Get amplified to rock: student bands thrive at Yale

PATRICK MCGARVEY/YH Yale students rock out to their own brand of music.

Somewhere inside almost every suite at Yale, there's a guitar or two lying around. Acoustic, electric, six-string, two-string, or what have you, these unfortunate wooden instruments have a tendency to collect dust in a corner, right next to the nicely framed picture of you and your high school sweetheart at the prom. That's right; after a few weeks, you'll stop calling your long-distance lover and, in even less time, you'll forget about your guitar. What you may not realize is that the Yale community needs you and your guitar. Never mind the symphony, the concert band, the singing groups—those are for real musicians. If you are a true rocker, you will sidestep the establishment and march alongside the small but growing group of rock bands and rock enthusiasts at Yale.

If you're looking to load up the Yale Bowl for a stadium rock extravaganza à la Frampton Comes Alive, you're deluding yourself; audiences for rock'n'roll gigs generally don't exceed 50 or 60 people, and a lot of audience members will be people from other bands who are just there to maintain the scene. The advantage, though, is a tight-knit community of would-be rock stars. Audiences are, for the most part, understanding. Bands lend each other equipment. Triple-bills start to sprout up. Everyone's happy.

Well, maybe not everyone. For some rockers, there's nothing more thrilling than playing in a really good concert; however, there are a lot of obstacles to face on the way. The first is finding a group of like-minded individuals with whom to play. Compromise is probably the best solution. Sure, if you love Richard Marx and the kid across the hall likes to break things while listening to speed metal, then the two of you are probably better off parting ways. But if you can find some common points of musical interest—a few bands or records here and there that you all admire—that should at least be enough to start experimenting.

Then on to the next hurdle: practice space. Neighbors don't appreciate the thump of a bass drum or the squeals of overdriven guitars against their walls, so it's pretty important to have a suitable and comfortable place to play. If you're lucky, someone in your band will be in a college with good practice spaces. Saybrook takes the cake for this one; the college has a spacious practice room with near-soundproofed walls and a PA system. Facilities in other colleges vary; some have rooms designed with quieter musicians in mind.

Once you're practiced up and ready to share your rock'n'roll vision with your fellow Yalies—well, there's yet another obstacle. There aren't too many on-campus venues for rock shows. Trumbull's Buttery, also known as the Trumbutt, is a perennial favorite. The stage is really tiny and the room is really narrow, so everyone—band included—is shoved into close quarters. But it has an intimate, trashy feel, and the carpeting helps absorb the high decibels coming from your drums and amps. The Calhoun Cabaret is more spacious but lacks the Trumbutt's sound-absorbing qualities. Consequently, it can sound like you're in an audio torture chamber. The Morse CD Cafe is similar to the Cabaret, but its popularity for shows has declined in recent years. College common rooms, particularly Timothy Dwight's, also work.

But enough with the sticky details. Signing out PA equipment from your Master's Office, making up posters, schlepping your hardware from practice space to gig place—these things are all annoying, but they do bring rewards. Otherwise, the campus wouldn't have so many dedicated bands sprouting up to threaten your eardrums.

Whatever your inclinations, if you love rock music and you've noodled around with an instrument, get some friends and rock out with them. Disregard notions of quality and don't worry about results: just play. The band scene at Yale doesn't provide the prestige of the Symphony or the Whiffenpoofs, but we're all musicians alike, and we all love what we do. The point is simple: don't let those guitar strings rust in a dusty corner—get amplified to rock.

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