The 20-something band, which includes bassist Chris Putzer and drummer Drew Fitzgerald, both Cicero natives, as well as guitarist Jon Sorder of Camillus and lead vocalist Weston Czerkies of Syracuse, is getting prepared to release its debut, eponymous EP (on vinyl!) during a gig at the Westcott Community Center, 826 Euclid Ave., on Sunday, April 26, 7 p.m.
Bone free: Oak and Bone, featuring Chris Putzer (pictured), will host an album release party at the Westcott Community Center on Sunday.
According to Fitzgerald, the band hadn’t
at first intended to pursue the EP path. “We did a rough demo just to
get stuff out there. That was our first thing. We played a live demo
and sold those for a while,” Fitzgerald says. “Finally we got a solid
recording with our friend Josh Coy {of Long Since Forgotten, who operates local studio Wayne Manor Recording}. He set us up pretty good, and that’s what we’re releasing now.”
Ryan “Hex” Canavan, who is a
member of the Westcott Community Center’s executive board and a friend
of Oak and Bone, soon got wind of the project. Canavan offered the band
a chance to release the album on his Hex Records label, which
pays for the recording and distribution of the albums it markets, then
works with national distributors to bring albums to boutique record
stores such as Armory Square’s Sound Garden, 301 W. Jefferson
St. In Canavan’s perspective, that business model makes more sense than
going after retail chains, as the kind of listeners who are still
attached to vinyl records tend to congregate in throwback shops of
Sound Garden’s ilk.
“I kind of have a thing about working
with bands that I know, and that I’m friends with,” Canavan says. “It
kind of mucks up the process when it’s someone you don’t know at all,
even though there are plenty of bands out there I don’t know. If we’re
already friends, it helps with the trust issue.”
Fitzgerald says that a friendly
camaraderie has developed in the hardcore scene, a seeming
contradiction from the loud, angry timbre of the music that blasts
during an average hardcore concert. “That’s usually what I try to
explain to people. It’s a way to get your aggressions out. People don’t
understand the hardcore scene. They say, ‘Everyone looks so angry!’
Well, if you go to a show and you see someone screaming or pumping
their fists or headbanging or whatever, they look so mad or angry, but
really that’s their way of expressing how happy they are to be there.”
Canavan hopes that the scene’s diversity
will help perpetuate its traditions. “I think {hardcore’s} got a lot of
variety right now, which I think is a really cool thing. Some people
would see that as dividing people up, and I can’t argue with that, but
I would rather have a lot of things happening than a one-set thing.
There are a lot of bands in town, and I find that different and
exciting.”
Admission to Oak and Bone’s album release party is $7. Fight Amp, Screaming Females and Urchins of the Night are also on the bill. For more information, call 478-8634.
—Matt Mumau
