The art of shape shifting

Taking care of bid-ness: Spafford headlines the New Year’s Eve show at the Orpheum, which also includes the Haymarket Squares, Diamond Down String Band, Chuck Cheesman. Courtesy photo

Since originating three and a half years ago, Spafford has jammed their way to success and now find themselves at a pivotal moment for many up-and-coming musicians. Their humble origins are still an arms length behind them, but they are being irrevocably hurled forward into the exciting lights and flashes of fame.

When they began they were no more than open mic night participants at a bar, but seemingly have grown into their name and let their electrified jam funk-rock music speak for itself.

It has been a journey for this Prescott-based group, and thanks to a gig last year where they played for hundreds of people at the Hard Rock Café in Las Vegas, the days of open mic nights for the four-man band are a thing of the past.

“Last November marked our first really big show,” says Chuck Johnson, Spafford’s lighting director. “We had never played in front of more than 75 people and all of a sudden we were opening for Particle at the Hard Rock in Las Vegas. At that point we all kind of realized we could do this.”

Johnson recounts the hard work that guitarist-vocalist Brian Moss dedicated to getting the group into that show and how much it paid off for Spafford in their early stages. From huge venues in Las Vegas to later feature performances in festivals like McDowell Mountain Music Festival, Spafford tasted their first bit of fame and set their sights on the future.

As a relatively young band, Spafford’s members are humbled by the origins and history they share together. Johnson met Moss and bassist Jordan Fairless while they were all living in Prescott. It was this early-on friendship that officially marked the start of Spafford. The three bonded over their love for music and the drive to see what they could do with it.

“My middle name is actually Spafford,” Johnson says. “Originally, during the days of open mic nights, it was only Brian and Jordan. And when they got up on stage, the announcer couldn’t pronounce their name. I remember Brian looking at me in the audience and saying, ‘We’re Spafford’ and it just stuck.”

With a name under their belt, Spafford was inducted into the professional world of jam rock and took off from there.

At the time, Fairless was on drums and after sorting through other bassists the group met drummer Nick Tkachyk. The fit seemed destined, so Fairless made the switch to bass as Tkachyk stepped into the drummer’s seat. Soon after, they found Andrew “Red” Johnson who filled the role of keyboardist and Spafford was officially formed.

With members in place, the band began their whirlwind of music making and jam spreading.

“It started as smaller bar gigs,” Johnson says. “But people loved it and soon started following them around Arizona trying to get to every show.”

The stepping stones were laid and Spafford was ready to walk the road. With a growing fan base, the group found themselves learning more and more about each other and how to communicate with their audiences on a different plane. This is what they refer to as the art of the “jam.”

They place an emphasis on knowing each other and knowing music. They approach each show with a single goal: to jam and get people to feel it. Their priority is live music and the originality that comes from their interactions with each other as well as the audience.

“The art of the jam is being able to have free expression,” Moss says. “We don’t communicate through headsets, we just go. Somebody takes the lead and we follow, and that’s why you can listen to one of our songs and find 15 different versions of it. It’s like a snowflake: never the same. So maybe we’re a snowflake band, not a jam band.”

Moss chuckles as he tries to explain the bliss of jamming and creating spontaneously. No song of Spafford is ever exactly the same and they pride themselves on that.

“You let the music go where it goes,” Moss says. “When you get a chance to look at the people, their eyes are closed. And then you close your eyes, and it doesn’t feel like you’re playing in front of an audience. It feels like you are all in the same spot and that energy between us is the most important thing.”

An audience member at a Spafford show is not going to hear the same song they might have fallen in love with when they heard it online or even at a show a few months prior.

Tkachyk notes that a lot of other jam bands get settled in a formula, which he says is exactly what jam music is not about. Audiences at jam-rock concerts are there to feel the music as it is being made.

“When we’re playing we’re breaking the mold of anything we’ve done before,” Tkachyk says. “It really is a jam. There’s no planning for how we’re going to get there. It just really is the art of improvisation. Our best stuff is when we have no idea what we’re going to do, it just happens—true jam.”

There are no cookie-cutter songs, no predetermined sets. Spafford experiences the music alongside their audience and is constantly seeking new ways to feel their art and give that fresh jam to their fans.

“If you’re going to jam well together then you need to feel like one big unit, not four different pieces, and that’s what works for the guys,” Johnson says. “We’re all really close and we all just kind of get each other, so it’s the five of us driving around from show to show in this van talking about who knows what and coming up with new ideas for what we can do.”

This is an exciting time for Spafford. The transition from backyard shows to packed major venues is not made easily, and the group is starting to experience the rewards of the dedication they put into their music.

“It’s like we’re starting to see the dreams we’ve all had as musicians coming to life and being fulfilled,” Tkachyk says. “We’ve all dreamed of becoming a successful band and making a name for ourselves and now it’s actually happening.”

Now Spafford is headlining the New Year’s Eve show at the Orpheum Theater and they encourage anyone looking for a night of originality and a love for jamming to join them. The future is unpredictable, but for this local band, there is undoubtedly promise and possibility on the horizon.

“It’s crazy to think that they were playing in a coffee shop just three and a half years ago,” Johnson says. “Back then it was all just a dream. But it’s grown from a free show in a coffee shop in front of five people to playing a few-thousand-person venue in Las Vegas, and we’re all figuring it out as we go.”

Asperger’s Syndrome Not Linked To Killings In Newtown

It has been more than a week since the massacre of 20 children, and six adults took place in Newtown, Conn. As the time has passed, and people around the world are mourning the lives lost, answers continue to be sought, and new details revealed, though many questions still remain unanswered.

Much is still unclear about the shooter, who originally was reported as Ryan Lanza, but was later apparently identified as Adam Lanza, age 20, Ryan Lanza’s younger sibling (click here for the original article by The Alternative Press), a resident of Newtown.

Adam Lanza reportedly died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound after taking the other lives that day.

Ryan Lanza of Hoboken, N.J. was interviewed by police right after the shooting, and according to news sources, was released as a suspect. Reports also indicate Ryan Lanza said he has been estranged from his brother since 2010, and Adam Lanza dealt with Asperger’s syndrome, and personality disorders.

According to Wikipedia, Asperger syndrome (abbreviated as “AS,” and also known as “Asperger’s syndrome, and “Asperger disorder,” is “an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) that is characterized by significant difficulties in social interaction, alongside restricted and repetitive patterns of behavior and interests. It differs from other autism spectrum disorders by its relative preservation of linguistic and cognitive development. Although not required for diagnosis, physical clumsiness and atypical (peculiar, odd) use of language are frequently reported.”

Reports in the media, especially a December 22 Associated Press article, have noted Adam Lanza rarely spoke publicly, typically wore the same outfit to school, pushed himself next to walls as other students would pass him in the hallways at school, and, even during a presentation at school, permitted his computer to speak for him, rather than presenting the material himself.

The same article alleges Adam Lanza had an obsession with computers, and was often sequestered in the family’s basement room, which was equipped with couches, a flat-screen TV, computer, and video games. A former classmate of Lanza’s in high school said Lanza once played the video game “Counter-Strike” with him, a game featuring terrorists, and counter-terrorists, and chose a military assault rifle and Glock to use during the game (a Glock 10 mm handgun, and a Bushmaster AR-15 were purportedly two of the weapons used by Lanza during the killings).

Adam Lanza’s mother, Nancy Lanza, who was reportedly the first victim of the December 14 killing spree, is said to be the registered owner of all of the weapons used by Adam Lanza in the slaughter. Reports from ABC News indicate as well, Nancy Lanza directed Adam Lanza’s steps in life in diffierent instances; a former babysitter has now come forward stating Nancy Lanza told him to never let Adam Lanza out of his sight when caring for him, requesting he not even use the bathroom when watching the boy. Hairstylists who used to cut Adam Lanza’s hair every six weeks when he was a teenager, said his mother would always accompany him on the appointments, and instruct Adam Lanza when he was permitted to move in the chair; according to the stylist, he never uttered a word, and only stared at the floor tiles as they cut his hair.

The Alternative Press interviewed Johnny Regan, a Sussex County resident, who was diagnosed as an adult with Asperger’s syndrome in 1999. Previous to that, Regan, who said he is also a cancer survivor (a blood disorder, which he is now cancer free from for seven years), was told he was “neurologically impaired,” before the Asperger’s diagnosis. However, Regan has been able to hold down a job, including having worked 17 baseball seasons at Skylands Park as a scoreboard operator. Regan is also very involved in the Sussex County NJ Sports Hall of Fame (click here for a previous article by The Alternative Press), as the group’s historian. At the recent induction dinner, he introduced one of the speakers from the podium, and spoke to many of the attendees during the evening.

Coincidentally, when The Alternative Press of Sussex County released the first article about the shooting in Newtown, Regan was a reader who reached back when a request for comment was posted on Facebook looking for comments about the tragedy, and indicated a friend of his lives in Newtown, Conn. When Regan first heard of the shooting, he said he immediately called his friend to check on his well-being, and learned his friend was safe, and, the friend’s children were as well; they were too young to attend Sandy Hook Elementary School. Click here for the story.

Of the possibility of Adam Lanza having Asperger’s syndrome, Regan commented, about the link some news outlets have attempted to make between Adam Lanza’s supposed issues with Asperger’s, and the violence committed. “It doesn’t apply to everybody.”

“The chilling fact is you don’t have to be mentally ill to be violent,” Cherney said. “There’s nothing definitive between Asperger’s, or any other disorder. It’s a myth.”

Cherney described Asperger’s syndrome as, “sustained impairment in social interaction that starts in youth. It’s one of the defining features.”

Cherney said another defining feature can be the “restricted range of activity. They [those with Asperger’s] can be acutely interested in certain subjects and goals with great intensity. Restricted focused activities are a hallmark.”

This can create disturbances, and difficulties, from work and especially in the relationship domain, in which those with Asperger’s may have difficulty interpreting non-behavioral cues, and gestures, which, in turn, can impact the development of peer relationships.

“Categorical schemes don’t try to capture reality, where intensity or spectrum can shade one into the other,” Cherney said. “This has created diagnostic disputes, and it’s not settled.”

The fourth edition of the DSM, the “DSM-IV,” was published in 1994. Of the revision of the newest manual, and, who decides what is kept, and what is axed, according to the American Psychiatric Association’s DSM-5 website, the planning stages for the upcoming version started in 1999; and between 2006 and 2008, the co-chairs to help bring about the revised manual were chosen, as well the task and work groups formed. Since then, field trials, and tests have taken place, and the draft put together.

The DSM-5 draft manual is scheduled for printing on December 31, and is planned for unveiling at the American Psychiatric Association’s annual meeting in San Francisco, Calif., in May 2013.

In regard to the building process of the manual, Cherney said, “They [the creators] land somewhere by consensus in the building process. It doesn’t mean everyone is in favor.”

Wikipedia notes Asperger’s syndrome was named by Hans Asperger, an Austrian pediatrician, in 1944, to describe four of his patients. The children had difficulties socializing, which Asperger called “autistic psychopathy.” Yet, he also said his patients were “little professors,” for their high intellectual abilities, and potential for achievement in their adulthoods.

Art Cellar celebrates sculpture

The Art Cellar Gallery’s annual area accept bloomed with a new accumulating of sculptures, created in steel, bedrock and clay.

The plan of sculptors Bill Brown, Carl Peverall and Pam Brewer will be acclaimed with a appropriate accident on Friday, July 20, from 4 to 6 p.m.

In ceremony of The Art Cellar’s 20th season, a appropriate ceremony accident will be captivated on the 20th of ceremony month, featuring altered artists.

Carl Peverall has created three characteristic sculptures from bounded bedrock and river rock, and ceremony has been carefully placed in the gardens. Peverall is a multi-media artist, and the arcade aswell shows his plein air landscapes created in delicate on paper.

Gallery administrator Liz Brown said, “I had the befalling to see a admirable agency of several bedrock sculptures Carl created, and I anon asked if he would actualize new bedrock sculptures to affectation at the gallery; I am assertive others will be aflame at the befalling to adore these works in their own area or landscapes.”

Carl Peverall has consistently been fatigued to stone, but it was while active in New Zealand for six months in 2007 that his affection and affiliation to the accustomed actual assuredly confused him to the a lot of physically arduous plan of his career.

According to Brown, “The after-effects are sculptures of accustomed adorableness with ancient, already bashful stones giving articulation to Peverall’s aesthetic voice, some suggesting abstracts others defying gravity, but ceremony with a audible and soulful presence.”

Bill Brown sculptures adroitness accessible and clandestine collections beyond the country, and his civic acceptability has been congenital with his constant charge to cogent his aesthetic voice, while arduous the backdrop of steel, his primary medium.

The Art Cellar is announcement two of his alfresco sculptures in the foreground area and has a advanced ambit of his autogenous plan in the gallery, as well. One of the pieces in the foreground garden is “In the Balance,” an agreeable life-size plan that reflects the accomplishment and challenges of award balance, created in adroit abounding animate with attenuate texture.

Brown has aswell created a numbered copy of baby “In the Balance” sculptures in account of his studio’s 30th anniversary. From his all-embracing alfresco works to his autogenous sculptures and sculptural lighting in destroyed bottle and steel, he continues to articulation his claimed aesthetic perspective.

“The carve I actualize is an aesthetic transformation of activity adventures and interpretations of the apple about me,” Brown said.

Pam Brewer is causing action with her circuitous bank section installed in the foreground garden, Brown said.

Brewer has been creating circuitous installations back her aboriginal years as a flat artist, but this is one of the few ample works not created for a commission. Created from clay, bedrock and glass, this 4-by-6-foot bank section recreates an arcadian garden arena and can be acclimated central or out.

Many apperceive Brewer’s hand-built adobe work, including antic ample beastly totems, ample birds and rabbits, and the arcade has a ample accumulating of her autogenous pieces, including several all-embracing works that are aswell acceptable for garden display.

Brewer said her plan is afflicted by her campaign as a child, the accustomed admirable activity in the mountains and afflatus from age-old cultures, belief and literature.

Brown said anybody is arrive to appear out and bless these sculptors during the 20th ceremony Arcade Bash, airing about the gardens, acquaintance the carve and absorb some time with the artists and apprentice about their inspirations and artistic process.

Also currently on affectation are two affection shows, “ The Grand Scape Series” by Bryan Keith Smith, featuring all-embracing oils on canvas, and “A Land Without Bees,” the paintings of Gregory Smith, aggressive by his accumulating of aged beekeeping accessories and exploring the activity and plight of the honeybee.