Video, Tour Mark Return to Spotlight

by: Roger Catlin (Los Angeles Times Service)

It has been almost a year since 10,000 Maniacs completed its Blind Man's Zoo tour and quickly dropped from sight.

In that time, charismatic lead singer Natalie Merchant moved from Jamestown, N.Y., where the band was formed nearly a decade ago. Keyboardist Dennis Drew got married, as did drummer Jerome Augustyniak. Guitarist Rob Buck spent time away in his home in Albany, N.Y., helping produce new bands in that area. And bassist Steven Gustafson bought a house in Jamestown, where he's been putting in some work remodeling.

"I was playing carpenter today," Gustafson said over the phone recently. "Putting windowsills in."

Of course, he spent all the previous week with family in Quebec. "The whole week, the only thing I concerned myself with was where to go fishing that day," Gustafson said.

Now, there seems a manic pace of Maniac activity. A new release, Hope Chest, just out, collects the band's first two independent releases, which have been long out of print.

Also new is a video compilation, Time Capsule, directed by Merchant, which shifts from live performances from various stages of their career to familiar studio videos to childhood home movies.

And to promote all this activity, the Maniacs are embarking on a low-key tour.

"It's hard to believe it's been 10 years that we've been together," Gustafson said. "We figure that's a cause for celebration."

So even though the band had not reached its widest success until its last two albums, In My Tribe in 1987 and Blind Man's Zoo in 1989, it's time to look back to the early days, when there was only one place to play in Jamestown and there were six Maniacs instead of five.

The project also marks a reconciliation with John Lombardo, a band co-founder who had a hand in writing most of the early songs. Lombardo left the Maniacs in mid-1986 after the tour following the recording of their big-label debut, The Wishing Chair.

Ironically, the band scored its biggest success with its next release, In My Tribe.

"There were bad feelings when he left the band," Gustafson said, "but it was the sort of circumstances that couldn't be avoided."

There was thought of replacing Lombardo when he left, Gustafson said, "but we decided to stay as a five-piece." That meant they had to change direction a bit, which mostly affected Buck, the other guitarist. No longer could he play inventively off the rhythms of Lombardo - he was the lead guitarist.

"It scared us a little bit because John had been one of the principal songwriters," Gustafson said. But slowly, each of the band members developed his own songwriting skills.

Lombardo had helped the band grow, Gustafson said. Before he joined, the band was called Still Life. "Mostly, it was a lot of endless jamming as we were figuring out how to play our instruments, like a bunch of kids with new toys. John had been with bands in the area for a while, so he helped the band find a little direction."

Because of Lombardo's large role with the band during the early recordings - indeed, he sings lead on one title - he will join the band when these songs are played on the current tour. He and his singing partner, Mary Ramsey, will also open the shows. Lombardo joined Merchant and Joe Barbaria in the remixing process.

"It was nice to have him involved," Gustafson said. "It's nice to be hanging out with him again."

The four-song EP Human Conflict Number Five and the 10-song Secrets of the I Ching LP were taken off the market when the band signed a contract with Elektra. Two of the tracks on I Ching - Grey Victory and My Mother the War - were later remade for The Wishing Chair.

"We don't want people to think this is new product," Gustafson said. "This was eight or nine years ago, when we were just starting as a band and just starting as musicians. Basically, we released it for fans, who have been asking us for years how they could get hold of it."

Both were recorded in a studio on campus at the State University of New York at Fredonia, and extensively remixed and remastered from the crude recording process, although no new recording was done.

"My dream was to support myself playing music. And I stumbled across other people who had the same idea. We were fortunate to find each other in the same small town in New York," Gustafson said. "We didn't dream we would be playing The Tonight Show or Saturday Night Live. We just wanted to be support ourselves and be sincere in what we are doing."

There weren't any other bands in Jamestown back in 1981. "We played in every bar we could in that town, even bars that didn't usually have bands. And we built a following."

One of their regular places was The Keg Room, where they plan to throw a surprise performance the night before the tour starts.