Janis
Chicago, IL
Female, 0
I’m a bass player in an independent Chicago-based band called Family Groove Company. We’ve released 4 full-length albums and have played over 800 shows in 34 states, all with no record label or big-name booking agency. My favorite part about being a musician are the connections I make, whether it be in writing sessions with my longtime bandmates, improvisational performances with musicians I’ve never played with before, or interactions with fans at live shows.
Some of my biggest influences when I started playing music more seriously in high school were not rock stars on the radio, but rather local musicians in my hometown of Harrisburg, PA. I would go out to clubs with my friends and see these bands up close who were playing shows to packed houses and having the time of their lives. I eventually got to know a lot of these musicians (who were 10+ years older than me) and they became like mentors to me. It was so much more tangible than idolizing a rock star that one might see in a big stadium, though I did have one of those moments when seeing the band, Phish, in 1996. They were playing a small arena in Lake Placid, NY, and when I entered the venue and found my seats, I was annoyed to realize that my seats were behind the stage. My annoyance quickly turned to awe once the show started, because although my viewpoint was of the back of all the musicians that I had paid to see, it was a direct front view of the entire audience. I watched the show and imagined myself being on that stage playing for those people, and that was the point when I decided I wanted to do that for a living.
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I started on classical piano at age 6 at the “suggestion” of my parents and stuck with it for about 9 years. Toward the end of my piano studies, I started dabbling in other instruments, taking brief stints of lessons for viola and harp, the latter of which was an embarrassment insisted upon by my mother that I kept a secret from all my friends. When I got into high school and started discovering new musical tastes, which gravitated toward old classic rock and bands like Phish and The Grateful Dead, I found guitar to be the most relevant instrument and stopped taking piano lessons entirely. I took some formal guitar lessons, but mostly learned by playing along with tapes or with my friends, finally discovering music as a creative outlet rather than rote exercises like my piano lessons. After a few years of playing guitar, and getting quite good at it, a friend lent me a bass guitar and I was instantly intrigued. I loved playing music, but I was shy and never sought out the spotlight. I quickly discovered that bass guitar was a completely essential and directive instrument within a band, but had none of the pressure and spotlight that comes with being a lead guitar player. Not to mention, bass players are far rarer than guitar players, so after just a few months of getting the bass guitar under my fingers, I was immediately recruited for several bands and gave up the guitar entirely. I had found my calling!
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As an artist at my level, I’m all about the sharing. That’s the best way to spread your music around if you don’t have a record company doing it for you. Of course I would ideally prefer if everyone who had an album of mine actually paid for it, since the album cost a lot of time, effort and money to make, but more important is that they have it, listen to it, like it, and introduce it to a friend.
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Ha, it would certainly be more interesting if we had some juicy stories about significant-other drama, but things are pretty tame in my band. No Yoko moments here.
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Birthday Party Clown
OK seriously, how DOES the clown car thing work?
Professional Gamer
What's the longest playing gaming session you've ever had?
Emergency Room Manager
What is the most bizarre thing you've seen in your ER?
Sure, and we’ll usually opt to “sell out” because principles don’t pay the bills! I’m not talking about doing an endorsement for adult diapers or something shameful like that, but we have been known to take a “corporate” gig here or there whose paycheck grossly outweighs its artistic value (or lack thereof).
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Ha, I haven't, but thanks for the great idea!
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We have little tiffs all the time, and after 10 years of playing together, we’ve learned the ropes of how to compromise and pick battles. The times we’ve typically argued the most is when working on a studio album. The stakes are high because the end product is permanent and so much time and effort goes into it. We’ll argue over things like how a song will be arranged, how a guitar solo will sound, what order the songs will be in on the album, etc.
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