Coming Up Spades and Ash Trays, An Interview With The Human Reunion

To say I approached my interview with the Human Reunion with some trepidation would be an extreme understatement. I missed the band’s Cincinnati and Akron debuts earlier this Summer (where they shared the limelight with Enon and Thunderbirds Are Now!), and while I fully expected (based on their collective pedigrees alone) that the band may have already firmly established themselves as Dayton’s newest rock showmen, I didn’t know for sure. Contributing to my hesitation was the fact that I’d been privy to more moniker-related message board crossfire than music, and I’m not normally one to voluntarily rock the Dayton musician shit talk boat (at least not in print).

So you must be asking yourselves why I made arrangements to prepare this
eccentric quintet for their media debut? Simply, curiosity killed the cat. And an
invitation to interview the band at one of their regular bi-weekly practices would
provide the perfect opportunity to adequately sample their aural antics. To be
frank, these four dudes can assume a fair share of the credit for keeping a pulse in the Dayton indie rock undercurrent for over a decade. While this list is in no way comprehensive, they’ve been in some way responsible for the following legacy and current
powerhouse Dayton indie, pop, punk, noise and shoegazer outfits: Lazy, Cigarhead, 8-Bit Revival, Revampire, The Motel Beds, The Lab Partners, We, Electricity, and the list goes on.

Did I mention, that a few of these dudes also have an, um, reputation? I’ve spent enough warm Summer nights in Dayton with HR singer/keyboardist Jeremy Fredericks in my periphery to know these guys would be a handful. I’m not sure that “slightly eccentric” would be the appropriate description of Mr. Fredericks, who spent much of our pre-interview coaching me through applying for food stamps (though he made sure I was careful not to tell them I was “too crazy too work” because they’d make me “spend a week building blocks with retards.”). Teamed with the smart aleck wit and sharp tongue of Dayton drum showboat Ian Kaplan, the quiet cool, and careful dance/fuzz chops of bassist Alan, and the semi-permanent “stink-eye,” and herky jerky keyboard, vocal and guitar muscle of Tim Krug (who was once escorted (i.e. dragged) directly from the stage to the door after a particularly boisterous performance with noise rock duo Revampire), I knew these guys were gonna be a wild card.

To my pleasant surprise, on this particular night, these dudes came up spades -- both behind their instruments and the interviewer’s tape machine. The Human Reunion must be witnessed first hand to be fully appreciated, which leaves me at a bit of a loss for words. However, I happily report that these guys are navigating some of the same blue-flame quirk-rock Ohioans had the pleasure of witnessing during Devo and Brainiac’s heydays. The results of the interview? Well, see for yourself…

Interview conducted in person by Tim Anderl. Photos by Tim Anderl, manipulation by Tim Krug

Name: Jeremy Fredericks (vocals and keyboard), Alan Baker (bass), Tim Krug (vocals, keyboard and guitar), Ian Kaplan (drums)
Band: The Human Reunion

Bettawreckonize: The Human Reunion moniker has sort of taken on a life of its own. Are you guys the real or the fake Human Reunion?

Ian: We’re both.

Jeremy: We’re just reuniting the humans man. It’s not about that. I could say all kinds of crazy shit. Ask Tim that question.

Tim: The only adjective in our name is human. We don’t go by fake or real.

Jeremy: Articles are for people with weak material.

BW: So you guys aren’t the Human Reunion with the monkeys on the website?

Jeremy: We are the Human Reunion that writes songs and plays shows and doesn’t fight other bands. We’re just active as the Human Reunion. You remember what happened to Alanis Morrisette in the big dot-net boom….she lost her ass on that shit man.

Ian: We are The Human Reunion. That’s it.

Jeremy: I don’t know how prudent it would be to….well Craig (the other Human Reunion) was in the band. He left. But, the band was still going on, and he chose not to be in it anymore. Apparently, he was surprised that I was able to pull this off and find other people to play with. He just made different decisions. So we’re like South Carolina and North Carolina I guess….By the time we already got rocking and rolling people we’re already calling us the Human Reunion. And when we started doing stuff with Enon, they told us we shouldn’t change the name because we were already on calendars and stuff. So we had to make that decision there…we already were those people. It would’ve been stupid to change it then. That was a hard question.

BW: The concept of a Human Reunion is sort of a complex one in that humans could be reunited with other humans, or reunited with a favorite barnyard animal or some sort of philosophy. Is there a concept behind the moniker that relates to what the band is trying to do?

Jeremy: Its not really fair to single out barnyard animals. There are a lot of other animals out there. I guess the decision about that is up to the poetic license of the listener.

Ian: We say what we want the band to ultimately sound like or represent and every time we do then we end up doing something totally different ten or fifteen minutes later. But no sooner, I want you to stress that. We have trouble making definite decisions on things because there are so many good ones you can make.

BW: So it is like a Choose Your Own Adventure?

Ian: Yeah, but not that one where you always died. There was one, maybe “Under The Sea,” and I checked it out, even as an adult….there was one where you always died. There was no way to get to the end of the book.

Jeremy: There’s a Choose Your Own adventure where the captain is either Gregory Peck or Tony Clifton.

Ian: Tony Clifton’s adventures under the sea.

Jeremy: We read a lot of Melville man. After each practice we sit together for hours and just read Melville. (To Ian) Sorry, I shouldn’t have been here. You were right.

Ian: Hey, can you start this over?

Jeremy: Yeah, you started in with the heavy shit man. You’re supposed to like, “Do you like candy?”

BW: So you guys have played two shows out-of-town, but not one yet in Dayton. Was that a conscious decision to make your debut in front of the Cincinnati and Akron crowds rather than to introduce yourselves to a hometown crowd?

Tim: I don’t think we really planned it like that. But, I think it is generally easier to have that first show in front of a bunch of people you don’t know rather than people you do know.

Jeremy: The failures that happen the first show, the technical things that go awry…you don’t have so many people, your peers, your best friends or your enemies, or your parents…I always feel a lot of pressure. We had these shows….we were kind of forced into planning this shit so that we’d get our act together. We were kind of floating for a long time, doing all this complicated experimentation, trying to figure out what we wanted to do.

Alan: You had the shows before you got me.

Jeremy: Yeah, we didn’t even have Alan….we were reuniting with him as this was happening.

BW: If someone were to start documenting the life of this band now, in some sort of Dig-inspired documentary fashion, who would be the band, based on those first two shows, that you would have the tumultuous sort of love/hate relationship with?

Ian: The other Human Reunion.

Jeremy: I think it would be the sound guy everywhere. You see, bands are human, sound men aren’t. They’re either eagles or reptiles.

BW: In doing some research on-line I found an actual Human family reunion.

Ian: I graduated with a Human, Mark Human.

BW: This particular one was in Tennessee and started in 1939 or something. My question is: What potluck item would you guys bring if you were invited?

Jeremy: What do they like? Maybe something like a cheese ball or one of those seven-layer taco dip things. Something that you’d have to make people try. Something that looked weird until they tried it and then they’d eat it afterwards. It looked like dog shit at first, but then they’d like it.

Ian: Potato salad?

Alan: Out in the sun in Tennessee?

Ian: Yeah.

Jeremy: How about a couple dead road chickens and a bunch of cocaine? Nevermind. Let’s start this interview over.

(Editor’s note: Ian’s blood sugar was low so we stopped the interview so that Alan could ply Ian with Little Debbie snacks. When I turned the tape back on….)

Jeremy: …that’s not what makes it sound good. Think of Black Sabbath. Those guys probably never said one word to each other the entire time they were in the band together. That’s what I think.

Ian: We have a very strict, severe beating policy….of me.

BW: So you take out your frustrations on the drums?

Ian: No, I’m not even allowed to do that.

Alan: If he messes up on the drums it always results in a severe beating.

Ian: Fuck you. Anything could result in a severe beating.

Jeremy: Just eat your pie. Shut your pie hole Ian.

BW: There are about ten keyboards in this room and there are two set up. Are these the two that you guys actually play with – this Alesis and Nord Lead?

Tim: Those are just keyboards that we have. These are the ones we use.

Jeremy: Those are for the video. You gotta have this shit man.

BW: You guys have some early practice demo songs up on the website. Are those songs that you are playing out and are intending on keeping, or are they some sort of early ideas and now you’ve moved onto other things?

Jeremy: They are early ideas and songs that we’re playing….they just keep getting better and better, though they’re staying almost the same. We just had to put something on there, cause we just needed to. Timmi, answer that question.

Tim: That was like the inception of our music and the stuff we’ve written since then just keeps getting better. But we still think that stuff is good enough to have up until people have seen us at a couple of shows. A lot of that stuff is from our first actual practice in October of last year; the first time that Ian, Jeremy and I ever got together and really worked on anything.

BW: Are you going to concentrate more on playing out for now, and nailing down your songs and your sound, or do you have plans to record something for release to the public?

Jeremy: We are going to do an album, probably sooner than we want to. We want to sort of let things coalesce a little more, but the way that we operate, I could see us successfully recording a record by the end of the year -- conceptionally anyway, I don’t know about financially. We’d put out a record every day if we could, if it was cheap.

Ian: When did you approach me about doing something?

Jeremy: You approached me. I was playing with some guys and we had some communication problems so they walked away. It turns out that the one guy was like, “I’ll introduce you to these guys, but they’ll never play with you.” But they’re into this electronic shit too. I ran into Ian at school, and he was working there, and I was sleeping in a chair. Well turns out that Ian was one of the guys he was talking about. I have those guys to thank for introducing me to Ian. I was getting ready to pack it in again. The last few bands I tried to get together….it was just that I couldn’t get with the right people to do this kind of music. I wasn’t into doing blues-oriented, 70s recreationist stuff.

Ian: A year ago, we had been trying to establish….we always knew what we wanted to do and it is fortunate that we have been able to be on the same gauge for this entire time. I don’t think we’ve had any sort of conflicts about what we want to do, where we want to go, and how we want it to sound. We’ve never had a major conflict.

Jeremy: Except for the beatings.

Ian: If you look at it, much to my chagrin, we are a band based on severe beatings. I’m not lying. This is the only time I’m ever going to be able to say this without being beaten…until later.

Jeremy: Sorry I stopped you when you were doing so good. I don’t want to start sounding like certain bands that we know, and then be like, “This is 60 minutes, and I’m Mike Wallace.” Let me ask you a question, Who do you think the Mike Wallace of the Dayton indie rock/punk scene is? Who do you think the most belly-achingest, most washed up person in Dayton is?

BW: I’m not sure I want to think about that.

Alan: You can write it down….put it on paper.

Ian: You can even stop the tape.

BW: I’m sorry.

Jeremy: Well if you find out who that person is, tell us and we’ll change that for them. We’ll turn it around man. We take old clowns and turn them around. Anyway, that is what these dudes have done for me. But really, I was mowing the grass for Ian’s dad and stuff, and I was like, “Hey man, are you guys jamming?” I eventually worked my way into the house, and got his mom some crazy reefer and it was cool. Sorry, I’m just nervous excited here, so I’m being a little negative.

BW: What preconceived notions about you guys do you think people will come into the clubs with, based on the fact that you’ve all been in a bajillion bands. Which ones are true? What expectations would be totally untrue?

Ian: Hair. Wet Leaves. I think the only constant thing about this and what we’ve done in the past is that it is fucking really good shit….being great. We are the best musicians in the world.

Jeremy: We’re Cher and Paul Schaffer?

Ian: I will kill anybody. I will murder you in cold blood if you disagree with me.

Jeremy: If any drummer out there wants to bug out on him for being good at drums, tell him to go home and beat on his drums some more. Then he can come back. Go practice drums bitch. Obviously there are going to be some preconceived notions based on the fact that we’re playing keyboards. People should expect that none of us are bald yet, that I’m probably going to drink some beers, and probably apologize to someone throughout some part of the evening. But then the music is going to be….no one is going to be able to argue the music at all. No one will say anything about it. They might hate it. But that will just be their own guilt tugging at them man. I don’t know, I just really like what we’re doing and I’m having a lot of fun, so I just can’t imagine someone else not having fun. I’d almost want to see a doctor’s excuse. I’m not saying that in a Hulk Hogan, wind-bag frontman like way, but I think it is just that the people that know us and like us and have seen our bands before will know that this is going to be good. That we’re going to be fun, and turn the love on.

Ian: I want to say something. I hate anything to do with all this post-punk dance shit. I really can’t stand it. I think if people were to walk in and see that we had keyboards set up, you know….it doesn’t sound like that. You’re not going to expect this.

Jeremy: When I see a keyboard on stage, I think that I’m going to hear a bunch of club sounding presets and they’re going to be a hardcore band suddenly playing ambient cause that is what their keyboard sounds like. We try really hard to be as raw as possible, but I’m personally tired of it. I’ve played in a million guitar bands. And people tell me, “Man, you have to play the guitar.” I like playing guitar, but why do you have to play guitars? Well yeah, sometimes we have them, but we’re not going to rely on them or use them as a crutch. We’re going out of our way not to Nuge-out. I’m going to try not to name names of bands that do that….

Tim: We’re just trying to write fun rock songs without picking up the guitars very often. It is still rock music, it is just as unhinged….we don’t really rely on sequences and there aren’t a bunch of drum machines going off and everything. It is still just off-the-cuff, unhinged rock music….made mostly with keyboards.

BW: As I’ve been going out more the last couple months, I’ve noticed that a lot of the Dayton bands don’t sound like other Dayton bands, and they don’t sound like any other band that I’ve heard really recently. I can’t pigeonhole them in my head as any one thing or sound….

Jeremy: Dayton has always been that way. It has always been unique. When I started going to shows in the late 80s, you’d have a band like Haunting Souls who were doing this politico stuff that was borderline-Slayer in terms of heaviness, and the band right after that would have two drum machines and the guy would be naked and wearing a Dominos pizza box and rapping about straight-edge shit. And yeah, there are rivalries and shit like that, and there’s all kinds of scandal like there’s supposed to be, but I think that Dayton….there has always been a great uniqueness here. If there was ever a real “Dayton sound” it was more of an undercurrent running beneath what ever was going on. It was an attitude. I describe the Dayton-music scene, well aside from the funk shit, which was in a school of its own too, I describe the Dayton rock premise as taking a bunch of ashtrays and someone yanks the sheet out to see what lands on the carpet. And someone gets mad, but then the guy who owns the house is mad at the guy for getting mad at the guy. That’s how Dayton is. I find myself disappointed when I go to other cities….it is like Austin Texas, “Wow.” New York, L.A. I’ve been taken to see whatever’s the greatest thing there, and people will say, “You’ll like these guys Jeremy, they’ve got a plastic robot on stage.” Well bands in Dayton may have costumes on, but they’re not wearing costumes. Even if you don’t like what is going on on stage it is probably pretty close to being real. It might be something that you really hate, but you can’t really hate anybody for too long in Dayton without being ridiculous, without being mixed in with the ashtrays. I’m glad you asked that question.

If there is anything behind our name….we didn’t know each other very well. We didn’t have a childhood together, three of us happen to be from Beavercreek, but we haven’t known each other for 15 years and we’re not together because that’s just what we do. But we’re together because we have similar interests, and we happened to bump into each other.

Ian: I think what he said is really poignant. We all bring unique ideas….

Jeremy: We don’t know each others’ bullshit yet….when you get a lot of history together, and you have the same history too many times, you tend to forgive each other’s mistakes. That can be good, and it could be like, “Man, these guys have been friends forever and they’re so good.” Or it could be the other way where, “Man these guys used to play shows, and now they’re turning the guitars down when the football game comes on and just doing it to get away from their wives. I think especially since we….we get along fine, but we’re not sitting around on the couch. We purposely moved the couch out of this room so that no when would sit on it. If you have a couch where you are practicing chances are you’ll sit on it. If you have a couch where you’re practicing then chances are you’re slouching.

Ian: And we also shoot each other. Like with real guns.

Jeremy: He’s always telling people that his dad is a real important police man too.

BW: I can understand having that challenge and chemistry with someone that you’ve been playing with for just a short while, but at what point does it get to the point where you do have that history, but you can still flip the switch….like in the case of the Pixies.

Jeremy: That’s a different story. The Pixies are like what we’d want to be. We have been in bands forever. And it isn’t necessarily that I’m not comfortable with these guys. In fact, I like playing with them a lot better than with people I was supposed to really like playing with. I think the thing is, is that we stumbled upon a good mix of people. We complement each other and right now things are just coalescing. I wouldn’t even describe it as chemistry. We’re just a good musical operation right now. If there are feelings hurt, they are immediate, and it is always me hurting, and taking….I should just quit talking now. Tim wants to say something. Alan does too. Alan is officially in the band by the way. (to Alan) You knew that right? (whole band laughs) So you want to be in the band?

Alan: Yeah.

Jeremy: Ok good. We have stuff in the can going on, but we can’t talk about it. As soon as you talk about that stuff someone loses a hand in a weird, crazy, bad, bad D and D game.

BW: Alan I have a question for you? Do you think somebody is going to be pissed when the find out that they didn’t in fact pick up their gym clothes, but rather lifted your guitar pedals, in Cincinnati?

Alan: I would hope so, and I hope they get hit by a car.

Jeremy: They’re going to be disappointed cause they suck. And they’re gonna get to the pawn shop and get $11 and realize that you can’t even get a decent piece of crack for that. That is the big thing about equipment. Stealing a bag of pedals is dumb. It was probably just some psycho stalker that was in love with Alan.

Alan: It was unpleasant. But, the second show erased any bad taste that may have carried over from that first show.

Jeremy: Yeah, the first show I was having multiple nervous breakdowns and people were asking me, “You think you can handle it?” I don’t want to cultivate it, but I’ve built up this reputation as like someone in between the guy from XTC who was afraid to get on stage and I don’t know who the other guy was….some jerk from a trojan battle. I was asked by someone if I could handle it cause the last band I was in….I almost couldn’t deal with it. But the first show always sucks. When I was in Lazy, every mistake for the first 15 shows stuck in my memory after every show. I don’t know. Were you at that show?

BW: No

Jeremy: So then you don’t know what I’m talking about. It was weird because people really liked it….one cool thing about having electronics is that you have a totally different kind of people coming up to you before and after the show. You get these people who are into bands because they have the same box that you do. Before we even started playing, these kids were asking me, “Do you make you own presets? Do you know how to make this sound on this keyboard?” Its not just like, “You’ve got a Les Paul, bleeeh.” It is cool, but it was kind of freaking me out….

Ian: Most guitar nerds are also guitar players….

(Editor’s note: My keen journalistic eye completely misses the fact that the tape is full. Here is what I can remember: Ian complains about guitar players not wanting to share their sounds and techniques with other guitar players for fear of being copied. Tim commiserates and explains how cool the electronics community are on the Internet and how they share ideas and encourage thinking outside the box. All agree that kids who are into electronics, and their use in music, rule. The conversation switched to how kick ass Human Reunion think TAN! are.)

BW: I missed flipping the tape guys. I’m really sorry about that. I’ll just have to make it up from memory or something….

Jeremy: “I’m Tim Krug. I’m really cool.”

BW: So you guys were talking about the dudes from Thunderbirds Are Now!

Alan: Those guys are great – they’re a lot of fun, they’re really nice, and they’re an amazing band. They’re so good and they almost don’t even realize it.

Ian: They’ve got the right kind of attitude. I met Ryan (Allen) years ago when I was in Lab Partners and he was just as nice then as he is now. He said, “Hey, I remember you.” And even with the small amount of stardom those guys have seen lately, they’re still not letting it go to their heads. They’re still really overwhelmed by it I think.

Jeremy: They seem really surprised when people show up. When we played in Akron with them and Enon, they kept wondering how many people would show up and we’re really concerned with having a good show. They were talking to Ian and they said, “Sometimes we draw here, but I can’t tell….” They have to know that they fucking draw. They’re just really cool – they just want to know about Dayton rock. I didn’t know any of those guys from my past bands. I like to be a stranger everywhere I go. Seriously though, it is nice to have a fresh start and it seems like there is a lot of fun music out there right now. Those guys are doing stuff in a grass roots area, and their making gut-level music from what I’ve seen – it is sort of a fresh Renaissance that’s going on….

BW: It seems like bands are taking a lot more chances in 2005 than bands have during the five previous years….MTV is still playing whatever. For a while it was grunge, then it was rock and roll revival….

Jeremy: And they stretched both out with Creed and Jet. Let’s stretch it out another 10 years.

Ian: And they’re going to do the same thing with dance music. I was telling Tim that after the first time I saw Franz Ferdinand….

Tim: I think that people are always taking chances. It is just that so many chances have been taken now that it seems like everytime something new comes along and really breaks, and becomes a trend, that the next time something totally new pops up, it just makes it that much more interesting.

Jeremy: I agree with Tim on this, but I also think that when the grunge thing happened that there were all kinds of “it” bands. Some of the best shows I’ve seen at seen at like Sudsy Malone’s were during that timeframe. But, I think grunge made it seem possible to everyone that you could latch onto a million dollars, and I think that stagnated the whole thing. It also put pressure on every musician though….cause it seemed like every band was getting signed, it seemed that your major focus was to find that major label and to be as fierce as possible in that way. I think less chances were being taken, and ideas were being dumbed down to try to match whatever Layne Stayley was doing, or whatever. A lot of it felt bad. Big record companies definitely ruined all the fun after that. Look at the difference between the Melvins and whatever shit Creed is doing and it is pretty scary. I don’t think kids get into bands because they’re like, “I wanna be a huge fucking star.” They want to have fun, and to travel, and play good music. Think about what it was like in the mid- to late-80s with bands like Black Flag. They never had any dreams at all about that stuff. They just wanted to do their thing. I notice a lot of younger bands talking about their draw a lot, and using a lot of industry buzzwords. But I also think it has lost a lot of that weird pressure. I was in bands that played showcases for a lot of different record labels. It was a really stiff arena. And you’d get questions like, “You guys were good tonight, but why do you think you could make a commercial statement for Columbia?” That kind of question ruins the possibility of really being a band. If you’re thinking about turning in a product, or turning in homework….this should be an escape from that, from all the boy band shit. I think that MTV’s doing a little better job of not plugging it, plugging it, plugging it, but….whatever, I’ll just shut up.

BW: Do you think it is possible in the current environment to make money and still do what you want to do?

Jeremy: I think people can do whatever they want to do….as long as you’re not gay and want to get married….

Tim: Great, people are going to think we’re total homophobes.

Jeremy: That’s not what I’m saying man. It seems like that is the only thing that you’re not really allowed to do right now. You can be Toby Keith and take your dick out and sodomizing teenage women, but gays can’t get married. Nevermind….

Ian: I think the same basic principles still apply though. You’ve just got to work your ass off, and that takes time, and dedication, and a real honest to goodness belief in what you’re doing. I think that is what really sells it. If a guy from Columbia Records approached me right now, I certainly wouldn’t want to have anything to do with it.

Jeremy: I’d eat whatever food he had, and take whatever free shit he was offering though….

Alan: What qualifies as making money anyway?

Ian: Making money.

Alan: Are you talking about making enough money to pay the rent on a shithole apartment and to eat Ramen all the time….

Ian: No, Cribs makin’ money.

Tim: I’d just be happy with getting enough for gas right now.

Jeremy: The way I look at it is that the more money I have, the closer to Peru I’m digging. I can make a lot of money….it is just the keeping it that is difficult. The dream is always to not have to work or have a regular job, to make your band your regular job. But to succeed at that, there is going to be a point where you have to take off from your job, past the point where it is cool. Bobby Pollard did it, and he was well past his “cute band alert” time. I think the man is a genius, but to think that his thing was picked up and turned into some kind of pulse was just strange. I think if you wanna do something like this you just can’t let yourself get burned out. I think that is the biggest challenge. Keeping it interesting for yourself, and not letting weird shit ruin it, is the toughest part. Oh yeah, and you can’t be pulling any, “I’m not gonna ride with you guys on the bus anymore,” Axl Rose shit. You wanna kill the band, man, have one person who makes all the money and doesn’t pay anybody else. You have to keep things interesting. You have to have other ventures on the side too. Have I told you about our bean catalogue? We don’t try to make it punk or anything man. Our bean people don’t come to our shows and we don’t take our beans to our shows….

Tim: Do you want to hear a couple of songs?