|
STREET BEAT BAND PROFILE
by Ernie Thomas
 Most
bands who choose to do original music over covers have high level dreams
of MTV videos, world tours and all the trappings of rock stardom.
Not the case with Dumpstar, a quartet boasting three
Hoosiers and one South
Sider, who create modern rock rife with sequencers (i.e. Orgy and NIN).
"It’s not that we wouldn’t like a record deal and all
that," said vocalist Jerry
McCormack, "but that’s not what drives us as a band."
McCormack and bassist Dave Wallace got a taste of the
"business side" of show
biz in the late 1990s, while in the heavy rock group, D’Gruv.
That outfit spent
considerable time flirting with such labels as Metal Blade
Records before ultimately disbanding in 1997.
"If someone doesn’t come knocking on the door
with a contract in hand, well that’s okay. We’re doing this because
we love to play music," said McCormack.
Their music screams with positivity. "We’re a
pretty heavy band with pretty
heavy music, but being heavy doesn’t mean dark," said McCormack.
"We try to have a
positive message in everything we write. There’s enough
darkness in the world today." Their uplifting messages are
tucked into metal-edged songs which employ pop elements like catchy
choruses and three-part
vocal harmonies.
Dumpstar also features drummer Edd Merkel and former
Firescape guitarist/vocalist
Mark Ditmars. "Firescape and D’Gruv did a lot of shows
together and Mark and I became close friends," said
McCormack on the roots of Dumpstar.
"About a year after both bands broke up, Mark and I started
writing together and playing as a duo."
Eventually, Wallace and Merkel were brought in to the
project. The four originally
hooked up in 2000 and after much rehearsal, took advantage of some
old booking contacts in Central Indiana.
Dumpstar’s music soon found a comfortable niche in
such burgs as Lafayette and
Bloomington.
"We were playing down there a lot, but that got
to be a long drive week after week to do gigs that weren’t paying
much," said McCormack. Plans to
break into the Calumet Region/Chicago club scene were suddenly
disrupted when personal
affairs needing his attention resulted in Merkel taking an extended
hiatus from the group in 2001.
"We put classified ads out and spent almost a
year auditioning drummers. We
had some good drummers try out, but nobody really fit with what we were
doing," said McCormack.
Eventually, they found beat-keeper who fit their
sound, but the long-distance
gigs and moderate pay soon wore thin.
"We’d always stayed friends with Edd and he
came down state to see us play a show," recalled McCormack.
"That next week the drummer we had been using
told us that he would not be able to stay with the band, so we
called Edd about filling in
for a show."
Timing proved fateful. Merkel ended up returning full
time to the band last fall. Running on all cylinders once again,
Dumpstar has now returned to their original game plan of cracking the
Chicagoland club scene.
They recorded a self-titled 13-song CD at Watchman
Studios in Valparaiso, and culled a 4-song promotional EP disc from that
collection, which they now hand out free to potential fans when national
bands of their same style play places like Metro and Double Door.
"We stand outside and pass out 300-400 of
the 4-song demos," explained McCormack.
"The [marketing] plan seems to be working, because a few days
after we hand out the demos, we see hits on our web site really
go up. We have found that a lot of people log on (www.dumpstar.com
) to find out more about us and some even order the full album."
Dumpstar’s song, "Static," will be heard
this summer on the soundtrack for
the DVD release, "Judgement Day 2," released by Barracuda
Films in association with
X-Factor Video. The DVD will feature death-defying,
high-speed street bike stunts filmed in various parts of the
world.
|
