Longtime Durango alt-country band Lawn Chair Kings will help The Balcony Bar & Grill celebrate its sixth anniversary with a 4 p.m. show Saturday. The Herald recently sat down with band members Erik Nordstrom (songwriter/vocals/guitar/harmonica), Dan Leek (bass) and Pat Dressen (drums/mandolin). The band discussed their favorite places to play in the area, their aging audience and what it’s like having pieced together the same band since the dawn of the millennium.
On the early days of Lawn Chair Kings
Erik Nordstrom: I remember early on we were wondering how this country, punk-influenced music was going to be taken. I remember we thought it was important to juice up our gigs a little bit. We had flamingos on stage, we had a TV set with just static and I’d get those Christmas tree, turn-on-and-off switches, so you could turn on and off the static-y TV.
Dan Leek: We called them “gimmicks.” “Let’s create some gimmicks.” We’d load in all our gear and then we’d load in, bring in the gimmicks, spread them around the stage.
EN: We should probably get back to that.
DL: I had three strobe lights on these foot switches. I could kick a strobe light on Erik if he was taking a solo, or just kick the drummer’s strobe light on just to annoy him. It was pretty great.
On playing The Ranch
EN: It can get rowdy, for sure. I believe the party after the fire, I remember Chip, the owner, having a black eye the next day. He was escorting a guy out of the bar because he was drunk and unruly, but he was in a wheelchair. And the guy in the wheelchair decked Chip in the eye as he was wheeling him out but Chip’s comment was “Oh, totally worth it.” It can be fun.
DL: One of those early El Rancho shows, we were doing sound check. You know, feedback is inevitable during sound check. Sometimes really loud, sustained feedback might occur; you never know what’s going to happen. I’ll never let up on Erik about this one, but he knocked this guy off his barstool with his feedback. Do you remember that?
EN: I’ve blocked this out of my memory.
DL: He literally just fell over backwards from the impact on his ears.
Pat Dressen: Did he get up with his ears bleeding?
DL: He was out for five or 10 seconds. His friends were very concerned. Yeah, it caught him just right. That was one of those funny stories…not funny for that guy. Memorable.
On some of the best gigs
DL: The Paonia Harvest Fest last year was pretty great. It was just a great scene they cultivated there. They set up this great festival where they shut down, like, two blocks on the main drag and they had four venues right there on those blocks. Multiple bands and they kind of just staggered them one after the other. And everyone was so nice and so appreciative and so into it, from the attendees to the organizers. Fun gig.
PD: Paonia is an interesting scene. It’s a town that’s kind of young, hippy, organic agriculture. Kind of earthy people. Lot of nice folks … One of those kinds of places where people who want to live in the beautiful mountain scenery but still have humble means, where they gather. It’s a great scene.
On the band’s aging and evolution
EN: I think the stories back then were more saucy because our audience was younger back then because we were younger. We’d have all these well-respected people in the community that, back then, were falling into our stage and puking and spilling different liquids on us. And now it’s their babies that might be spilling liquids but not the adults so much. Which is probably why playing at The Balcony is perfect for us because people can still get a little wild but can still get home early.
PD: (Lawn Chair Kings is) just not your typical bar-band stuff, so we don’t really want to go out and play late to a bunch of people whose purpose is just getting trashed, which is what late-night people are mostly doing. We would rather play to people who come to enjoy us, maybe dance, maybe listen and certainly enjoy a few beers, but not there just to get trashed. We want a symbiotic relationship with an audience that enjoys music.
EN: It seems like that’s becoming more of a trend and I’m a fan of the earlier shows, myself. I think there’s a significant population that wants to see music, but…I’m especially struck by the shows that will start at 10, 10:30 on a Tuesday. And for a lot of working stiffs like me, it’s tough to do that, you know? I should have been in bed an hour ago. And that’s just getting started on a show.
EN: And to be clear, we welcome some of our old fans to come out to our shows and fall into our stage again.
DL: You can get a little trashed [laughs].
David Holub
Among Lawn Chair Kings favorite covers
“Coming Down,” Meatpuppets
“Hang on to Yourself,” David Bowie
“When the Dope Ran Out (So Did She),” Mulehead
“Sweet Caroline,” Neil Diamond
“Tainted Love,” Soft Cell
“Lucifer Sam,” Pink Floyd
