A Brief NOCO Music History

On April 12th, deep in quarantine, I reached out to Miah Brooks - inquiring after some information about the local North Country music past. I met Miah while I was volunteering at the Loading Dock. Miah was, of course, mixing for the show and I approached him behind his ostentatious sound board, asking if I could watch what he was doing. We ended up talking about music, how to work in the arts, the politics of the past and current world, and the history of the North County Music Scene. As the virus hit in March and local art organizations, including the Loading Dock, started to cancel events and close down - I began to contemplate the history that got us here in the first place, the North Country music roots, and I knew who to talk to for more information.

What follows is… 

A brief History of North Country Music, with Jeremiah Brooks. 

By Emma Aldrich Jordan

Emma

Hey Miah, I’ve been thinking a lot about local music lately and it reminded me that you said there used to be a more extensive music scene up here - I was wondering if there were any bands from here with music that I could find somewhere? I’d like to listen to it and check it out.

Miah

Well, now...you probably came to the right place.

However; a lot of the history precedes digital and therefore recordings are scarce. The first band I was hired to run sound for was The Regular Einsteins. Do you know Pam McCann or Morris Manning? Pam and Morris basically started the Einsteins. Pam now runs Dog Mountain and plays mostly in Vermont. Morris is a perennial local favorite.The most kickass band ever around here was Swazey Lane/Alley Rose, that was my mom's band back when she was 20-something.

Then there was Mudfoot. I'm kind of biased on this one; but although we recorded nearly every show we ever played, most disappeared/got lent/lost. After that, in the wake of the Einsteins, came Crunchy Western Boys. Also: the thing to consider is that in the late 70's, there were literally 8 venues between Franconia/Bethlehem/Littleton that would have music on any given night. That lasted through the late 80's; by the 90's (when we were coming up) it had dwindled to like four. This also coincided with the rise of hiphop/deejays in the area. By 2000, the full-band gigs had mostly dried up and venues wanted to hire dj's/duos. It's really only since about 2010 that real live performances have started returning, and still nowhere near the prevalence that existed before. Which is super long explanation for this:you can pitch it as a local resurgence.

Would you say the djs have a hand in drying out the live band scene?

Absolutely, in a financial sense DJ/duo will undercut a full band on money every time.not to mention needed space/volume level.

There were only a few "club" owners who were dedicated enough to the scene to keep hiring bands. The restaurant trade went almost entirely DJ/duo.

Is that still going on in the area?

Yes, although the pendulum is starting to swing back. Put it this way; you can get a duo for $150-200 if you hardass them. A band can't even make gas/food on that most times.

Where did the live bands of the past come from? Do you know what the scene was like in a social/collaborative sense?

Yep. It mostly stemmed from the influx of arts around Franconia College. Franconia was already a liberal/moneyed pocket in an otherwise rather undereducated factory landscape. That was when the paper/shoe mills dominated. Then it turned into "Goddard lite with more acid"

the Union Leader went after them with articles about "wanton sex/drugs/communists" and eventually the Staties did a campus-wide surprise bust/invasion. A fair proportion of the "old people'' around here are leftover from that influx/migration, more than you might think.

Woah did that invasion like shut the college down?

It started a political process that eventually cost them funding and led to the end. The Chicago Review showed up and did a story on it... I was the naked 4yo child running with a black lab on the lawn for the cover shot. 

So was the music scene made up of musicians who stayed?

Not just musicians; carpenters, architects, gardeners, herbalists, writers. I grew up in it; and it took me until my mid 20's to understand that not everywhere around here was like this. The mill towns still existed. Those were the places that the hair metal was big. Here's the truth: somewhere beneath all that, was GG Allin, who very quickly fled the area.

Were there hair bands that played in the area as well?

Yep. They only did covers though. Fox was the biggest/longest hair band. Twenty years I think? Maybe it was Foxx. Then there was 8084; giant light show, fog machines, semi to haul it, etc. That was the 70's into the 80's. By the 90's, it was Third Degree out of Berlin and then Box.

Who is GG Allin? I’ve heard the name before but only since moving up here.

He's the reason there are sooooo many "punk" bands right here right now. They had to actually dig him up and move his grave to hide him so people would stop shitting on it. Apparently it was a popular pastime and the rest of the people using the cemetery didn't appreciate it. Could probably be considered the father figure of shockrock/performance art. I wouldn't really call it music.

Wait so did people dislike him?

Nope.  He was a total anarchist...WANTED people to do that. So it turned into a ritual with people driving hours to do it. Kinda like Morrison's grave on a very micro scale. And yes; here in Littleton. Like I said, it didn't go over well with anyone else. Let's just say his performances made Ozzy biting a bat's head off look tame. But again; mostly about violence/anarchy, and not about music. Most music people would say that punk was the counter reaction to the excess of the late 70's progressive rock. However that was mostly British; didn't really happen here on the local scene and here's why I can't chalk the current situation up to a political resurgence against bourgeois "studio musicians"... there *aren't any around here* invariably, all the best musicians (other than a handful born here) have left. I guess my takeaway from all of it is that if you look at what happened here before, and other places like Austin/Asheville...it comes down to maintaining a critical mass.  if you drop below that, stuff starts declining at a slow/steady/exponential rate.

A critical mass of musicians? Audience?

Both.  "Scene", if you will. There's something that is very hard to quantify, but to me it amounts to an energy exchange. In the right situation, the band is giving it out, the audience is giving it back. It becomes (again) exponentially multiplicative and I'm the guy with the fingers on the throttles; I get a % of all of that as it happens/goes by. "Tapping into the electricity" or whatever you want to call it.  It’s highly addictive. Final piece: if I do my job right, it becomes even another multiplier. 

Do you think the north country has the ability to get back to that?

Yes.  It was already here, the foundations are laid...just have to clear off some moss/dig a little to find them. I believe that the loss of the arts around here was due to people thinking it was "wasteful spending". However, if there is one thing that this current episode proves...

where would we be as a society without music/books/movies/photos/paintings/art in general?