Around Hear

"I had a ticket to REO Speedwagon about two years ago, and I was so upset because I didn't get to go. I look back and laugh at it now. Now I'm like, 'I'm going,'" recounts 17-year-old Jason Smith, The SuperNauts' guitarist and vocalist. "And I might get to see them just a little bit closer."

That's because The SuperNauts scored the opening slot for REO's show with Styx and Eddie Money at Sandstone Amphitheatre on Saturday, June 10. That gig is the prize the fledgling KC group earned for taking top honors at 99.7 KY's Battle of the Bands, held at Flamingo Casino four weeks ago -- the same one where Boot Hill had its gear stolen. The win came despite the fact that no one in the band is old enough to drop cash at the blackjack tables.

Jason is actually the eldest SuperNaut and bookends the group with his bass-playing younger brother, Jordan, 13. In between are Dustin Padget, 14, on guitar and harmonica, and drummer Kenny Wood Squires, 16. Like the other KWS (Kenny Wayne Shepherd), The SuperNauts are down with the blues, in forms both heavy and more traditional. "We started listening to Zeppelin and Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughan -- I'm really big into the blues, and I practice, like, seven hours a day. I still do, just to become really good at the blues and put blues into pop music," says Jason. "We started acquiring our own sound after taking bits and pieces from other people. I like the Goo Goo Dolls and stuff -- they're a cool band, but you take all that together and you get The SuperNauts."

The band started to come together before any of its members had even entered high school. "I met the drummer at my junior high and hung out with him for a while. My brother was playing drums at the time, so we got rid of him, and he came back later as the bass player," Jason explains, also noting that although Squires was born with cerebral palsy, he can still beat the hell out of his kit. "It makes us sound even better because he just doesn't give up on those drums. He's probably one of the most intense-playing drummers I know, and he's a good example to everybody. A walking miracle, I think."

Summer 2000 is shaping up to be a big one for The SuperNauts, with that show at Sandstone being but one of the highlights. Not only is the band's debut CD, Orange Moon, scheduled for release sometime in the sweaty months (a portion of the proceeds will go to the United Cerebral Palsy Organization), but The SuperNauts will be on 99.7 KYYS with Max, Tanna, and Moffitt the morning of Thursday, June 8, and will appear on the WDAF Channel 4 Morning Show the next day. Don't think the boys are nervous about that Sandstone gig, either.

"The bigger the crowd, the better it is for us. We just go at it, and I don't think we have a lot of fear toward the crowds," Jason says. "The only fear we have is not having our guitars in tune." Maybe Styx can spare a roadie.

Daybird believer
Metallica may be all grumpy-grumpy about the online music revolution, but for acts that haven't yet reached that peak, exposure on the Internet is a sweet blessing. On the local front, The Daybirds are another band that seems to be doing well there, even if the Web site it conquered is in the United Kingdom. Last November, The Daybirds' happy-go-lucky pop took the number one spot on the UK version of Vitaminic.com, and out of that, the group has secured another plush deal. The UK version of PC Magazine is distributing a CD-R with its May issue that features 10 songs pilfered from Vitaminic.com UK. Surely you don't need to be told who one of the bands on it is.

"The boys from Vitaminic.com e-mailed us and said, 'Do you want to do this?' and we said, 'Well, sure," says Dean Woods, one of the Lawrence-based band's four multi-instrumentalists. He also notes that there were quite a few contenders -- the site has more than 10,000 songs on it -- and The Daybirds have yet to see the issue. "We actually haven't got a hard copy of the magazine, so we're waiting to see what happens. It's a computer magazine, but still it goes to a lot of people, and their May issue was all about MP3 technology -- just basically the whole MP3 world and its role in the music industry."

That role has yet to be well defined, except that it could turn out to be a big one, but Woods is still happy to take advantage of the development. "We're on MP3.com, and we get anywhere from five to 20 downloads a day. That's a great way to get your name out there," he says. "It's nice for the fans to be able to go on and download the songs and throw it on to a CD-R and slap it into the car. But obviously, that's as far as I would personally take it. I want the artwork, I want the graphics on the CD, I want the lyrics and the whole package that comes along with it. I don't think it's really a bad thing, especially for new bands."