This is the kind of stuff that crosses your mind when you think about what it must take for a band to stay together for going on fourteen years now. Patience. Boy, these guys must have lots and LOTS of patience. Fourteen years is a long time, but for the Clarks, it's been such a labor of love, that the fact that these guys have never had a Top 20 record doesn't matter. Not in the least. Born in the mid-80s in the sleepy college town of Indiana, PA (home of IUP, a place that many alumni fondly remember as the home of Idiots Under Pressure, but is really known as the Indiana University of Pennsylvania), The Clarks -- Scott Blasey, guitars and vocals, Rob James, all lead guitars, Greg Joseph, bass and vocals, and Dave Minarik on drums -- first played gigs at frat houses around town to anyone who would listen. After the standard four-year college turn, the band returned home to Pittsburgh, 70 miles to the west, and for the next few years kept plugging away in small clubs in nearby Oakland and the South Side. In 1988, they released their first CD, I'll Tell You What, Man..., an energetic slice of power-crunch that took more than a couple of people by surprise with some of its intensity.

Remember, now, this was back even before a certain long-haired, blonde, flannel-shirt wearing surf-dude from Seattle with a big drug jones and a bad attitude formed a band with a couple of other guys and re-invented garage rock by calling it grunge. Back then, the local club scene in Pittsburgh was a lot like it was in other towns: in a bit of flux. Big-hair metal bands ruled the charts nationally, so there was a plethora of those bands around town, most of 'em knocking out Bon Jovi and Poison tunes and wearing their sisters' makeup and lingerie.

Meanwhile, "alternative" bands that weren't Duran Duran cover bands (local legends like Portable People, and The Affordable Floors) were pretty much burnt out on the whole scene and were either breaking up, with various and sundry members moving to NY or LA to join other bands, or giving it up altogether and going back to having day jobs again. "Image" had gotten to be everything, and it was all getting to be very, very boring. It was in this veritable no-man's land of broken illusions and cynicism that the Clarks found themselves growing and evolving musically, and in retrospect, it must have been a really weird time to be just starting out. Especially since despite the band's punky energy and interesting and witty, yet simply-themed lyrics, musically, they were just into yer basic 4-piece rock-n-roll thing--these guys had absolutely no glam, no glitz, and no gimmicks.

Little by little, they were becoming a Big Deal around town, though, and they really loved what they were doing, so before too long, they figured they ought to have some sort of coherent game plan. In 1992, they all quit their day jobs, formed their own publishing company and label, King Mouse Music, and finally got around to following up that first CD with The Clarks. Despite the band's low-key approach and lack of pretense (or maybe because of it), it took a bit more time for this one to be appreciated. But the record was full of some more really catchy, energetic, power-pop-meets-the-blues. The Clarks contains not only a downright worthy cover of the Beatles' "Dear Prudence", it also introduced the breakthrough tune that's still an audience favorite, "Penny On The Floor". A couple of years later, in 1994, they followed that one up with Love Gone Sour, Suspicion, And Bad Debt, which caught a bit more of the bands' energy in the studio, and showed them coming of age rather well. This grittier collection of songs contained some real treats: the song "Treehouse", a tune worthy of anything a Petty, a Springsteen, or a Mellencamp has ever done; "Behind My Back", a tune that could to this day claim to be the best song that the Hoodoo Gurus never recorded; and one of the baddest stanzas written in the last 10 years, from the last verse of "Cigarette": "in a black and far-off corner of my mind, there's a box of something I can't quite define, it houses circus freaks, temptation, and the Fayette County Fair; and it reeks of love gone sour, suspicion and big hair...".

More shows followed, and before too long, the Clarks were getting to be a pretty big draw in some of the nicer venues in town, garnering great word-of-mouth, and scoring some occasional airplay on local radio station powerhouse WDVE-FM. Everybody was sick of makeup and lace and "we're so bored", and just wanted to have a good time, and found in the band a way to fill this sudden musical void rather nicely. These guys didn't have any heavy messages to impart. More and more people were starting to discover that it was always a fun evening, just hanging out and singing about girls and fun and drinking beer and all kinds of love--good love, bad love, sad love, lost love, you name it. So here was this band with a clutch of great songs that lots of people could relate to; with a reputation for playing high-energy, melodic, yet very roots-oriented rock guaranteed to get people on their feet and dancing; and who always packed the house. And they were great. And they were hometown guys. And they were darned cute, too, all four of 'em, boy, the women in the audience were always going nuts.

In 1996, after flirting with a couple of big record companies, they made a decent little deal with MCA, and the band set about making their Major Label Debut. This release turned out to be Someday Maybe. A little bit better timing and it would have been non-stop Top 20 action in the making all the way to the top of the heap for the Clarks. Finally, a band from the 'Burgh hits the Big Time--who knew? "Stop", "Courtney", "Caroline", "Last Call"--this is the kind of stuff that sells gazillions, great, solid rock-n-roll, from beginning to end. It put the band on the brink of the Big Time. All they needed was that final push, and then....

Ouch. Did somebody say the word "timing"? Who knew it was a lousy time to sign with a label, because Merger-Mania was about to sweep Wall Street? Sure, you remember how ugly it was, don't you? Labels folded. Went bankrupt. Got bought by Seagrams. Disney. Time-Warner. Oh yeah, and there was a little thing unfolding in a big way in another dimension called the Internet, which was giving all these same executives the heebie-jeebies anyway. So in the middle of all this great stuff that was going on for the Clarks in Pittsburgh, The Industry decided it had better tighten up. And wouldn't you know it, mid-level management was streamlined, and excess was gutted. Everywhere. Lo and behold, along with about a thousand other bands of every genre over the next couple of years, the guys suddenly found themselves cut from the label for no real good reason that anybody could say for sure what it was. Fortunately for them, though, they still had their own label, so they weren't completely down and out. And they had their still-growing legions of fans.

This little flirt with stardom had left the Clarks a bit bruised, but by then, they realized if they were going to continue, they were going to have to take a good look at where they were, and either sink...or swim. It had been a decade now, and they were still at "home", though at least they were making a living. So it had to continue. They decided to kind of sit back and regroup, and to keep the fans happy while they were figuring out their next move, they recorded a couple of shows in 1998 at the legendary Nick's Fat City in the South Side, and released it as The Clarks--Live. This CD showcases all of the best of the band's catalog--which could almost make it a 2-CD set, when you think about it--from a rousing cover of Prince's "Kiss" to a couple of hitherto-unrecorded, killer tunes ("The Apartment Song", "Lock And Key") to the best tracks of "Someday Maybe". It also contains the definitive version of "Penny On The Floor", complete with mandolins, a bit of tasty slide guitar, and that woman who screams loud and appreciatively after the first verse, caught forever for posterity. It is a must-have for the die-hard, and it's a good primer for those who've never heard the band before. This project not only kept them going, and made the fans happy, it also breathed a little new life into their ambition. Thank goodness.

Since then, it's been a real up-and-down kind of thing with the Clarks--mostly up, if you ask them. And they're still hanging in there, being content to write more songs, and play to more and more people, and get the word out about the magic--they realized what kind of magic they were making after they'd listened to the live CD themselves. When it was all said and done, they decided it had been too long of a road to give up altogether, so they decided to stick around. And these days, it's finally starting to pay off. Last year, they scored a deal with a new label (Razor & Tie), thanks to the strength of a couple songs that ended up being on their new CD, Let It Go. The first two singles from that disc, "Better Off Without You" and "Chasin' Girls", got tons of airplay on both the mainstream rock and alternative stations in the hometown, and are attracting interest here and there at radio stations all across the continent.

Today, they also find themselves with more fans than ever. The new tunes are winning over converts daily, and the great word-of-mouth is no doubt fueled further by the steady stream of hits at their really-sharp-looking website, www.clarksonline.com. In fact, the word is really getting out, so much so that people like yours truly, who've been trying to keep this great band a secret all these years, try and see the guys wherever they happen to turn up in really small, shoebox-sized clubs, opening up for other bands. You know, so we still can see them up-close-and-personal, and toss lingerie in their general direction and still be able to hit 'em with it, instead of seeing them in big arenas and stadiums, where they're bound to end up sooner or later.

Actually, regardless of their surroundings, the Clarks exhibit a world-class attitude, and perform a solid set, whether they're playing club opener to other regional bands in the mid-Atlantic states (like Richmond's highly underrated Fighting Gravity, with whom they've been trekking a lot up and down the East Coast); or playing as the second-stage headliner during nine or ten dates on the Steely Dan amphitheater tour this past summer; or selling out the 4500-seat AJ Palumbo Center back in Pittsburgh, which they did this past Thanksgiving holiday weekend, and where all 4500 people sang along to every song in their set, from beginning to end. One wonders how many bands can inspire that kind of devotion these days, who aren't a household name.

At least, not everyplace. Not yet, anyway.

We wanted to discuss what's been new and exciting in the Clarks' camp since the live CD, the subsequent new record deal, and the latest foray into the mainstream. After a couple weeks of missed signals, and a week after that jaw-dropping show at the Palumbo Center, we finally tracked down lead singer Scott Blasey in one of the aforementioned shoebox-sized-type clubs, this one a charming little bistro in Baltimore's Fells Point. This place was so compact we finally settled into the stairwell that led from the dressing... um, the hangin'-out-in room to the stage to chat. True to form with the rest of the place, it was a small hallway, and the three of us--me, Blasey, and my intrepid new photographer, the always-slightly-bemused Ms. Berkman--settled in as comfortably as we could. The whole scene was so rock-and-roll, though, and it was great fun--we didn't even mind that people kept having to squeeze past us in the stairwell to get in and out of this room. Clearly, this hallway wasn't built to accommodate the press. Actually, it was barely built to accommodate walking by a human being, period, especially by one much over 5' 7", but Blasey was very laid-back about it all, considering he had the most at stake in this hallway--all 6' 2" or so of him. When we finally got the hang of who should be where (I am towered over most times, I'm a mere 5' 3" or so, while the photog checks in at about 5' 10" or so), and whether we would stand or sit (no, really, it was comical at times, when people came and went from the dressing room), the three of us managed to settle in for a fairly lively and interesting half-hour chat.

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Cosmik: So was that a big deal (to lose the MCA deal), like, did you guys think about packing it in at that point?

Blasey: I think we all sort of, after it happened, it happened in like August or September of that year, and we just sort of did shows up through the holidays, and we came back in January. And when we did, I think we all kind of reassessed where we were and what we wanted to do. I never seriously considered doing anything else. It was just, like, we had to regroup and decide "ok, now, what are we gonna do?" which is when we decided to do the live record.

Cosmik: Who's idea was it to do the live CD?

Blasey: It was definitely a group idea, there was nobody that was singled out that said "we should do this..." I think we all felt like "it's the perfect time to do a live CD". We didn't have enough material, nor were we ready to go into a studio situation and do a big record, we didn't have enough money at the time to do that. Live records are a little less expensive, you're just recording shows that you're making a living on anyhow. It was a group idea, it was very easily reached (as a goal). It was kind of a real natural thing to do at the time, after the record label thing fell through. We wanted to have a goal, too. I remember at the time thinking that it would be very destructive to sit around and sort of wallow in self-pity about being dropped and not have anything to work toward, not have a goal, not have a project, and so it gave us a focus. "OK, so we're gonna do this live record. When are we gonna do it, where are we gonna do it...how are we gonna do it?" And then everybody's focus just turned to that, immediately.

Cosmik: So, tell us about this thing called "the Clarks"--a friend of mine, somebody said to her, "describe the Clarks' music." and she said "I don't know, man, they're just the Clarks!" If you had to describe yourself to someone who never heard you before, how would you do it?

[Photo by Kristin Berkman]

Blasey: If I had to describe the music, I d say it was guitar-based rock n roll, the easiest thing I think for people, sometimes, is to use references. I'd tell 'em Tom Petty, bands like that, if they liked stuff like that, they would probably kinda dig what we're doing. It's hard to describe yourself--I think people outside of it have a better way of describing what we do than I do. I'm too close to it sometimes. Labels are difficult, too. Rock n roll is so broad, and we're not an "alternative" band, whatever that means anymore. We're not an alt-country band. We're not a "rap-metal hybrid" band or a "boyband", or any of that stuff...

Cosmik: well, technically, you are a "boyband", but you're uh, not (musically-speaking) (much laughter)

Blasey: well, ok, we're a Guy band--or, no, a Man band... (more laughing)

Blasey: first, you're a Boy band and then you get to be a Man band...so that would be us!

Cosmik: A Manly Man band! So you've always had the same lineup?

Blasey: Yeah, the same four guys! It's rare...

Cosmik: Do you do most of the writing for the band? Or is it more of a team effort?

Blasey: I come up with a lot of the ideas for the songs and stuff, but it's a group effort to put the songs together. Everybody has an opinion on how they think it should sound and what the tempo should be. It's definitely not autocratic--I don't go in and say "this is the way I want this song to sound...". Greg writes...he writes quite a few. In fact, on the last one I think he wrote three of the songs. Rob writes. Not a lot, or not as much as I do, but...we all are very creative, and have opinions. I think being the singer, you know, being that I have to sing the lyrics, I tend to be more interested in what I'm saying. It's easier to be passionate about something that you wrote. It's, to write for...like, sometimes I've found it hard to sing Greg's songs, 'cause I need to know where he's coming from, and what he wants me to do with it, so it can be a bit of a challenge sometimes. But a fun challenge...

Cosmik: Does something like that cause a lot of tension?

Blasey: Oh no, no, I wouldn't say "tension". Well, creative tension...I mean, creative energy, we're together working out music, there's disagreement and compromise, but never, like, mean-spirited tension. It's a good thing. I mean, everybody's got opinions, and we're not afraid to voice them. I mean, we've been together a long time, so we know how to deal with one another. Our interpersonal dynamics are pretty good.

Cosmik: You know what to expect...

Blasey: yeah, yeah--you know how to approach each other...with suggestions and criticisms and comments. There's a right way and a wrong way to tell somebody that you don't particularly care for the way the song sounds, or what they're doing with that part, you know. So you approach it delicately, and in a constructive way, that most people--we'll all listen to what everybody else has to say. I mean, instead of just saying "you know what, dude? that sucks, you gotta find something else to play there..." that's not quite the approach you want to use...(laughter)

Cosmik: So, whenever you put out the live CD, and you just kinda went out and played a lot after that, how did you end up with Razor & Tie? Did they find you, or did you have to find them, or...?

Blasey: Our management company found them, we were doing tracks for Let It Go, toward the end of the process, they sent out a bunch of demos to record companies, and people we knew in the industry, when it was almost finished, so they could get a really good idea what it sounded like. And there were a couple of interested independent labels, but Razor & Tie was the most established, and I think the most serious about doing something with it. But yeah, it was just our managers through contacts found them, and sort of pursued that--that was their job for that project: "find us a record deal".

Cosmik: So will this be an ongoing thing now? Like, do you have a long-term commitment from them?

Blasey: Well, not really, we said let's do this record, and if it sells X amount of CDs then we'll do another one. And we'll probably sell that amount. But I think at this point in our relationship with them, it's comfortable enough that if we said "Well, we don't want to do this again with you guys", I'm sure that...nothing is written in stone. That was the thing we discovered with MCA, you know, it doesn't matter what the contract says, if you want to do your own thing, you can find a way to get out of it. If the record company doesn't want you on the label, they can find a way to get you off it, so... But it's been good with them (Razor & Tie) so far. I think we'll continue. I hope it does. We've made friends there already, and they're cool, and they like our band, they're small and personable, which is really good. They know who we are when we walk in the office, which is nice...

Cosmik: Very...So they're very supportive--they seem to have a rep for being good like that. They have some other good, quality bands on their roster...

Blasey: Yeah, they do, there's Dar Williams, a singer/songwriter, and a band called Sixteen Horsepower, they got a few great things going on with bands, it's neat to see those people getting attention...

Cosmik: And so then, you really got a handle then on how popular you really were after that, didn't you? I mean, if you hadn't realized it before, you did after that?

[Photo by Kristin Berkman]

Blasey: Yeah, the live album more than anything I think helped let our fans know that we weren't gonna go away. That it wasn't the end of the band. It might have been the end of a particular phase of our career, I think it definitely was. I know when Let It Go came out is when the fan base really got bigger. We're sort of--when the live record was done, and we were starting to work on Let It Go, like all of last year, we did some pretty good shows but our profile was sort of laying low. And then when the new one came out, it was like...(motions upward) right through the roof...

Cosmik: was that in part because you went out on different tours with different bands as openers, or do you think it had to do with the new website, maybe?

Blasey: A little bit of everything....I think the tours helped. I think that raised the profile of the band. I think working with Razor & Tie, just being on that label, they certainly got the word out. And I think that the radio stations in Pittsburgh really got behind it, both The X (WXDX-FM, the area's "modern rock" channel) and 'DVE helped. It was like--to use a term, "critical mass", where all these things just sort of come together. The other thing, too, for that was that young people in Pittsburgh and western Pennsylvania sort of grew up with their older brothers and sisters talking about the band, or maybe even somebody's parents. And suddenly there's all these 15 year old kids that had grown up their whole lives, hearing about the Clarks--maybe hearing "Penny On The Floor" and "Cigarette" on the radio, and suddenly when that record came out, they were playing it on the X. Then, we started doing all-ages shows, and it was amazing how many young kids were in the crowd that we had never seen before. So I don't know exactly what the causes were, I think all those things together. I was amazed at how many young people seemed to like the band all of a sudden...

Cosmik: You mean it's amazing that there's kids out there that don't dig on all that angst-driven, depressing, cussing,...

Blasey: There are definitely a lot of kids out there like that. These days, kids are a little more open to all kinds of music. I think teenagers, or even younger kids, they're interested in good music, they don't care if it's rap or it's country, or a boyband or whatever, if they like the song, they're gonna like the band. They don't care. It used to be when I was growin' up, it was very much you liked one style of music, you know, you either liked rock, or you liked soul or whatever, you didn't really get into different stuff...that makes a difference.

Cosmik: Yeah, and you guys seem to cover a broad spectrum, speaking of that, you got some funk and some rock and some...

Blasey: Oh yeah, that's been a conscious thing, I know, on my part, you know, to make it, like, less white... I grew up listening to Prince, and Al Green. I like bands like Whiskeytown, and y'know, some country stuff too, but I like to get the groove on. I like people to dance, I wanna see people dancin'. I mean, I don't want us to be a "dance" band, but I want people to be groovin', ya know. Moving around...I'm not interested in the passive audience, I like participation, interaction...

Cosmik: Like crowd-surfing? Or all that bouncing up and down...

Blasey: I'm not a fan of crowd-surfing, actually. I mean, first of all, it's just old, y'know? (laughter) There's always people at shows up front--girls in particular--getting crushed and getting kicked in the head. I mean, that's just not my thing...

Cosmik: You'd rather see them dancing...?

Blasey: Yeah, yeah...

Cosmik: With all these live shows, and all this publicity, is that how you met your producer, Justin Niebank (Wilco, John Hiatt, Blues Traveler) or did you know him from before?

Blasey: We met Justin when we were on MCA, we did some demos with him in preparation for what would have been our second CD with them. We did some demos and we all got along real well--he liked us, we liked him, and then the deal fell through, but we stayed in contact with him. All along we kept saying, "we really liked working with you, and even though we just lost this thing, we'd still like to make the next record with you" and he was open to that. And I'm sure there are some producers who would have said "well, you don't have the deal now, you might not have enough money" or whatever, but he was really cool about all that stuff, so that's how that happened. Kind of ironic, too, in that he was a connection via MCA, and that didn't happen but he did with us. I'd like to do another one with him--I loved working with him.

Cosmik: I remember reading, when it first came out, a bit about him, that maybe he was a bit of a perfectionist?

Blasey: well, yeah, but I think to be a producer, you have to have a certain amount of technical perfectionism. But he was also pretty loose in the studio, you know, he'd get us to try new things, and stretch ourselves a little bit, do stuff we'd never done. I didn't find him to be "difficult". His perfectionism was easy to do, because I think we're all kind of perfectionist in the band, too, so we all--it worked, because none of us was like "oh no, this is too much, we should be looser". We were all pretty much in tune with one another with that kind of stuff.

Cosmik: So is this CD selling the best out of all your CDs so far?

Blasey: yeah, we've done around 30,000, um, it's only been out really for like seven months. I think we've sold that many of one or two other releases, but that had taken a year or two, so this is definitely doing better than any others.

Cosmik: Are you getting out into the country more?

Blasey: We're definitely travelling more, playing to new places, just doing more touring, which we'd never really done a lot of. We did regional stuff before, but this is the first time we're getting into the south. We're playing the major areas on the east coast a lot more often--NY, DC, Philly, Baltimore.

Cosmik: We see a lot more on the website--on the message boards; "hey, when are you coming to Florida? Kentucky? Richmond ..."(and the two of us were all for that one, definitely). I mean, all of a sudden, it seems like your fans are everywhere.

Blasey: Yeah, I know there are definitely fans out there now in other parts of the country that want us to come to where they are. I'm sure that'll happen eventually.

Cosmik: So how did you end up on the Steely Dan tour?

Blasey: We had two people that helped us with that--actually, one of them was a guy who used to work for our old record company, at MCA. He works now for SFX Entertainment, which is the company that owns all the venues where we played at--like, all the amphitheaters? So, he's sort of a head honcho there now, and we still had a good relationship with him. And our one manager had a friend that worked for SFX, so between the two of them, we convinced them to let us do this. Or try it out. But it worked out well.

Cosmik: Did other things come about from that, do you think, that might not have presented themselves to you otherwise?

Blasey: Not really, there hasn't been anything like that since then, although sometimes those things don't come back to help you--or haunt you--until maybe two years, three years, down the road. All of a sudden, somebody says "oh yeah, you guys did that Steely Dan stuff a couple years back, you know, I really liked you when I saw you in DC, let's do this..." Nothing directly has happened yet, other than making fans. Which is really the number one reason to do it anyway. I wouldn't doubt, though, that we'd work with SFX again. 'Cause they liked us, actually they sort of hired us for it. It really wasn't Steely Dan that hired us, they sort of just said "OK, well, we don't mind them" (chuckles) yeah you sort of get their blessing, or the blessing of their manager, or whatever, that says "yeah, this is OK, they're not offensive to us in any way", soo....

Cosmik: Do you have to kind of then go by what the record sales are, to get on an opening tour slot in a given part of the country?

Blasey: It really was and is a good way to meet new fans, opening up for other bands, especially when they're compatible, you know, the music styles are similar, I think, when the fans are open to new stuff. But the thing that really is the key is radio airplay. You gotta get your songs on the radio in other cities. And you can tell when you go into a city where you've got airplay, 'cause it's always a better crowd, people definitely know the single, and a lot more of them know the other songs on the record. So that's a big thing. We try to follow the airplay. Cause we get a sheet every week that tells us where it's being played and how often, it really breaks it down, so we know what's going on. So we try to follow that. And you know, if you can get a newspaper article written before the gig, the day of the gig, those kind of things, you all have to coordinate that stuff so it happens at the right time.

Cosmik: So little by little, it seems that the best-kept secret in the city of Pittsburgh for the last 10 years or so is finally starting to get out to the rest of the world...

Blasey: Yeah, I think it is starting to leak out there--like, something in the water (laughter), finding its way into other parts of the country. I would like for it to be more that way. you always want more and faster. But like you said, with the guestbook, if you read emails, that's where I notice it, they're all over the country now. We just got an add on a radio station in New Orleans, and Seattle, and some other places, so they're hearing things, they're definitely registering. We're getting out there.

Cosmik: It's also harder and harder to get airplay nowadays, too, isn't it? Doesn't it seem like there's more competition?

Blasey: Yeah, it is, and there are fewer people deciding what goes on the radio now, too. Radio stations are owned by one big company. It used to be if you'd go to one radio station and convinced the guy there to play you, that you could do that. But now, there might be one guy programming for ten stations. So he's got ten times the amount of people coming to him to play their music. Then again, if you get that one guy, you've got ten times the stations, too. It helps. It's like...kind of like lemmings into the sea, the more people that play it, the more they get on the bandwagon, so it's like a snowball effect. But it's hard to get it going. Once it starts to roll, though, sometimes it takes on a life of its own. It's like "follow the leader"--if a big station in Seattle plays the record, then maybe a big station in Portland will start playing it. Or Boise, Idaho starts playing it. It happens like that...

Cosmik: Well, I hope you guys get lots more airplay, I can't think of anybody more deserving right off the top of my head...

Blasey: Yeah, that's the key, that's what we're trying to do, hopefully.

Cosmik: Well, however you're working it, the word is getting out there. Because I have to tell you, I've never been to a two-hour concert where the entire crowd sang along with every single song...I mean, you know, I could hear the band sometimes, right? (laughter) All you heard was the crowd. That was just phenomenal to me...

Blasey: Last Friday (the aforementioned Palumbo Center show) was really special and unusual, I've never heard people sing all of it like that either. You know, there's certain songs, but I mean, it seemed like that night, every song on "Let It Go" that we played, they were singing along to...it was amazing!

Cosmik: They knew all of your songs...

Blasey: They knew everything. I was just--oh, man, it was...special. Truly.

Cosmik: Aw, and you know, being from that area, it got me right here (thumps chest patriotically)...

Blasey: There's a lot of love there. lot of...it's a communal thing. Music just brings people together. Of all ages, that was the other cool thing. You know, older people were there. And teenagers were there. Good crowd.

Cosmik: Yeah, weren't they? Didn't somebody throw some lingerie at you during "Let's Get It On"?

Blasey: Yeah, one or two bras came up onstage even before that song (grins). Yeah, that song really gets 'em going. We should do it earlier in the night, 'cause we save it for last...

Cosmik: Any chance that's actually gonna turn up on a CD?

Blasey: I won't say no. I would say that probably not--I don't think we'd ever do a studio version of it, but I wouldn't be surprised to see it come out somewhere in a live version. 'Cause that's where the magic is...

Cosmik: That would be great...

Blasey: I don't think we could capture that in a studio, I don't even know if I'd wanna try. 'Cause it's all about the live thing. It's amazing how many people want that though, ask about that, that they want it on a CD. I love singing it, I just feel like another...it's a style that we don't do, and it's fun for me to not play guitar, and be a front man, and kind of stalk the stage and walk around more, play with the crowd. I really sort of indulge myself.

Cosmik: So you're having a good time, then? It shows...

Blasey: Oh yeah, I love it, there's just so much energy that you get from people, I feed off that, big-time.

Cosmik: Well, I'll tell you, whatever you're doing and whoever's helping you do it, I hope you keep on doing it (shakes hands) 'cause you guys are finally getting somewhere, and it sounds real good, too...

Blasey: Well, thank you!

(C) 2001 - Melanie Campbell