The Deedles

For the first time since May, Emporia’s The Deedles are playing at Beer30 on Friday at 10:30 p.m. Bassist Adam Smith said the band has some new material that they’re excited to play and that he never knows what to expect at the local bar.

“Usually the next morning you find random articles of clothing, flip flops, stuff like that all over the bar, which is definitely proof that people had a good time,” Smith said.

Bar owner Josh Olsen said he’s known most of the band’s members for about nine years and they frequently play at Beer30.

“They just bring a professional side of music to whatever bar they play, just from being on the road,” Olsen said.

Guitarist and vocalist Garret Briggeman said the band has gone through various changes over the years as far as members, style and name. Originally, it was called Locamachine, then the Dewayn Brothers and as of last August, they became the Deedles. Briggeman said it started out as an experimental rock band, and then moved into more bluegrass.

“It’s all just kind of been an evolution from one project into the next,” Briggeman said.

Smith said he had been involved with a band called Oakhurst in Colorado, and after touring together in 2007, he made friends with the members of the DeWayn Brothers. In April 2008, Briggeman called him to see if he could play bass for the Deedles.
“I played mandolin and electric guitar in Oakhurst, but Garret called me up and asked if I could play the bass and I said ‘No, not yet’, and he’s like, ‘Well you want to play bass in the rock band? I said sure,” Smith said.

Smith said the band’s sound hits everything from modern rock to classic rock. He said its blues, country, and the band’s bluegrass roots are still visible.

“It absolutely is different than anything we’ve ever done, I mean it’s basically just rock. It’s everything that the word rock which is also a pretty broad word, encompasses,” Smith said.

Jamie Briggeman, guitarist and vocalist, said a lot of the band’s songs are ones that she and Garret would perform acoustically because they didn’t quite fit in with the bluegrass feel of the DeWayn Brothers.

“We’ve had these songs for a long time, it was just kind of like they were on the shelf, you know, so once the bluegrass band dispersed we finally had a chance to really focus on it and make it our goal to do the songs full time,” Jamie said.

Smith said it’s difficult having the experience that the members of the Deedles do and having to start with a new band that nobody’s heard about. Despite having to start from the beginning, Smith said he thinks with all of the touring and experience they all know what to do this time.

“We have to take what we know about it and just start from the ground up, but we’ve learned so many lessons about what to do what not to do that we feel really good about this being the one,” Smith said.

Lauren Walbridge

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Local musicians Muffington are planning to rock the halls of Beer:30 with their reunited group tomorrow, with Stacy Kumberg opening for them.

            “We haven’t had Tyler Stephens, our rhythm guitarist, for a few weeks,” said Riley Day, junior music education major. “He’s coming back from Ohio to practice with us this Wednesday, so that’ll be very refreshing.”

            Muffington, an experimental rock band made up of students from fifth floor South Towers dormitories at Emporia State, has been in the Emporia music scene for over two years now.

            “The local music scene is a tight knit group,” said Glenn Woolard, junior percussion performance major. “We owe a lot to the guys at Flint Hills music.”

            The group’s distinctive style combines elements of jazz, reggae and alternative rock. At previous shows, they’ve covered Grateful Dead songs and Beatles songs.

            Stephens, former ESU student and guitarist for Muffington, had left the group to go back to Ohio with his father for a time, but is returning to play with the group for the show this Friday.

            “My dad lives in Ohio and I am moving back with him,” Stephens said in a previous interview. “Hobo Monk is made up of my dad’s friends from Ohio.”

            Part of the group’s goals for the reunion is to practice together for a tour that would include Kansas City and Ohio.

            “Our plan is to go up to Ohio where Tyler’s dad has some connections to make a CD,” Woolard said. “After we get our CD out, we can fund our tour, or use the money so we don’t have to eat virtually nothing.”

            This summer is going to be integral in the band’s growth, Day said.

            “We’ll hopefully get our CD made this summer,” Woolard said. “Then maybe we’ll be able to get to Lawrence, Ohio, or Kansas City.”

            The band attributes its success largely to the collaboration it has had with Josh and Jared Olsen, owners of Beer:30, particularly with Josh’s volunteering to play bass.

            “We wouldn’t be anywhere without them,” Woolard said. “They’re awesome guys, and they’ve helped us out ever since the open-mic night.”

            In a prior interview, Josh Olsen conveyed his enjoyment at being invited to play with Muffington, and described how he believed the local music scene was trying to grow.

            “I’ve been friends with them for a while, and they needed a bass player for some songs,” Olsen said. “I think the local music scene is trying to grow.”

The concert at Beer:30 starts at 10:30 p.m. with Kumberg and Muffington’s keyboardist Greg “Greenhorn” Drummond performing together.

            “Drummond is a great keyboardist, and he is a baller,” Day said. “Also, everybody should watch Stacy open, since she has such a beautiful voice. After that we come on around midnight, and get to play after everybody’s had a few drinks.”

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John Henry, lead vocalist and guitarist, sings late Friday night at Beer:30, 4th and Merchant streets. The band is planning a tour of Europe in 2010. Jennifer Baldwin/The Bulletin.

On Friday, John Henry and the Engine performed onstage at Beer:30. The St. Louis/ Columbia, Mo based band is touring about 100-110 dates a year and has had shows in Emporia for the past few years.

“We’ve been playing in Emporia for about two years off and on,” guitarist and vocalist John Henry said, “more on lately. We were introduced to the scene by Ha Ha Tonka. They just showed us this market here in Kansas and it was pretty close to home and the people cared about live music, so that’s why we’re here.”

The band classifies itself as “Americana” music and keyboardist and vocalist Wes Wingate said their influence is American music of all kinds, including country, soul, gospel and rock and roll. At the show, they played covers of Credence Clearwater Revival.

“You know, the stuff they’re doing is pretty late 60s-esque stuff,” said John Shell, music major. “I mean, it is what it is and they play it very well. When you do covers, you want to hear somebody that can nail it.”

Henry and Wingate said they like playing in Emporia because there’s always a crowd of people that care about the music.
“The best thing about Emporia is probably the fact that there ain’t much to do in Emporia,” Wingate said. “So we are gathered here and everybody who is going to be out tonight is going to be here, really and that centralizes it which is harder.

“The bigger the city, the more it’s like a hotdog down a hallway, but here we can just really get a lot of people at once. And you know that they’re going to care about what you’re doing most of the time, so that’s a really good quality of this town.”

Eric Nelson, a member of The Whiskey Trio, which opened for John Henry, said he was honored to open for a band that the crowd really enjoyed.

“I thought it was great,” Nelson said. “It’s nice that there’s touring musicians coming to Emporia that care enough to stop here. It’s just good that we have musicians from other parts of the country coming through here.”

John Henry and the Engine plan on touring Europe in 2010. They are also coming out with a new EP on vinyl in October and will be back in Emporia towards the end of that month.

“The goals that we have are to constantly write better songs and to expand the radius that we tour in and to build up so that everyone can hear us,” Henry said. “We want people to hear the music that we do because we feel like what we’re doing is honest American music and we’re not trying to bullshit anybody.”

Lauren Walbridge/The Bulletin

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Josh Olsen, senior management major, and Jared Olsen, Emporia State alumni, stand in front of their bar, Beer:30, Thursday evening. JENNIFER BALDWIN/THE BULLETIN

Beer:30, a bar located at the corner of 4th and Merchant Street, recently celebrated its third year of business. Owners Josh Olsen, senior management major, and Jared Olsen, 2006 Emporia State graduate, pride the bar on the variety of entertainment features that it offers.
“We have a dancing area if you want to dance,” said Josh. “If you want to hang out you can go to the lounge. If you want to be outside you can be outside. If you want play pool you can play pool. We offer everything but shuffle board. It’s the same with drinks. Pretty much, if people ask for it and we don’t have it, we’ll buy it.”
Jared stressed that Beer:30 is centered around satisfying the customer.
“When we opened the bar that was our goal,” said Jared. “Whatever it is you like, (we) have a place here for you. We tried to make a bar that we would want to go to, that’s it, no frills.”
Another goal that Josh and Jared have is to always keep the prices low, which is just one thing that they do to appeal to college students.
“We always wanted to offer cheap drinks and quality service, and it’s been our plan to attract the college crowd because the college will never go away,” Josh said.
To keep prices low, instead of hiring employees to cover slow shifts, they do it themselves. This is just one way that they quickly made a profit.
“One of the reasons we’ve been successful is because we keep labor costs low with us working,” Josh said. “The truth is, we paid our investment off in a year and a half so we could close down tomorrow and just say we had fun for three years.”
University ties also played a role in their success. Both Josh and Jared attended ESU and were members of the Kappa Sigma fraternity.
“Something that helped us out is that I just graduated and Josh is still in college so it was easy in terms of knowing people and being able to get the word of mouth out about the bar,” Jared said.
Another factor bringing in crowds is live music. Beer:30 hosts bands varying from rock’n’roll to bluegrass, and will eventually add a recording studio to their facility. Because of his experience, Josh manages the music.
“Josh does all the music stuff because he was in a band that was successful here in town,” Jared said. “He knows both sides, what they should be asking for and what we should be paying. He knows how to set up sound and has the contacts and all that stuff.”
However, not just anyone can play – the bands must be reviewed and selected.
“We screen our bands, they have to give us a demo and we have to like it,” Josh said. “There’s nothing worse than people leaving because of the music that is at the bar.”
Beer:30 also offers an open mic night every Thursday that has less stipulations for performers.
“People just walk in and play a song,” Jared said. “It’s actually hard to get time now because people just come and book it up really fast. It’s designed so that people who are just trying to play their music or trying to get in front of a crowd to get used to it can have that opportunity, and they also have to opportunity to meet other musicians in town. Several bands got started because of that open mic night.”
Events such as wedding receptions and graduations and fundraisers like Poker for Darfur and No-Shave November for breast cancer also take place at Beer:30, opening up business to a variety of people. This diversity is just one aspect that Kaila Mock, junior glass working major and regular at Beer:30, likes about the bar.
“It’s very welcoming,” Mock said. “There’s a whole different variety of people there but everyone gets along really well. And I love pretty much everyone that works there. They’re just all such cool guys, you can talk to them about anything.”
She said she also enjoys the relaxed and friendly atmosphere.
“I’ve known Josh for eight years, so we just hang out and watch football games and stuff,” Mock said. “There’s not people yelling and fighting, and it’s just really laid back. You can just sit there and talk.”
Jared said that regulars contribute largely to the bars’ calm reputation.
“We don’t have fights down here, and that’s a testament to our staff, but that’s the regulars too,” Jared said. “They keep their friends in line because they don’t want their bar messed with. We have the best regulars that you could ask for, they’ll take people home when they’re getting too rowdy. They’ll tell them they have to leave. They’ll cut their friends off, it happens all the time, and it’s just because they don’t want their bar screwed around with, or to have to come in the next day and say they’re sorry to us.”
The regulars as well as the employees give Jared reason to be enthusiastic about his work.
“We really appreciate the people who work here and the people who come often because we have made a ton of friends from this place, a ton of people we can count on,” Jared said.

Sarah Shaw/The Bulletin

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PHOTO BY JENNIFER BALDWIN/THE BULLETIN

“When we opened the bar that was our goal,” said Jared Olsen, 2006 Emporia State graduate. “Whatever it is you like, (we) have a place here for you. We tried to make a bar that we would want to go to, that’s it, no frills.” PHOTO BY JENNIFER BALDWIN/THE BULLETIN

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At 10 p.m. this Saturday, Ha Ha Tonka will perform at Beer:30, 402 Merchant St. The band will also be touring in Cambridge, Mass., Philadelphia, Penn., and Dallas, Texas.

Josh Olsen, a co-owner of Beer: 30, said he is excited to have Ha Ha Tonka back in town.

“We are expecting a crowd of 500 or more and we’ll have drink specials all night,” he said.

Some of their specials will include a mixed drink recipe that is the signature drink of Ha Ha Tonka. Beer: 30 also offers the band drink specials and free Pyramid Pizza.

Ha Ha Tonka will play after two openings acts, Treaty of Paris and Eric Murphy. A cover charge of $3 will be charged to those who are over 21 and $5 for those who are under, Olsen said.

Ha Ha Tonka is classified as indie/rock and is promoting their second album “Novel Sounds of the Nouveau South.” Their first album, “Buckle in the Bible Belt,” can be accessed via their merchandise links on MySpace. They are originally from Springfield, Mo.

The band consists of four guys – Brian Roberts (vocals and guitar), Lucas Long (bass and vocals), Lennon Bone (drums and vocals) and Brett Anderson (keyboard, guitar and vocals).

The four use harmony to their benefit in most of their songs, but especially in “Hangman.” The group has been touring all summer and has been getting a lot of attention from radio stations across the U.S.

Just recently they’ve had requests for their music to be played on stations in Alaska and Florida. A station in Wichita, KACY 102.5, is the only station in Kansas listed as playing their music so far, according to their Myspace page.

Ha Ha Tonka has also recently received a lot of attention from magazines. J. Edward Keyes of Rolling Stone said in May that “(Novel Sounds) Occupies the sweet spot between country and indie, writing ornery songs with big hooks.”

This weekend’s performance will be Ha Ha Tonka’s third time playing in Emporia, and Olsen said he hopes they continue to return in the future.

Krista Harries, junior accounting major, discussed her musical preference as consisting of country, soft rock, and oldies.

“I’ve not heard of them before, though I would be interested in going,” Harries said.

Ha Ha Tonka will have merchandise for sale at the show.

Beer:30 will also host an Open Mic night tonight, the DeWayn Brothers on Friday, with Granny Tweed and Calvin Bennett opening, and the grand finale of Ha Ha Tonka with Treaty of Paris and Eric Murphy on Saturday night. Both shows start at 10 p.m.

Shawna Berry/The Bulletin

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William Smith, guitarist for Roman Numerals, sings Saturday night in the Red Room at Beer:30 in downtown Emporia. Roman Numerals were one of three bands to play on Saturday. Kellen Jenkins /The Bulletin

With a blend of old familiar faces, a brand new musical act and one band that falls in between, Saturday night’s live music jam at Beer:30 included genres ranging from indie and classic rock to new-age pop. Rock bands Radio City and Roman Numerals, in addition to newcomers Mammoth Life played sets in The Red Room.

“I love it in the Beer Garden, but the Red Room is a cool venue in Emporia,” said Kyle Thompson, junior political science major. “Radio City was my favorite act, but all the bands were just great, and the whole lineup was astonishingly good.”

Utilizing a wide variety of musical sounds in order to attract a larger attendance was a successful strategy, Thompson said.

“I really think they’re doing the right thing at Beer:30, bringing in a wide variety of acts like that,” Thompson said. “Nothing ever got old or stale.”

The concert, which began at roughly 10 p.m., opened with Mammoth Life, a Lawrence pop band making their debut appearance in Emporia.

Mammoth Life’s Myspace Web site describes their music as “kaleidoscopic art pop,” a genre of music that relies on layering multiple instrument sounds with vocal backing and ambience sounds, said band leader and producer Nicholas Goss.

“The overall genre is pop, but we’re in between sounds right now,” Goss said. “The first sound we have is kaleidoscopic art pop, which is also the name of our debut album, and the second is more of an American Movement sound, influenced by spaghetti westerns and that sort of thing.”

Invited to the Emporia concert by local band Radio City, Mammoth Life’s members are KU music students, graduates, or former students, and believe that their sound is especially relevant for college students, Goss said.

Second on the night’s program was the return to Emporia of indie rock band Roman Numerals.

Band vocalist, bassist and guitarist Steve Tulipana described Roman Numerals’ music as a blend of traditional indie rock and high-energy underground tempo.

“We’re trying to strike a balance between math-rock and dance-heavy pop music,” Tulipana said. “We really try to make our influences our own, rather than just sound like a mish-mash of other bands.”

As unique as their sound is, the story of how their band came together is even stranger, Tulipana said.

“We were originally going to be a one-off thing for a special performance act, and we had no original intentions to form a band,” Tulipana said. “But then we realized we had something, and decided to go for being our own band with our own sound.”

The last band for the evening was Emporia regulars Radio City, who described finding a venue in Emporia as an adventure all its own.

“The music scene in Emporia is always interesting because here it’s a matter of finding a place for a band to rest its head,” said band freeman Matt Kosinski. “I mean for a while we were at Josie’s, and now we’ve sort of found a new home here at Beer:30… It’s sort of like being the musical equivalent of a refugee, we have a home and then it gets uprooted or things change, and we have to go in search for a new one.”

Kosinski described Radio City’s music as a combination of classic and modern rock influences, with a sound that has evolved over time to reflect the band’s internal changes.

“We’re working on our third release right now, our sound has changed a little bit since we switched drummers and tightened up our vocals,” Kosinski said. “We’re really excited about this album, it’s a lot higher-energy than our usual, and we think it’ll really carry our style.”

In addition to playing at the concert, Radio City also had a large hand in bringing Mammoth Life to Beer:30 and in recommending the setup for the concert in general, Kosinski said.

‘We actually found out about Mammoth Life through Terry Schmidt, the sound guy for tonight’s concert,” Kosinski said. “So we extended the invite through him to come out to Emporia and show everyone what they’ve got.”

Schmidt, a freelance sound technician who works most closely with nu-grass band The DeWayn Brothers, said he enjoyed Emporia’s atmosphere.

“I normally travel with the Dewayn Brothers, but Emporia is a terrific place to stop by,” Schmidt said. “I mean, I get to work with Mammoth Life, which is just a truly unique band, and my job is to listen to music and make it sound even better, and who wouldn’t want that?”

The concert, which ran for nearly four hours, is part of a series of local artist venues promoted by Beer:30 and drew a crowd of over 400 individuals.

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At a time when the hip-hop scene is seeing resurgence in the Midwest, local bar Beer:30 will host a collaborative hip-hop concert.

The concert, titled “Kansas Invasion,” will feature artists both local and regional, including hip-hop artists Stick Figa, A Train, MWP and Wichita singer-songwriter J Tuck.

The concert will be held on this Saturday, April 11, with seating beginning at 9 p.m. Weather permitting, the concert will take place in the outdoor area of Beer:30, called the Beer Garden.

“We expect attendance will be actually very high, around 500 people not counting the setup crew or promo teams,” said Josh Olson, co-manager and bartender at Beer:30, referring to the Crazygirls Promo Team advertised by flyers promoting the concert. “It’s going to be a very good night for business.”

Cover charges will be $3 for those 21 or over and $5 for underage attendees, something Olson said he hopes is a selling point.

“That’s one of the nice things about this concert, is the cover charge is cheap, so we hope that will encourage attendance,” Olson said.

For some, concerts like this present a welcome change.

“There aren’t a lot of hip-hop shows coming to Emporia, so we’re happy we’re getting this one to host,” Olson said. “I’m a fan of all music, but I like it when local artists come around to play… It’s just nicer, you know?”

Olson also said that he’ll be watching for one artist in particular.

“I’m really looking forward to seeing J Tuck,” Olson said. “He’s good at his thing and he DJ’d in town for a long time so it’s good to see him around again. He’s got a new mixtape or album, one of those, so that’ll be good to hear.”

According to J Tuck’s MySpace page, he is originally from Wichita but attended Emporia State.

The fact that the musicians playing are local has made the event attractive to some.

“I like that they’re local Kansas artists,” said Shelley Marsh, senior secondary English and Spanish education major. “They’re just kind of from-the-earth people trying to make it big in the music industry, so there’s that appeal, and as far as Emporia bringing in groups overall instead of just one band, I like that, it’s more involving.

“I like all kinds of music, and I always like it when they bring organized events to Emporia, but it’s nice to see stuff targeted to your everyday college student.”

For some students around campus, the appeal of this concert has less to do with the style of music and more with how it has been advertised.

“They’ve done a lot of promoting lately,” Marsh said. “I’ve seen a lot of flyers around recently and Facebook advertisements, there’s even a group about the concert on Facebook and that really got a lot of people fast, so I decided to check it out.”

Zachary Hughes/The Bulletin

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