“I like Dracula. I don’t look at other bands for influences, I like other things.” — Jake Wisti

Don’t call them roots rock. Don’t expect them to tell the truth. And above all else, don’t ask them to talk about their music.
    I sat down with four of the five members of Jake Wisti and the Centurions recently, armed with tape recorder, notepad and a few specific questions about what makes this band rock. Three hours, 13 collective cups of joe and a plate of Turkish delight later, I still didn’t have my answers. Actually, I had lots of answers; just not many answers to the questions I asked. So I’ll let them speak for themselves (or in most cases, for each other).

Can you tell me a little bit about the philosophy behind your music? I ask.
Jake Wisti (lead vocals, violin, guitar): I like Clinton a lot. When he started getting in trouble I started liking him. I thought, “This guy has a knack for pissing off the people I don’t like.”

Did I miss something? I’m not exactly sure what he means by that, nor am I entirely sure that he heard my question. No problem. I appreciate the social/political activism of Jake’s lyrics. He denounces stagnation in government, social injustice and even bad marriages. And he doesn’t do it by whining or offering outrageous solutions. He observes; he tells stories. It’s all very simple and clean, which is why it works. I decide to keep him on the topic of politics for a bit longer…I tell myself we’ll get to the music in a moment. I ask how they feel having a Bush in office again will affect the state of rock ’n’ roll?

Jake:You know, I—
Michael VanGogh (bass, vocals), interrupting: I like Bush. And the president’s okay, too.
Jake, continuing, undaunted: I really can’t stand organized religion. I hate it.

Faced with a discussion on religion or sex, I choose sex. I ask why there isn’t more of it on the album.

James Edlund (guitar, keys, harmonica), objecting: There’s a lot of sex on our album.
Michael: You know what they say: people who aren’t hungry don't talk about food.
Donny Doane (drummer, percussion, vocals): If I wrote the songs there would be more sex. Of course, I’m celibate. I’m married to my art.
Michael: You can have sex to the album.
Jake: I just don’t want to hurt somebody every single time.

Yikes, I think, before I realize we’re now talking about the infamous crazy stage antics of Jake and the boys.

Donny: A lot of people are like, “Wow, you’re a punk band!” And I would agree with them because there’s that energy there; that manic drive. I would say we’re one of the better punk bands in town, because we don’t try to be a punk band.

It becomes obvious that these guys don’t take kindly to genre compartmentalization. What’s more, they are adamant opponents of the petty competitiveness brewing among Twin Cities musicians and music fans.

James: Instead of bands working together to promote each other and have fun, they backstab each other. There are a lot of people who play the 400/Turf/Entry circuit, and others who play the Cabooze/Fine Line/Lee’s Liquor circuit. There’s this line down the middle where people don’t want to cross over to the “mainstream.” They’re scared to play certain stages. Nowhere else does that happen.
Donny: It really is a rock ’n’ roll ghetto scene. People act as if to say, “Stay in your rock ’n’ roll ghetto; you don’t belong in ours because you don’t buy your flannel at the right secondhand store. It’s ridiculous.

But I want to know more about those injuries. So I ask.

Jake: I was swinging the microphone around…I didn’t know there was a kink in it…Wham! Right into Donny’s head. He looked like he was going to kick the crap out of me. Another time I nailed James when I missed the cowbell with a drumstick. His immediate reaction was to pick up a vibrator and start slapping his guitar with it.
Michael: Call it a marital aid.

Back to sex again, apparently.
    Despite the very unusual direction the interview is taking, I’m starting to find a theme here. This group of talented musicians may be serious about their art, but they have a hard time being serious about blowing their own collective horn.

Michael: I have perfect pitch.
Donny: Mike Wisti (brother of Jake, producer) mentioned in the studio that I have pretty good pitch, too.

Okay, never mind.

Donny: And I’m self-taught. I never had a drum lesson.

Okay, okay.

Donny (continuing): But I started taking coronet lessons in 3rd grade. Then I started playing the drums my sophomore year in high school. I wanted to play something I thought was rockin’. After freaking out on the Who and the Kinks, I was like, “Yeah. I wanna do that.”
James: I started playing piano when I was a little kid. My parents forced me. I finally appreciated it when I went to college. In junior high I took guitar lessons from this guy out on a farm. He taught me about women, too.
Jake: I know we’ve lied a lot here, but my mom would steal my blanket if I didn’t practice the violin. (I gave up my blanket a lot later than most.)
Michael: I was formally trained with the saxophone. After I graduated high school, I was accepted to Berklee School of Music, but my parents felt that going the music route wasn’t a good idea. When I got into [Kansas State], I sold my sax and bought a guitar.

As it turns out, each of the Centurions have been involved in numerous other music projects, from shitty cover bands to collaborations with pre-fame Flaming Lips to backyard concerts. No wonder their sound is professional and spontaneous all at the same time. These are accomplished musicians motivated by a general love for music that transcends all the label bullshit, the scenester politics, the meager financial compensation.

James: I’m doing it for money. (Where’s my check?)
Jake: We’re just doing this to support our temp jobs.
Donny: I can’t wait to get back to my safety retraining seminar and pizza party.

I’m beginning to pick up on the sarcasm, and so I decide to completely ignore the fallacies and forge on. They might not be very good at following directions, but then no great artists/leaders ever are, right? We Will Destroy U is a great album. A smart album. The music is sharp, straightforward rock that surges with an energy unusual even for a group of musicians as talented and accomplished as the Centurions. Social commentary, political criticism, government conspiracy, religious paranoia and relationship frustration all find quarter on the disc. The wisdom lies somewhere between, yes, roots rock and country ballads sans the mournful tone. You just don’t hear this kind of stuff in balls-out rock anymore. This kind of music starts revolutions.
    The band feel that the album is an accurate mark of their current coordinates on the musical map, post-Red Button Babies (their first album). Although Donny joined the group after the recording sessions, he has been with the band long enough for a solid personal and musical cohesion to sink in—a phenomenon that seems to please Jake a great deal. He appreciates the musicianship of these particular fellas, as well as the camaraderie.

Jake: This whole ensemble feels like a band I trust now. I might even eventually just call us The Centurions. Having myself in the band’s name comes from a time when I was more…unstable...with the relationship between band members (I thought, “I’ll just call it Jake Wisti, because no one can take that away from me!”). Then I started playing in the Youngers. People didn’t bitch at each other; it was more fun and relaxed. I decided after that I would never play in a band that puts up with any crap. In retrospect, I could have been more patient with other bands, and that’s what I’ve been with this band.

Jake is also the patient solo lyricist. “From start to finish it’s difficult to collaborate the whole thing,” he says. I think I know what he means. Given the way these gentlemen like to finish each other’s sentences, a collaborative writing process could get a bit crazy.

James: Actually, there’s a lot of writing in this band. Michael and I both have bachelor’s degrees in English, and have both taught—myself at Stillwater State Prison, Michael at Kansas State.
Donny: I help Jake out with a line here or there. I try to hang back from music as far as that goes, but I have a vast collection of my own I’ve been compiling and editing since ’97.
James: Donny and I are starting a band of our own, actually. We’re calling it Morass. Meaning “swamp.” Undoubtedly, people will think we mean “more ass.”
Michael: Oh, yeah.

This is maybe the longest we’ve talked about music, and I’m feeling lucky. I try to keep the ball rolling. Turns out, these guys especially detest being slapped with “roots rock” label, mostly due to images it evokes of self-indulgent acoustic artistes whining their way through song after song about why life sucks.

Jake: I really hate writers like that.
James: We don’t mean to dis roots rockers, really, but a lot of them are into confessionalism, which is awful stuff to read and awful stuff to listen to. It means a lot to the person playing it, but unfortunately to everybody else it really is a little too narcissistic.
James: It’s almost as if you stand too close to a roots rocker and you suddenly become one. God hope you don’t share beers with one or you’ll start morphing.

I imagine that perhaps the absent guitarist/vocalist Dave Hazeldine is the sane one in the band. Tell me about Dave Hazeldine, I say.

James: Dave Hazeldine is a hillbilly.

Okay, maybe not…

Donny: He’s a very erudite hillbilly.
Michael: He’s not a hillbilly.
James: Call him up; he’ll agree with you. He’s a hillbilly.
Donny: I would definitely call Dave a man of letters.
James: Only person I’ve ever known to get kicked out of a petting zoo.
Michael: He’d probably say some intelligent things. Maybe even talk about music.

Speaking of music, tell me more about the new album. Someone. Anyone.

James: The easy way to learn how to be a good musician is kind of like plenaria—you know, those little worms. If you eat a really good musician you automatically absorb all of his talents. So next time you get to see Leo Kottke, bring a burlap sack and drag him out the back door of the Guthrie.

Next.

James: Why don’t you ask us about our musical influences?

Close enough. Everybody loves the Brits, of course. The Stones, the Kinks, the Who, the Clash. And everyone seems to have a soft spot for CCR as well. And guess what? You can tell. Not because the Centurions play derivatively, but because they give play to their their musical loves—sometimes overtly, sometimes in a more subtle way—in the context of their own songs.

Donny: I think I play in a very Brit kind of way. People know I’m into Keith Moon, Mick Avory, etc. when they listen to us.
Michael: I like Fountains of Wayne…
James: I was pretty much a shredder and played metal and stuff to begin with. I still have a place in my heart for people like Steve Vai. I like a lot of guitar stuff, really…ZZ top and a lot of swampier stuff. Lately I’ve been hitting on more experimental stuff and hip-hop. I did the plug-in-and-play approach for some time, but now I’m trying to broaden my palate of sounds, incorporating technology…
Jake: Who do I like?
Michael: Miami Sound Machine, the Jets…
Jake: No…my influences are Agent Mulder and that guy on Channel 45—who is that again? I like Dracula. I don’t look at other bands for influences. I like other things.

This much is obvious. And it’s a good thing. For a group of people seemingly unwilling to discuss their art, I kinda learned a lot about it.

Final thoughts, guys?

Michael: Our music is street-smart yet academic, hyperactive space-cake melobrasive...
Jake: ...hackneyed Frampton Heil talkbox rock...
James: ...encompassing imminent social unrest and eventual transcendence...
Donny: ...above the din of the pedestrian collective unconscious.

I love it. But we’re talking about music, now. And suddenly it’s making me a little uncomfortable. Let’s end with something a little less relevant, okay?

Michael: I’m pretty much a live-and-let-live person.
Donny: I’m live-and-let-die.
James: I don’t put gunpowder in my fettuccine.
Jake: I’m kind of booksmart.
James: Let’s think up more lies. How about this: I like Jake’s sweater.

I couldn’ta said it better myself.

Jake Wisti and the Centurions play Thursday, Jan. 25th at the Turf Club. Cave Music and Grickle Grass also play. Call the Turf for more information at 651-647-0486.