Is that short for detention or delirium tremens?
The DT's on life after high school (Dave Crider style)
PREVIEW
THE DT'S
Friday, September 6
The Night Gallery
There's something to be said about being in a band with a best buddy. As in many cases, they take the edge off potentially dull or stressful situations. For example, if you are at a swish party with tons of snobs and you have your best friend by your side, Lord have mercy on the uppity turkeys around you. Add a little best-friend banter and the so-called party goes from snooze-o-rama to all-out fiesta.
That atmosphere has come into fruition for Dave Crider – head of the garage rock empire Estrus Records, former member of the renowned Mono Men, and current member of Watts. When his pal, Diana Young-Blanchard (the sassy dame behind Madame X, Baba Rhum and Lucky Stiffs), moved to Bellingham from Seattle, the band they'd always wanted to form was finally a possibility. The two high school pals clicked with ex-Watts drummer Phil Carter, and have now become an unstoppable garage rock force. Reportedly, the tightly knit unit delivers convincing, hard-soul shakedowns every time it hits the stage.
"We met in high school," explains Diana. "We went to Eisenhower High School in Yakima, Washington – which is basically central Washington. We met in a music class and Dave started fuckin' with me and it went from there."
"We had an argument about Led Zeppelin," says Dave with a chuckle as he reminisces. "I can't quite remember."
"He was actually the only guy friend that I've ever had that's never flirted with me," continues Diana, who is no stranger to making guys' jaws drop during her gigs over the years. "It was all about music right from the beginning –"
"I'm not gay," the very married Dave blurts out, faster than lightning.
As you can probably deduce from their banter thus far, it's more entertaining listening to Dave and Diana goof around than it is to force a Q & A session on them. (Don't ever get them started on the word "ass" or Discovery Channel topics like monkeys and hairy chickens.) Throughout our conversation, as one veteran good-naturedly needles the other, all the teen-angst details come out.
"We were really into music and not too into authority and not too into the bullshit that school was all about," admits Dave. "It's funny when I think about it. I know quite a few other people who grew up in Yakima. Bill from Fed-X (garage band Federation X) has had similar experiences, but when you grow up with it you don't think about it. I mean, Diana and I would go out with our friends on a Wednesday night and get drunk and stoned and then go to school in the morning – and that's just what we did. We didn't know that that was something weird. That's just what we did."
"I had my Subaru," continues Diana, "and I had a tape deck in there and we'd basically get stoned and go park and crank up the Hemispheres and The Cars and the Stones and Todd Rundgren and stuff and just sit there for a couple hours and just groove on music."
Thanks to Diana's move to Bellingham, the two are having great times all over again. Except now, they're a little more popular than one would guess they were in their high school days. She has one of the most drooled-over voices in rock and he is at the helm of a highly regarded rock ’n' roll record label. With Phil on the skins, it looks like Estrus has itself a new hit band... that was only 13 years in the making. |
