The Zombie Bar Crawl

This chai tea came from a little drive-thru coffee shack in the parking lot of a grocery store in Fargo, North Dakota. It is delicious. So was the peanut butter and jelly for breakfast. And more apples for the van.

There is some snow on the ground out here and a light dusting was coming down when we woke up at the hotel. We played the usual game of pushing how long we can possibly stay past check-out. One p.m. today.

It’s been a good weekend overall. Had a good show in Chicago and then one in Minneapolis that I won’t forget any time soon:

On Saturday night they were doing an annual “Zombie Bar Crawl.” I drove seven hours from Chicago right to the venue and right smack dab into the middle of 4,000 people dressed like zombies in the streets. And not just dressed like zombies, they were in character, limping and clawing along, dripping blood and shouting out “brains!”. And drinking heavily.

We loaded into the club, which was completely filled with smoke from a fog machine and packed wall-to-wall with zombies. One guy with fake blood all over his face asked me if I was with the band.

“Yes.”

“What kind of music do you play?” He had to shout. It was LOUD in there.

“Well, we do a bit of everything.”

“We gonna hear some Snoop tonight??”

“No.”

“Well, then you don’t play everything, do you?”

I walked away. Smarmy zombie. We had a load-in to finish. This was not good.

I’ve alluded to this before and I’ve been wanting to further articulate it: It can be fun to throw a dance party. And part of us coming up in the clubs and the jam-band world has requried that. Especially on a Friday and Saturday night. People want you to get them going! And we can do that, and I understand the desire. But more than making people physically move, I want to be LISTENED to. People can tilt and spin and hoot and holler, but seismic activity comes from the inside. I don’t feel as comfortable as a shouter or a funk guitarist. I want the words to hit home. It’s hard for them to do that when they aren’t really being heard.

So how am I going to sing “How Many Times?” to a room full of drunken zombies? I’m not, that’s how. We’re going to have to throw a dance party and that’s cool, we’ll have fun. (We HAVE to have fun with this one. Otherwise, why are we here?). It’ll be a jouyously loud, trainwreck of a night.

Compounding my apprehension was the fact that there were some people clearly there for us. A few dozen maybe. These folks were the real reason we were there and no doubt some of them had seen me open for Martin Sexton at the pristine Fitzgerald Theater, or saw the whole band play at the Cedar Cultural Center six months ago. I could only imagine what they were thinking as a hundred zombies chanted:

“What do we want?”

“Brains!!”

“When do we want it?”

“Brains!!”

So we took the stage and tried to hit hard. In a room like that, if you don’t grab some attention early on, you may lose the whole thing. So we did a bunch of upbeat stuff, some covers. Played “Spooky,” which I used to do years ago, “A Way with Women,” etc.

The room held. The zombies were getting into it. And then we did “Thriller.” Had to, right? Played it right into “She Blinded Me with Science.”. Take that zombies! We had the room and here was the miraculous part:

Our people stayed. They were all still in the front, still very attentive. I think we mixed it up enough to keep everyone interested. (You can dance to “Draw the Line” but there’s also a lot going on there lyrically, I think.) But more credit goes to the audience here. These people were patient and great.

In fact, for a wonderful blog from a fan’s perspective on this night, check out Scott Carpenter’s “Moving to Freedom” entry: http://www.movingtofreedom.org/2009/10/11/ryan-montbleau-band-plays-to-zombie-pub-crawl-in-minneapolis/

When we did “Inspired by No One” the whole room seemed to lock in. The living and the dead, all together in peace and fake blood and harmony!

When a zombie kept shouting out for “Chariot,” that was the highlight for me. I played it wholeheartedly.

We encored with “How Many Times?”

Then we did “Electric Avenue” and zombies playfully attacked the stage.

So a night I was sure would be a loud disaster ended up an enthralling success.

Cut to the next night:

For a Sunday in Fargo, North Dakota, and our first time there with the band, attendance was predictably light. But the 30 or so people in the small dark club were certainly locked in and ready to listen. On a night like this, it makes all the difference in the world that people just plain care. Could be 3 or 3,000, the point is, someone’s listening and into it. We played Variety, Quickie, Love and Love Lost, My Best Guess, Duncan. Small crowd, but again, quiet and listening and it was all about the SONGS, the words, the subtleties that the band could lay in there. In this setting, the band that had played Thriller 24-hours ago would’ve seemed a tad ridiculous.

But that was us, both nights. And the weirdest thing is that both nights felt really GOOD. They were each very different and both were the show we wanted to put on.

In this line of work, you are two things: you are an artist and you are an entertainer. Any time you can find a balance of both that leaves you feeling good…

Amen.