IF YOU’RE ALL sad about The Dead Weather shows this coming Thursday and Friday because Jack White will be behind the drum kit instead of playing guitar, you probably haven’t heard the Screaming Females album Power Move. I’m not one to exaggerate, but the album has restored my faith in good guitar-driven rock ‘n’ roll. It’s technically insane, it’s got heart and, best of all, it’s fucking loud. I was able to talk with the three New Brunswickians, drummer Jarrett Dougherty, guitarist/singer Marissa Paternoster and bassist Mike Abbate, about working their way up from the basement to an opening slot at the one of the most anticipated rock shows of the summer.
NYPress: So you’ve already opened for the Throwing Muses, Dinosaur Jr. and The Dead Weather. Is it uncomfortable to play big shows on big stages after playing in basements for so long?
Marissa: Well, usually they have really nice fancy lighting at the big places so we can’t see anyone. It’s almost like we are playing for nobody, which makes me very comfortable. As long as I don’t have to stand 20 feet away from my bandmates then I’m OK playing on a big stage.
Do you not like it when you can see people?
Marissa: No, I’m OK with seeing them, but not when there are 1,500 of them. I’m glad they put up those blinders.
How did you get to open for Dinosaur Jr. in New York and The Dead Weather on a full tour?
Jarrett: Well, for the Dinosaur Jr. show, we noticed that a Joseph Mascis from Amherst, Massachusetts, had ordered our albums on the Internet. I filled those orders...I helped the guy who runs our label fill the order for the new album.We saw those go out to Henry Rollins in L.A. and J. Mascis. A few days after the albums went out, we got an email from Dinosaur Jr.’s booking agent asking if we wanted to do the show at The Music Hall of Williamsburg.
On our last spring tour, in Nashville, we played at this place [called] The End, and after we were done playing, this guy came up to us and was like, ‘Oh I help run this label.’ and me and Marissa were like, oh another one of those guys...He helps run Third Man Records, which is Jack White’s imprint.Then a few days after that we got asked by The Dead Weather’s booking agent if we wanted to go on tour with them.
That’s awesome. Do you get creepy record company guys offering you record deals?
Jarrett: Yeah, we’ve been offered managers and booking agents and publicists and record labels and everything else. I guess you get kinda jaded after a while.We had a couple early bad experiences with people trying to tell us what to do.We stopped listening to those people early on and decided to handle everything ourselves.
And you still book your own shows, right?
Jarrett: Right now, we currently book all our own shows, which has been crazy as far as the Dead Weather tour. I do all the booking and it’s a completely different realm of booking than I’ve ever had to deal with. I’ve been spending hours and hours on paperwork and immigration forms because we’re going into Canada. For right now, we book all our own shows, but at some point I don’t know if I’m gonna want to work all the time.
What’s so awesome about New Brunswick?
Jarrett: New Brunswick, New Jersey, is a weird town. I mean, New Jersey is one of the most densely populated states, but it has no major cities. If you came through New Brunswick you’d probably not think much is going on here.We’ve got one real official venue. It’s a bar, but we like playing all-ages shows.We like things with a little more community, so New Brunswick ends up with a lot of basement shows.
In June the leases end everywhere so everybody just moved, and we’ve got new houses springing up everywhere throwing shows and throwing their first shows of the year. It’s a blast.
Outside of music, what do you guys like to do for fun, I mean, do you all hang out together?
Jarrett: We just all moved into an apartment together for the first time ever, so we obviously like each other enough to do that. I like to ride my bike and listen to music.
Mike: For fun I like to watch Jarrett walk in from his bike ride in his spandex.
Marissa: I like to think about watching Jarrett walk in from his bike ride in his spandex ’cause I haven’t seen it. It sounds really cool. And that’s what I do for fun.
> Screaming Females
July 16 and 17, Terminal 5, 610 W 56th St. (at 11th Ave.), 212-260-4700; 8, $30.
