Triad
Style - Tues. October 8th, 2002
ESP
Magazine - Wed. December 18,2002
Winston-Salem Journal - Friday June 13th,
2003
ESP
Magazine - Wed. January 7, 2004
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Buh-bye Neidermeyer, Hello The Saving
Graces
ALLISON KING, Triad Style
(Tuesday, October 08, 2002 12:27 pm)
Things end. It’s unavoidable. It’s particularly inevitable
in the music world, where bands come and go like the tides of the Atlantic.
Still, a lot of good can come out of the disintegration of musical partnerships.
Take Neidermeyer.
The brainchild of musician Michael Slawter, Neidermeyer
was a four-piece Winston-Salem band that formed in 2001
and played its first show at Rubber Soul to a stunned
and enthusiastic audience. The band’s catchy, power
punk-edged, pop rock style fit rather well within the
pantheon of local top dogs like Evoka Project and Penny
Royalty.
The band recorded its first CD ("For Those About
To Pop") soon after that gig (the disc was recorded
in three days!). After snagging a Best Pop/Rock Album
of the Year Award from the Winston-Salem Journal, Neidermeyer
(made up of Slawter and Arthur Gormley on guitar, Chris
Myers on bass and Andy Gerber on drums) seemed poised
to take the rock world by storm. And then in July, just
as the band was gaining even more momentum, packing clubs
and playing big-time gigs like Winston’s Alive After
Five, something went awry. Things started to slowly fall
apart. It wasn’t anything specific, no cataclysmic
scandal rocked the local scene, no rumble or fights,
just a difference of musical opinion.
According to Slawter, the simple cause of the band’s
breakup was just that the members of the band started
to get interested in other projects, other bands and
other avenues of expression. Meanwhile, Slawter started
writing songs that were much more on the acoustic end,
and was leaning more toward the pop end of things.
“Everyone decided that rather than end up hating
each other, we’ll all do something else,” he
said.
So that’s what happened. Slawter is now leading
a new rock trio called The Saving Graces, and the group
already has an EP on the way, recorded and produced by
Winston’s own Britt “Snuzz’’ Uzzell.
I pulled up the trio’s Web site (www.thesavinggraces.com),
and I wasn’t surprised to see that Slawter already
has a first-rate thing going — press page, bio and
photos. Even band T-shirts already are available. Next,
I listened to “Song for Anyone Else,” the sneak
peek track from the as yet untitled 5-song EP. Melodic.
Acoustically driven. Decidedly pop-ish,. The song is
a hands-down winner. There’s still a jangly edge
to The Saving Graces sound, but the dreamy harmonies
(at least on this track) soften the crash considerably.
Can we say radio?
Slawter wrote all the tracks on the upcoming EP, and
while he says the energy seems to be from the same ether
that drove Neidermeyer, this project is different in
more than a few ways.
“Neidermeyer was a band; this is a different thing,’’ he
said. “ The rhythm section is awesome (Drew Jenkins
on bass/vocals and John Holoman on drums); they’re
cool guys and there’s no ego at all. But the core
of the project is me, and that’s really the main
difference.
“What Bob Mould (of Hüsker Dü) did with
Sugar was what I was thinking.”
In light of that, we need not worry about where Slawter
and The Saving Graces are going. If you liked Slawter’s
reedy tenor, and the sonically charged drive of his former
band, you’ll really like The Saving Graces. After
just two months of writing, recording and rehearsing,
the band has already got gigs on the books and a new
CD almost ready to hit the streets.
Is another Journal award far behind?
And check this out. I pulled the following quote from
the Bob Mould Web site: “SUGAR do not take requests.
SUGAR do not banter with their audience. SUGAR are not
cute. Bob Mould, Dave Barbe, and Malcolm Travis are a
glowering juggernaut, and for the next 90 minutes or
so, they will be the best rock band in the world.”
Now, let’s see if The Saving Graces can become
that same kind of “glowering juggernaut.’’ My
money’s on Slawter. If anyone can do it, he can.
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The Saving Graces Slawter's new vehicle
BY GRANT BRITT - ESP
MAGAZINE
The main difference between his old band, Neidermeyer and his new one,
The Saving Graces, is that "I make most of the decisions in this
band," says guitarist and founder Michael Slawter. He's quick to
add that he hates the way that sounds, but believes that the rest of
the band, Drew Jenkins on bass and John Holeman on drums, don't mind
the fact that he takes care of that end of the band's business.
"This band is a vehicle for my songwriting," Slawter
explains, whereas four people made the musical decisions
in Neidermeyer and at least one more, guitarist Arthur
Gormley, aided in writing.
There are other differences between the two bands as
well. According to Slawter, Neidermeyer had more of a
punk edge, "sort of like the early Replacements." That
band, labeled by Rolling Stone as "perpetually drunk
teenage miscreants," was known for its raw edged,
skate-punk garage sound and raucous tunes like "Gary's
Got A Boner" and "Tommy Gets His Tonsils Out." The
Minneapolis group flaunted its punk leanings prominently
on its debut '81 album, Sorry Ma, Forgot to Take Out
the Trash and the '82 followup, The Replacements Stink.
Slawter, the Winston-Salem guitarist, lists the Replacements
as one of his all-time favorite groups, admitting that
the sound he was going for with his current band is "the
latter day sound of the Replacements."
"Power pop" is the term that the industry
and critics have for the music, but Slawter says that
everybody he knows in pop bands hates the label. Asked
for his definition of pop, the guitarist says, "It's
not what you hear on the radio -- not the music of Britney
Spears."
His idea of what pop music is has its roots in another
time. Elvis Costello, The Replacements, Cheap Trick and
Big Star are Slawter's idea of what the genre should
be about.
To demonstrate his point, The Saving Graces have just
released their debut album, These Stars Are For You.
But once again, Slawter says that the focus is primarily
on him. "It was a way to show the diversity of my
songwriting, to try to attract a publishing deal." The
songwriter/ guitarist says that The Saving Graces were
not a even a band at the time he wrote the songs.
Slawter says what he was trying to do with These Stars
was "to be able to hand a copy to somebody and say
it was the very best I could do." Not that the songs
and the sounds of his previous band weren't. Neidermeyer's
release, For Those About To Pop got high marks from critics
and was voted Best Pop Rock Album of 2001 in several
area readers and critics polls.
This time out, the focus and the sound are different. "We're
a tighter band," says Slawter. The band also takes
more time in the studio to work on their output. "These
Stars took four months to put together. Neidermeyer's
record was done in about two days. It was more of a demo
than anything else," says Slawter.
But just because there's more time taken with the work
doesn't mean that it has lost its edge. If you're looking
for a file drawer to slide the Graces in, try aggressive
or raw. Slawter's main guitar influence is Mick Ronson,
longtime Bowie axeman known for his cutting-edge work
as chief Spider from Mars during Bowie's Ziggy Stardust
period.
In the hands of the Saving Graces, pop goes on with
a bang, not a whimper.
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Happy
Wanderer Keeps Playing
Songwriter-guitarist's
newest assemblage, its stellar CD just released, will
perform at The Garage
By Parke Puterbaugh - Winston-Salem Journal
• The Saving Graces will open for Will Kimbrough at 10 p.m. Saturday at
The Garage, 110 W. Seventh St. Admission is $6. Call 777-1127.
There are several scenes in the rock-band 'mockumentary'
This Is Spinal Tap in which the key members discuss their
evolution, name changes, and the comings and goings of
various drummers. The timeline and cast of characters
are amusingly Byzantine, and their tortuous recollections
cast an affectionate light on the almost devotional obsession
of the diehard rock 'n' roller.
Michael Slawter is a figure cut from the same case-hardened
rock 'n' roll mold. A genial guitarist, singer and songwriter,
he has been in more bands than you can shake a pick at.
The more he attempts to unravel the braided strands of
his band history, the more complex the threads seem to
become.
Slawter, 34, has been playing in bands for half his
life. He has been entangled, at one point or another,
with many of the major players on the Winston-Salem rock
scene from the mid-1980s to present. His group affiliations
include Jonathan E, Jack B Quick, Speck, the Wagteens,
Wafer Thin, Pill 9, Pulltoy and Neidermeyer. He has never
gone more than six months without being in a band.
Now Slawter is fronting the Saving Graces, which has
just released an EP on the Paisley Pop label (based in
Portland, Ore., and devoted to issuing the work of 'great
artists in the modern rock, power pop, jangle-pop, alt-country,
and indie pop vein'). Titled These Stars Are For You,
the five-song CD was co-produced by Slawter with Brent
'Snuzz' Uzzell and D. Henry Fenton at Snuzz's house.
This summit meeting of several of the area's brightest
musical minds has resulted in a power-pop mini-masterpiece.
It is Slawter's most tight and tuneful outing to date.
In a more perfect world, such standout tunes as 'Idiot
Proof' and 'Girl Automatic' would be streaming from radios
everywhere.
'I hope there's a number of people out there who think
like that,' Slawter said with a laugh from his home in
Winston-Salem as a sweetly disposed dog named Madison,
a mix of yellow lab and chow, paced the hardwood floor.
Yet the sad fact is that in these melody-averse times,
quality pop songcraft can't compete in the corporate
marketplace with the aggressive likes of Linkin Park
and Staind. This hasn't deterred Slawter or any of his
colleagues in the Paisley Pop network - the Windbreakers,
the Rain Parade, True West and other acts with 1980s
roots - from making the music they're driven to do.
The other members of the Saving Graces are bassist Drew
Jenkins and drummer John Holoman. 'They're unbelievably
tight, like John Entwistle and Keith Moon,' Slawter noted
proudly. In concert the Saving Graces are rounded out
by guitarist Jay Manley, from the Chapel Hill buzz band
Velvet.
Slawter has worked up 25 original tunes with the Saving
Graces, who also throw in some choice power-pop covers.
These include 'Ever Fallen in Love,' by the Buzzcocks,
'I Got You,' by Split Enz, 'Oldest Story in the World,'
by the Plimsouls, and 'Never Say When,' by the dB's.
When it's pointed out that these four span the period
from 1978 to 1987, Slawter responded, 'Can't help it.
That's who we are and who we play to. They're all people
in their late 20s, early 30s, even 40s and 50s. That's
who's following me.'
'Playing live, we're just such a straightforward rock
band,' he continued. 'Most everything is midtempo and
uptempo, and it's fun music. It's energetic. We're trying
to get people moving.'
Slawter has the best of both worlds. He's always in
a band, with all of the struggles and uncertainties that
entails, but at the same time he enjoys the stability
of a career and family. He has a bachelor's degree from
High Point University and works at home as a Web designer.
He also looks after his son James, who is 21/2, while
his wife, Laura, is at work. She is employed at Salem
College, where she works in donor relations.
Not surprisingly, the two of them met at a record store
- the Record Exchange, in fact, which is where Slawter
nurtured his musical obsession.
'The first record I bought on my own was Murmur, by
R.E.M., and it just took off from there,' he recalled.
'I was so into it, I was like a sponge. Anything and
everything. And when I saw 120 Minutes (MTV's sop to
more innovative, cutting-edge music), I went out and
bought every album that I saw. They Might Be Giants,
the Cult, the Cure, all that stuff.'
Slawter was a tape head. He bought cassettes so he could
listen to music both at home and in his car. He carried
around a briefcase filled with tapes the way an investment
banker totes a leather portfolio stuffed with important
papers.
'I kept my cassette case in the back of my car, and
by my junior year I had five of them that were all completely
full,' he said, laughing. 'I carried them around with
me wherever I went. People used to complain about it
all the time when they'd get in the back seat, 'cause
I had all these stacks of cassettes.
'I was hitting Record Exchange every Tuesday to see
what was new. I mean, if I had $10 in my pocket I would
go right out and buy two used cassettes or something.
Just because. Just 'cause I had $10!'
He erupted into an infectious, roiling giggle.
'It was kind of funny,' he said, 'because in college
the dorm room would have a chest of drawers, and I would
just fill it up with cassettes and have to put my clothes
somewhere else.'
Little has changed in the ensuing 20 years except that
compact discs are Slawter's medium of choice these days.
An old back room where the lawn mower used to be stored
now holds an alphabetized CD collection in neatly arrayed
rows that would do the Smithsonian Institution proud.
'My wife will tell you, it has never stopped,' he said.
'I've never stopped buying music.'
Over the years, he has become as prolific a songwriter
as he is a collector.
He estimates that he has written 600 or 700 songs, and
he never carries over songs from one band to the next.
His previous group, Neidermeyer, broke up because guitarist/singers
Slawter and Art Gormley were moving in opposite directions
- Slawter wanting to do poppier things while Gormley
was heading in a heavier direction.
'It burned brightly, and that was it,' Slawter said
of the foursome, which left behind one promising CD (For
Those About to Pop) and a year and a half's worth of
fondly remembered live shows.
These days Slawter is moving forward with the Saving
Graces while displaying the same tireless good humor
and dedication that has carried him through half a lifetime's
worth of bands and gigs so far. In fact, if they awarded
a Grammy for the power of positive thinking, Slawter
would make a strong nominee.
Meanwhile, if there is such a thing as musical justice,
These Stars Are for You will raise the national profile
of Slawter and the Saving Graces.
• Parke Puterbaugh, a free-lance writer for Rolling
Stone magazine and other publications, writes about pop
music for the Winston-Salem Journal. He can be reached
at parkep@aol.com.
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Saving Graces - what power pop’s
supposed to be
By Grant Britt - ESP Magazine
Michael Slawter is a graphic designer by day. Come the night, he turns
into a rocker who has become the poster boy for power pop in this area.
But the Winston-Salem guitarist says he hates the label. Even though
he’ll admit that bands he admires and is often compared to (like
Cheap Trick) belong to the pop era, what the term has come to mean doesn’t
jibe with his feelings for the music that is displayed under its banner.
Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake just don’t belong in the same
pool that once had groups like the Replacements and Elvis Costello thrashing
around in it.
Slawter, who learned his first guitar licks from listening
to Mitch Easter in the glory days of his band Let’s
Active, recently gave a little something back with the
release of Every Word: A Tribute to Let’s Active,
which came out in July of 2003. The record features 20
cuts by Slawter and fellow Easter appreciators covering
Let’s Active’s career, and included live
performances at the Garage and Summer on Trade featuring
some local bands doing Let’s Active material.
While Slawter acknowledges the Easter influence, he
was no means the only one. On his first release with
his band the Saving Graces, These Stars Are For You,
Slawter came out rocking hard, paying homage to bands
he’d long admired like the Who, the Move, and the
Replacements, even admitting that the sound he was going
for with his current band is “the latter day sound
of the Replacements.” He also managed to acknowledge
his main guitar influence, former David Bowie (Ziggy
Stardust era) guitar slinger Mick Ronson.
But Slawter says that The Saving Graces were not a even
a band at the time he wrote the songs. To remedy that
situation, Slawter and the Graces, featuring bassist
Drew Jenkins and drummer John Holoman, released The Saving
Graces Live at the Garage in September of ’03.
Some of the songs on the new disc are also on These Stars...,
including “Girl Automatic” and “The
Things That Make You Strange.” “Girl Automatic” has
brought comparisons to The Who due to its slamming power
chords, and “The Things” is the tune that
brings up the Cheap Trick references.
And as is the case in any live performance versus studio
recording, the band’s latter versions are more
upbeat and harder edged. There’s another difference:
There’s a member messing. For the past year, Graces
had swelled to a quartet with the addition of guitarist
Jay Manley. Though Manley was never officially acknowledged
as a member, he appeared with the band for all their
gigs in 2003. But the guitarist had a conflict with his
loyalty to his band Velvet and felt that he should have
been devoting more time to that project, of which his
wife is a member. Fans of Manley can hear him both on
the new Graces work as well as on his upcoming Mitch
Easter-produced record, due out in the Spring.
Slawter and the Graces are appearing with a songwriters-in-the-round
tour with Don Dixon, Robert Crenshaw, Jamie Hoover and
Bill Lloyd. Dixon needs no explanation to anybody familiar
with the area music scene, having been one of the pioneers
in producing and performing pop music for the last couple
of decades. Robert Crenshaw is Marshall’s brother
and has backed his sibling on the road and on record
as well as creating and performing his own original material.
Jamie Hoover works gigs as the Spongetones’ drummer
while balancing careers as a songwriter, producer, guitarist,
bassist and arranger. Bill Lloyd was part of the duo
Foster and Lloyd and has dabbled in the pop, country
and rock arenas while writing tunes for a slew of country
artists.
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