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WC's "Fab Five" Take Their Tunes On Tour
In one way or another, Washington College brings students together. For some it's poetry over cups of coffee in the O'Neill Literary House.
For others, it's the competition and rivalries of Division III sports. And for a few, it's making music.
The five alumni who
form the band Astralyte are carrying a college obsession to a post-graduate profession. Ted Knight '97, Andrew Stein '99, Ross Dettmering '00, and brothers Tim '97 and Greg Parent '00 are taking their sound beyond Chestertown this summer to the rock clubs of New York City and the castaway vacationers of Block Island.
Astralyte comprises Knight on rhythm guitar, Stein on percussion and synth, Dettmering on bass, Tim Parent on lead guitar, and his brother Greg on drums. For the five musicians, the sound is fresh but being in a band is old hat. At one time or another, all have performed with campus bands. One college band, Ghostbox, recorded CDs and went on the road to play schools, festivals, parties, bars and clubs in the Mid-Atlantic region, from Pittsburgh to Richmond.
After graduation the musicians scattered, but soon they found their way back to Chestertown to work or to live. They began meeting on occasional weekends to jam together at a secluded house that Stein and friends were renting outside of Chestertown. The rituals of this tribe were loose. There were no rules, no set songs, no set chords, no set list, no plans, no restrictions. Rather, it was musical "conversation" that they enjoyed with one another--spontaneous, instinctive and intuitive music that grew from disparate voices into an eclectic whole.
"The band's music is largely improvisational, exploring roots in electronica, psychedelia, world beat, rhythm and groove," Knight says. "With the name 'Astralyte', we were definitely going for a space theme. It reaches back to the early concepts of space and space exploration, in the 1950s and '60s. 'Astral' refers to starlight."
With the spirit of exploration forming Astralyte's personality, live performances are fresh and unpredictable--the band's signature piece, "The Ocean and the Jungle," rivals Yes for 20-minute-plus instrumentals--but in no way are they unprofessional. In April, the band even opened with a 45-minute set for Rusted Root--one of Stein's personal musical icons--when the group played the campus's Lifetime Fitness Center.
"Getting the opportunity to open for Rusted Root was amazing," says Stein. "Growing up in Pittsburgh, where they got their start, I saw them in their early days before they became popular. Their early percussion-based sound gave me the personal impetus to begin playing music."
For Stein and Knight, it all began when as students they cajoled from Student Affairs the use of a basement room in Caroline Hall as their rehearsal space. Now, as alumni and staff members at Washington College--Knight is the College's webmaster and Stein is the program manager for the Center for the Environment and Society--they have worked with Bryan Matthews, director of the athletic department, to ensure that students will always have a practice room on campus, a legacy for future students who find their creativity and friendships through music.
"The Ghostbox experience taught us a lot about maintaining a professional front and holding our own with other bands," adds Stein, whose events promotion experience has helped expand the band's horizons.
So, if you miss them in the heart of Greenwich Village at The Bitter End ("New York City's Oldest Rock Club") or on Block Island this summer, you can still hear the Astralyte sound in Maryland. Visit the band's website at www.astralyte.com for future performance dates and venues.
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