by: Michael Zabrodsky (Hot Trax column)

The 10,000 Maniacs are going to take a break.

The time off is well deserved.

"We are going to take an indefinite amount of time off for a rest and recuperation, to be with our families," bassist Steve Gustafson said.

Band manager Peter Leak said. "I'm sure while they are resting they will be thinking about writing songs and thinking about what they want to do. For the last 10 years, almost, they have been working constantly. They haven't had any time off and this will be the first time they will get a bit of a break."

"A few of the band members are going to get married, but I'm not at liberty to say who," Gustafson said. "We will let them spring the news. I will say that it is two boys in the band. Natalie's not getting married, at least not that I know of. We have been talking to the Halicki family and before he (Toby) died he asked us to help him with the musical score of Gone In 60 Seconds II. We might get that going after the first of the year, we are not really sure."

Who knows what this break will mean to the local band?

"I think Dennis and I are interested in getting a few musicians from town and playing a few gigs just for fun - maybe do something with Dave Tidquigt down at Joyce's Keg Room with some different people, maybe write some songs for it and maybe play a few of our favorites," Gustafson said.

Has the band been writing any new material while on the road?

"Yes and no," he said. "People in the band write at different times. I prefer to write when I'm at home. I think Natalie writes some stuff on the road and so does Jerry. I just acquired a new computer with full recording capabilities and I'm going to learn how to use that. It's amazing and I am going to expand my writing capabilities."

Singles of Blind Man's Zoo and Trouble Me came out on vinyl as well as 3-inch compact disc. Seven inch vinyl singles are being phased out in favor of cassette singles. Eat For Two and You Happy Puppet were made available only on cassette.

A special 5-inch CD has also been released, which includes You Happy Puppet, the acoustic version of Gun Shy, Wildwood Flower and a cover of John Prine's Hello In There. These non-album songs were recorded Aug. 22 at Criteria Studios in Miami.

The band has enjoyed a lot of publicity this past year, with the release of Blind Man's Zoo. Then recently RolIing Stone picked In My Tribe as the No. 65 album of the 1980s. Gustafson talked about when the band might play in Jamestown again.

"The problem for coming back to town is that no one in the area, we feel, could promote a concert properly," he explained. "The last time we did a show down there (at Jamestown Community College) the school didn't seem interested in having us. We had to talk them into it, I think. That seems to me what happened. We didn't get much cooperation as far as using the facility because of the open community recreation program they didn't want to interrupt that function."

"The Palace Theater (Reg Lenna Civic Center) and Philip Morris and those people have helped us a lot and we would love to play at the Palace when that reopens. They have the organization to promote these things. There isn't an independent promoter in town that can really do it. Some people have tried. We really wanted to do a full production with the big lights and the nice p.a. that we lease out for this tour. We have enough p.a. to do a 10,000-seat arena. It sounds awesome when you have that much power - a lot of clarity.

"We would really like to do that for our friends and the community, but we'd be the only ones promoting it and we can't do that when we're on the road. When we're not on the road we can't do a production like that for one day. We would have to fly in all our crew and hire the p.a. and lights. It's just impossible," he said. "Maybe it will be just another gig at the Keg Room."