Yalies can be rock stars too

The success of underwhelming, former college boogie rock acts like Hootie and the Dave Matthews Band has given people the wrong idea of what college rock stands for. What happened to naïveté? What happened to learning to play your instruments sometime after your first show? What happened to putting out a record before coming out with a t-shirt or a marketing plan? Yeah, Yale has plenty of funk bands providing the extended soundtrack to drunken near hook-ups at frat parties everywhere. But if you look a bit further, you will find some bands that do shows at Yale with the intent of forming songs, not just cool bass licks.

Like the hordes of Yalies who look to alumni for connections leading to lucrative investment banking positions, aspiring Yale troubadours can also find good role models in a number of successful rock musicians.

Mia Doi Todd, BR '97, went home to Los Angeles during winter break of her senior year with a self-released seven-inch and came back to the East Coast a newly-minted, full-length recording artist. While home on break, Todd racked up a few well-received gigs at L.A.'s Jabberjaw club—a kind of West Coast version of New York's CBGB. Thanks to those performances, the recording label X-Mas asked her to put out a CD for them. Todd's record of starry-eyed, chanteuse-like solo musings—featuring backup by Nothing Painted Blue's frontman Franklin Bruno—came out last spring.

Jason Morphew, TC '95, has also recently recorded a full-length CD debut. Combining an earnest love of rock 'n' roll and old-style country with the eccentricities of songwriters as diverse as Hasil Adkins and Leonard Cohen, Morphew garnered both local and student fans during his traipse through New Haven ivy. After graduating, Morphew released a CD on another small but critically well-received label BaDaBing!

Another Yale band that met with post-graduate success is Sunday Puncher, a math-rock foursome who called itself Deluxe during its tenure at Yale. Sunday Puncher has now released two CDs on Turnbuckle Records and toured the U.S.

COURTESY ANDREA LYNCH AND TURNBUCKLE RECORDS Before and After; Howe Lin, SY '97, playing Branford College and going on to release a CD.

Bassist Howe Lin, SY '97, fronted the Yale band Voltron with Ryan Chaffee, SM '99, Dov Frede, SM '97, and Brendan Gibson, TC '97, before he joined Sunday Puncher. In an interview this fall, Lin described his frustration while trying to set up a band at Yale. "It was hard to find people dedicated to something more artistic, or who want to make a statement musically," Lin said. Since graduating, however, Lin has found more than enough support from Yale students outside the Ivory Tower.

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