Norfolk - There are certain bands that hold a certain place in your heart.  It’s an alignment of what was going on with your life at the time and what their songs meant to you.  That indescribable feeling of certainty that this is the soundtrack to your life, written just for you.  For me, the years from 1996 to 1999 were best described in the words of Chris Demakes, Roger Manganelli, Vinnie Fiorello, et al.  Less Than Jake has come to symbolize that feeling of the growing pains in that transition from high school to being on your own in a world where it seems that you are all you’ve got to rely on sometimes.

Over a decade later, LTJ is rereleasing Losing Streak and Hello Rockview on their own label, Sleep It Off Records.  With new artwork…yes Chris?  “Well it’s not really new; it’s just kind of taking the old and kind of morphing it with different colors and stuff…”  That's Chris Damakes from LTJ.  Okay, “revamped” artwork then.  These gems are re-mastered and sounding better than ever and chock full of little extras like bonus DVDs and other such niftiness.  Still not sure if that story from Howard J. Reynolds is still on Losing Streak, though.  Chris?  “You know, someone wrote something about that on our website the other day.  I meant to ask our drummer.  I don’t even know if he even knows…I don’t know…”

[Note from the Wolfe: In case you aren’t aware, the original Losing Streak CD starts with the phrase, “This is the Old Dude, Howard J. Reynolds, and you’re listening to Less Than Jake.”  And then "Automatic" kicks in.  However, if you hit the reverse button on your CD player, the track goes back a few minutes into negative time where one can here the wistful details of one of the interesting stories from the life of the Old Dude.]

Losing Streak was the big definitive moment when LTJ really found their stride.  I asked Chris what was the big difference between that and their earlier albums:

“Well, we had time to work on the songs.  We didn’t have to go in and go, 'Ok we got three hours,' [when] we had two days to record and go as fast as we can.  [With] Pezcore, I sang every song in one day on that record.  You can hear it, too.  There’s bad notes and different stuff, all that stuff they fix today with computers.  We didn’t have that then.  That’s how old my band is, you had to do it right."

After that, with Hello Rockview, LTJ got that happy middle ground between their early raw sound and something that was polished but not over produced.  “That was actually our first 'real' producer that we had ever worked with.”  Thanks Chris for your informative interjection.

And thanks for your time Chris.  I think it’s time for the show…

For this particular show, I was joined by my ever-ready compatriot, the inimitable Tom Ass of "Tales From the Road" and DHH fame.  Being the purist he is, Mr. Ass was quite vocal about his expectations for the show, and I, of course, was the more optimistic loving all of the LTJ catalog and not just Losing Streak and before.  The philosophical debate over the qualities of Hello Rockview versus Pezcore was cut short as the lights went out and the crowd went wild.  You never know what to expect from a LTJ show, but you know you can always expect one thing without a doubt…a good time.  So when Roger Manganelli’s bass came out of nowhere with the first ringing tones from “Magnetic North” off Borders and Boundaries, I settled in for one helluva show.

Doubting Tom Ass was set at ease as Demakes and crew moved seamlessly into a Losing Streak staple with “Sugar in Your Gas Tank.”  Even my slightly sullen compatriot could not help himself but give in to the infectious chants and masterful horn section with Buddy Schaub on trombone and Peter "JR" Wasilewski on sax.  But an LTJ show isn’t just about the songs you can sing every word to at the top of your lungs, it’s about the onstage banter and the crowd interaction.  From a dismembered dreadlock thrown on stage, to a callout for an all-female pit (a “circle clit,” as they put it), the crowd was just as much a part of the show as the songs they came to hear.

There were old favorites like “Automatic” and “Last One Out of Liberty City” to newer ones like “Does the Lion City Still Roar?” off of GNV FLA, they covered almost every era of their catalog.  Speaking of covers, they also gave us a few choice tracks from their new TV/EP, playing such instantly recognizable theme songs as “Animaniacs” and “Sponge Bob Squarepants”, not to mention more crowd-pleasing moments like teaching a pair of eight-year-olds how to stage dive and pulling some poor kid and his mom on stage.  I say poor kid, because even though they did pull a hot chick with a mohawk on stage to make out with him, he refused citing a girlfriend at home.  This did not stop LTJ’s guitar tech from manning up and accepting a lapdance from said hot girl.

The show wound down with an encore triple play.  To start, Chris came back on stage, just him and his guitar, for a really heartfelt rendition of “Rest of My Life” complete with a confetti snow shower.  Moving along with full accompaniment, the band went on to play one of my favorites, “The Science of Selling Yourself Short.”  The evening ended on a retrospective note with the classic “Ghosts of You and Me”. 

In closing, the Tom Ass affair ended with a begrudging “Yeah, it was a good show,” and I walked away with a smile nine miles wide as I found once again, you might not always get exactly what you wanted song-wise from an LTJ show, but you always get exactly what you needed.

LessThanJake.com

MySpace.com/LessThanJake

By Director, Genre Lead, and Editor: Andrew Wolfe

The Wolfe was born to a small litter in the mountains of West Virginia and transplanted to suburban Virginia Beach in the iconic year of 1984.  Left to the public school system, he soon became immersed in the varied subcultures of suburbia. Quickly he became a connoisseur of the rich substrata of disaffected youth in post-Reagan America.  Having to leave corporate tool-hood behind, the Wolfe prowls the silent alleyways in search of the next great spark of local music - the incendiary device that will reignite creativity in a music world gone wrong (apparently in the throes of Bieber Fever).

And other fun facts ...

Age: 33
Place of Birth: Parkersburg, West Virginia
Gender: Raoul Duke
Religion: Gonzo
Likes: Good music.  Drinking.  Smoking.
Dislikes: Ignorance.  People who take themselves too seriously.  People who say "I just wanted to touch bases with you."  It's "base" asshole, not a baseball reference.