Well, it comes time again to revise the ever-growing and oft-meandering history of Small-Town Dogma. It seems the longer the history goes (at the time of this writing it has been nearly 7 years since The Birth) the harder it is to come up with interesting things to talk about. This is, of course counterintuitive. Clearly, the longer we go, the more interesting things we should have to talk about. Undaunted, I shall assume that being a member of the band… nay, the experience of Small-Town Dogma has been so amazing that many of out great moments which would be life-defining experiences for many have become but commonplace to us. Sure. That must be it. Eat that, Iggy Pop. And so I begin.
Common lore has it that Small-Town Dogma was originally formed with the name “Applesauce” at an 8th grade lunch table, upon our realizing that young Rick Gerriets’s favorite lunch item would be a pretty cool name for a band. You see, Ben, Rick, and I were deeply drawn to our rock idols of the mid-nineties. We loved us some Smashing Pumpkins, Nirvana, Green Day, Presidents of the United States of America, Bush, Oasis, and so on. We decided that the only way we could get chicks would be to somehow form a band and cultivate talent. The band formed, and we trusted the talent would surely come.
As real as our imagined talent potential was, we would have no proving ground until we acquired instruments. Through calculated savings and requests for Christmas presents, first Ben and I and then finally Rick acquired the instruments with which we would later become semi-competent. Ben took a side-project uniting two pairs of brothers. Ben and Matt Kennedy, Wes and Lee J. Webb formed Keychain… also known as Overdrive, Perfect Blue, and something rather amusing about frogs whose precise wording currently eludes me. Eventually they settled on Nevernoise. Together they wrote some good songs, some of which are still played by Small-Town Dogma today.
When Nevernoise came to its sad end, Ben devoted some more time to Small-Town Dogma and our practice schedule picked up. We threw together a few songs to perform in front of people, playing a few people’s parties between our junior and senior years. We made our formal debut at the Princess Anne High School talent show our senior year, playing “Phaeton.” We lost, but were filled with the hope that we could get people to sit down and listen to us time and again should our existence continue.
Damn it felt good to be in Dogma, and it only got better. Throughout the spring we practiced more intensely, and finally met the fellows of a band then-known as Noh Poppy. They would play occasionally at the First Colony Coffeehouse. One day, as they took a break, Rick was bold enough to ask Justin (guitarist/singer) if we could play a song during their break. And so we played Radiohead’s “High and Dry” and AC/DC proclaimed “Let There Be Rock” (apologies to Mike Jenista). The guys helped us get a couple of our own gigs at First Colony, the first of which Rick was unable to attend, but Ben and I played, employing the “index card method” in which the order of notes for the main parts of each of our songs were written on index cards. This was the night where we established the bulk of our live repertoire. We followed with a Cinco de Mayo gig and were set to have a most triumphant third toward the end of May, when some aromatic blend of disaster and opportunity struck us…
First Colony, you see, had a reputation for being a nice place with questionable management. We arrived for our set Thursday gig to find that the shop had spontaneously closed (for good) on Thursday and was locked. With our friends showing up literally by the dozens outside the closed establishment, we knew something had to be done. And we did it. Pirating the power source for the outdoor Christmas lights that were still operating in May, we rocked out in the parking lot of the defunct establishment until the police arrived and we peaceably dispersed. The stand had, however, been made. We were a band that was going to perform no matter how many coffeeshops closed in attempts to foil us.
Onward we swept to Cafexpresso, a bit across town. There we had a more intimate locale, but still friendly and happy. Our live repertoire grew, and the management and our friends agreed that we were, in fact, improving. This also marked our historical first live performance with Wes, which was at the time, easily our best performance to date. This was the first place we ever shared a bill with redBus, the best band in the world. The sound of two guitars was clearly in our future, but with the summer rolling to an end after our fourth Cafexpresso show, we had to part for college. Both Ben and Rick were at JMU, while I was at UVA.
At JMU, Rick and Ben kept things up and changed a little, forming “The Expendables” and performing a few shows at the campus site “TDU”. During this school year, we received the news that Cafexpresso closed down, and we would need to find a new place to play upon our return. Faced with adversity, we discovered the Wired Monkey. Wired Monkey was a fairly hip new coffee establishment ready to foster some blooming musical talent. That and Small-Town Dogma. We had a few shows there and made a grand summer out of our first post-college. This is, as Small-Town Dogma enthusiasts (I think I can be bold enough to say there are a few outside of its members) will remember, when the Nancy mystique began.
You see, Small-Town Dogma (even when it was called Applesauce) always aspired to actually record something, but had yet to put anything out for our friends to hear. We were hell-bent on making an album come together, and we started working on it… a really long time ago. Anyway, we recorded a lot at Nathan Hoobler’s house over the summer of Wired Monkey. Nathan, a long-time buddy of ours had agreed to produce the album. The recording sessions were fun, occasionally productive, and we hoped to release our the EP at the final show of that summer. These plans fell through as we started to listen to the recordings and realized that they were, well, rather sucky representatives the 5 years that had led up to them. Instead, we lured people to our final show of the summer by starting rumors of a breakup and instead announced the impending release. We are bad people, but wasn’t it a good show? Why call it Nancy? That’s a different story. Dig the Nancy story here. I sadly curtailed our summer together because I departed early for UVA to train to drive buses. Call it fulfilling our blue-collar-roots requirement.
Aaaaanyway. The following school year didn’t yield any major Small-Town Dogma developments, though Ben transferred to William and Mary and finally finished his “Disadvantage Point” solo project titled Crisis of Location. It’s a good-’un. We had played a song or two from it over the summer as well.
I continue. We returned following our sophomore year, halfway through college, and found that a third coffee shop had closed in our wake. With the Monkey gone, we did what we always do. Let Rick talk to Virginia Beach’s underbelly until a new venue rears its head. More important things, however, were afoot. We finally nailed down the venerable Wesley Webb as a fulltime band member. Our sound’s evolution took a serious quantum leap.
We booked a gig at Cici’s Pizza and it was a fun time. Despite the weekend we'd spent in Charlottesville still working on Nancy, we slated the gig for the night of our return. One frantic drive later, it was Cici's time. It was our first show that featured a cover charge, but we figured it wouldn’t be so bad since it included free pizza. However a few things left a bad taste in our mouth. They cut our show shorter than they said they would, they stopped serving pizza earlier than we thought they would, and the performance space wasn’t the best. A highlight, however, was that the Buttercream Band opened for us and it was awesome. We played a half-hour set at an open mic night at this place called Classic’s down by the beach. This was a pretty sweet venue that Rick got for us. Our first and only show with monitors (oooooooooh…) This venue, however, didn’t yield further gigs and we found Uncle Huby’s Sports Bar. Like Cici’s before it, this was a place that catered mainly to hardcore acts, the general mainstay of Virginia Beach’s local music. We conveniently consider ourselves a refreshing alternative. Two shows at Huby’s followed, and there was much merriment. This was a fun place where we had a stage and it basically let us do what we wanted. We got to share it with redBus (the best band in the world), Weekly Reunion (Wes’s other band with Lee J and Christian… represent!), Orange Drink (DREW = ROCK), as well as Damaged Goods and Vox Humana. After the first semester of our third year, we had a reunion / farewell for a bit show at Huby’s. Here we finally shared the stage with not only redBus (the greatest band in the world) and Aleph Naught (Nathan, Rick, and I joining the venerable Adam Forte), but also The Nate Cotter Impromptu Experience, an experience to be sure. This guy is going places, and we love him.
We now arrive at the present (beginning of 2004). I’m studying abroad in Spain for the semester (in Valencia, home of those tasty little oranges). Nancy is FINALLY done. As Ben eloquently put it, “The wait is over… now let the disappointment begin.” The cover debate finished (I voted for “smell the glove”), you should be able to get a copy soon. If you already have one, good for you! You are among the countless incredible people responsible for our continuing to do this. Sure, I’ve been long-winded about our history, but I’ve done so only to demonstrate how much I’ve thoroughly loved every minute about this journey. There’s no way we would have gone on like this so long without awesome friends like you. Special thanks go out to one and all. And we eagerly await our bassist's return from Spain. Thanks, Rogge.
Any more facts you'd like to know? Rock us an email over at webmaster@smalltowndogma.s5.com.
