

CN:Ed Lutz?

ES:Ed Lutz, yeah, his band. Or he was in that band and I just remember one-off singles. That was a great record-- yeah, I don't know. I don't know anything.

CN:All right. I'm going to--

This is Chip Nold. Eric Stoess, still at my house on October 13, 2016, had a thought that he wanted to add about distinction between Hula Hoop and Lemonade Hayride.

ES:Yes. Chip just said something talking about how special it was and how there's a similarity in the gang mentality. You and Tim were in third grade together, right? So, you had that bond, and that's special, but one of the distinctions when you ask me the difference between Hula Hoop and Lemonade Hayride, Hula Hoop was -- I think it was it was pure in that it was predicated 143:00on if we weren't friends and didn't like hanging out, generally, the band wouldn't have continued.

It was all positive. I can't think of anything negative to come out of that time. Stephen Jones is still one of my best friends. And I count him on one hand. And I love seeing Chuck, and Rachel is still one of my best friends. I can call them, and we still have whatever. And I see Stephen all the time.

And in Hayride, it was so intense, and it was limiting, to a certain degree. I think it was because of the age and because of location. Being raised in a small town and maybe it took longer to break out of that, and it was so constraining. And it was kind of like the church. It wasn't until I got out in the world and 144:00kind of was able to process and evaluate objectively -- yeah, they would make fun of this, but that's on them. This is kind of cool and I like it. And there's nothing wrong with that. And so, the main difference was in Hula Hoop there were no constrictions like that. It was just whether we were hanging out and going antiquing, or going thrift shopping, or playing music. It was fulfilling, and so anything that came on top of that--the Peel Sessions or touring or records or anything--was kind of icing on the cake. There was never, never once some, "We're going to go for this." The fulfillment came from writing and playing music together. Anyway, that was the distinction I want to make between the two bands.

CN:Great./AT/es