Medicine Hat - It's Gonna be Loud

L-R: Sean Bates, Jason Thomson, Jason Legat, Ben McAllister

For the last freaking month I’ve had the musical earworm of Medicine Hat playing in my head. Despite my desperate attempts to play other songs I’m stuck in some crazy sci-fi time loop. My mind won’t let their music go. Any moment of quietness I start to hear Sean Bates singing the track “I Am” and the intricacies of Jason Thomson (bass), intensity of Jason Legat (drums), and Ben McAllister (guitar) filling in the musical notes in between and I find myself asking the same question - How is it possible that these guys were playing such sophisticated and complex music? They were bloody (insert English definition curse word here - smile) underage playing shows at over-21 bars (just want to point out everything was legal the band had to wait outside to play). Where the heck were Mr. D and I? My curiosity piqued the more I listened to their music. I needed to know their story. It seemed to me in the pantheon of nineties Seattle bands these guys were kind of a big deal and really good musicians. Most of you know who read my journal, I am not the music reviewer in this partnership. I don’t profess to be a musician (although some late night musical things do take place at the Davis household…no recordings exist - smile), but I do listen to music with deep attention.

So on a sunny Saturday afternoon, while we were stationed at our desk, I turned to Mr. D and said, “I need you to listen to this record on Bandcamp. I want to know if you’re interested in interviewing the band for Exposé. They are playing a reunion show at the Royal Room next month and I think someone needs to write about this. It’s been, I think, thirty years since they last played together.” Mr. D’s musician ears perked up listening to the record. The interview was a go. Thus, a series of emails between Ben, Mr. D and I began.

One thing about my college days I miss is doing research, the deep dive, the unexpected discoveries that don’t fit with the research, but want to review at a later point. While I discovered some articles on the band in the Seattle Times, Rolling Stone, and ads in the Seattle PI, one that listed familiar names to me (Terry Lee Hale and My Sister’s Machine) in 1993, it was pics of stories on Medicine Hat’s Facebook page that caught my attention. I recognized that the band were extremely chatty and at ease with the press. I did at times question, are they telling the truth here or playing with the reporter? Their focus to play shows for all ages crowds that still remains a challenge in the Seattle music scene. They also appeared to have vast musical taste. The photos available of the band showed they were very photogenic. A photographer's dream.

I’m digressing just a bit with the back story. Let’s cut to the photographing part, shall we? My observations about the band’s sense of humor and ease at talking weren’t far off. I kept warning Mr. D he was gonna lose control. Throughout the interview multiple times, I started giggling, I mean snort giggling – that’s happy territory for me. I laughed so frequently I sometimes forgot to snap a photo.

In general I tend to avoid using flash, but given the location of the interview, for shooting purposes I decided to bring a flash and my f/1.4. This turned out to be a good call. The boys decided on mood lighting. They also rehearsed in a circle and the entire time I wondered, how am I gonna get a group photo? This will always be my dilemma.

By the way, the band has a warning for everyone who attends the show (Royal Room, 11.7.23, doors 7 p.m.). BRING EARPLUGS! Multiple times before they started playing, the guys kept asking me if I had earplugs and warning me that it was gonna be loud. The volume was the last thing on my mind. I just wanted them to start playing. I desperately wanted to hear “I Am,” my earworm track. They played that track last. It nearly killed me since I was waiting to hear from Mr. D to let him into the rehearsal space. I also wanted to know if the band dynamics are the same. Did they sound as good as the record? I knew Ben is an energetic player and that Sean’s voice was in good form from listening to his solo record (The Central Sound - https://seanpbates.bandcamp.com/album/the-central-sound) and his recent HalloQueen show. I also expected stops and starts during rehearsal.

As soon as they started playing, I was feeling a little stupefied. I’d been playing their record on heavy rotation. The band was fucking synced. Sean’s voice was in fine form and I was distracted by Jason Thomson’s finger movements on the bass. The energy of the drummer Jason Legat was relentless. There was a form of communication between them as they played. I really didn’t believe this was the band’s fourth practice session after thirty years apart.

The band’s cohesive and relaxed flow sometimes led to missed moments and other times during my editing process unexpected reflection. I love taking documentary photos more than staged photos. There’s something more human and connecting about this approach to me. For staged photos, I find some people require a lot of work to get them to relax and some people are just really good at relaxing with the camera. My intuition about Medicine Hat was on par and I find it difficult to say which is my favorite photo from this session (but I think they already know).

Lastly, I want to write about my editing process for these photos. The photos I located of the band were in black and white format, a common use of film photography. As I started the editing process for the interview pics, I recognized that I wanted to format my photos in the same way. I admire the work of Anton Corbjin. The imperfections of his work that look perfect, the high contrast, and the deep blacks in his film photography. My approach was to embrace the imperfections of my digital camera. For example, the group photo shows Sean out of focus, it is grainy in texture, and brightly lit. I wanted to give a sense of being in the nineties a band of friends together again in the dark bowels of a rehearsal space.