Gold Standard: It's about the horns
Wednesday 13 December @ 21:15:00 |
  by DWIGHT HOBBES
The guys in Gold Standard actually aren’t crazy about the band’s name. “We were just sittin’ around one day,” co-founder Dylan Nau recollects, “and somebody come up with it. We thought, hey, that sounds kinda nice. Somethin’ we all sort of agreed on.” Then, he regretfully adds, “Now, that we look back, we’re not too happy about it. But, it’s alright.” What do they know? The name fits just fine. It is a poor dog that doesn’t wag its own tail and the funksters at GS have nothing to be modest about.
Indeed, this airtight outfit raises the bar for area soul bands with one of the freshest sounds to come along in quite some time. The musicianship and material are solid, but that hardly singles them out in a scene that features the legendary likes of Greazy Meal, reigning all-stars The Truth and a full host of bad-to-the-bone ensembles. You can’t swing a dead cat in the Twin Cities without hitting one first-rate assemblage or another. Gold Standard, though, stand on singular ground. Sporting ace hands all around and fueled by the inventive songwriting of guitarist/lead singer Nau, they prevail on the strength of Nau’s fascinating arrangements, which are state of the art. The sweet, key ingredient is off-the-hook horn charts. Tasty as can be and executed by Aaron Stoehr (trombone), Jason Marks (trumpet) and Andrew Schwandt (sax), the arrangements work some of the most amazing magic since the late ’60s, when The Electric Flag and Al Kooper’s original Blood, Sweat & Tears brought back—for a while, anyways—the big-band sound.
 Take “Lydia,” off Gold Standard’s debut CD, Swap Meet. Anchored in vintage swing, it’s a pop ballad enriched with unpredictable touch after touch of exquisite finesse and nailed down by pocked-locket, syncopated funk. Nau acknowledges that, along with his arranging, drummer Chris VanDerpoll and bassist Jeff Westervelt have a lot to do with the band’s identity. “Chris and Jeff are totally into funk. Like Earth, Wind & Fire, Average White Band, all those bands. So almost any tune that I bring to the band ends up turnin’ funky.” Take, for instance, the reggae-tinged “Inline 4,” by Stoehr, a cat named Jeff Siegfried and Nau. At the break, Stoehr provides a Frank Zappa-influenced chart that sidesteps all reasonable expectations and just opens the cut all the way up. “Fire Bomb,” courtesy of keyboardist Buzz Chopper and percussionist Chris Yoerks, brings in the flavor of Carlos Santana topped off with lyrics commenting on the world’s state of warfare and America’s greed for oil: “Hey, let’s go some killin’. It’s our religious right. Fire bombs gonna get you. Fire bomb’s gonna save you. Fire bomb’s gonna free you.” Look for Nau’s killer solo at the bridge and, it goes without saying, his intriguing horn parts. All said, Gold Standard’s arrangements are second to none.
Dylan Nau looks at the horn section as more than mere background. His approach comes out of having studied music theory and, he says, “mainly listening to James Brown, [Brown trombonist] Fred Wesley, those guys. How they write those lines that sit in the middle of everything. That’s what I kinda try to do. Work the horns around everybody else. ‘Cause, you got keyboards playing the backup chords and the guitar doing that ching thing. You work your horns around, in between that stuff. It makes it all sit out.” He’s looking to have Stoehr get a bit more front and center in the group. Nau recalls that Stoehr brought him “Inline 4,” in its basic form, when they worked at the Red Sea Bar in the band Spry. “[It was] like, dang, man! You got skills. I just wish he was a little more prolific.”
Give it time. For now, Aaron Stoehr accounts well for himself and is content to enjoy contributing to Gold Standard. “I have a blast on the stage,” he says. “I love playin’. It’s even better with a great group of guys like this and we’re not just a bunch of hired guns. We’re all buddies [who’d] probably hang out and jam even if we weren’t giggin’ every week. Tonight, we’re all goin’ down to the Dakota to see Andrew’s jazz group [The Paul Renz Quartet]. That makes it all the more fun: when you have that energy onstage with the guys. Everybody has a good time playin’.”
Gold Standard got started in 2004, after area veterans Nau and Stoehr, having paid the requisite, band-hopping dues, figured they’d give it yet another shot and hooked up with the rest of the guys. Between them all, members of GS have, beyond Spry, gigged in noted outfits Wookiefoot, Mango Jam and Kung Fu Hippies as well as The Mojo Band, Puafua and Levitt8. With their upcoming stint, headlining at The Cabooze, word of mouth stands to create greater in-town demand. That would be a good thing as these fellas have chops to burn. ||
Gold Standard play Fri., Dec. 15 at The Cabooze with The Organ Donors and The Limns. 8:30 p.m. $5. 18+. 917 Cedar Ave., Mpls. For more info on Gold Standard, check out their MySpace page at myspace.com/goldstandard.
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