Fern Breaks Out

September 1999

Tim Brouk
The Pulp Music & Entertainment Monthly-Springfield Missouri



Anyone familiar with the Springfield music scene has come to know the pop/rock sounds of Fern over the past few years. The hard working combo that consists of Jason Gaylor, lead vocals and rhythm guitar, Brian Snadon, bass guitar, Brian Pierson, lead guitar and backing vocals, and Jay Sandidge, drums, have been playing shows almost constantly in the Midwest region and beyond since January of 1996.

This summer, Fern added to their already impressive list of achievements by releasing their first full-length album "Monologue." "We're pretty happy with the record overall," Gaylor said. Most of the 10-song effort was recorded on and off last winter in Pierson's basement, which is also where the band rehearses. "Basically we made a studio of the basement and tracked it all down there," Snadon said. Three songs, including the radio friendly "Sentimental Lovely Day," Were recorded earlier at The Studio downtown and where mixed and produced by Ted Nicely and Carl Glanville from New York. Nicely has worked with such noteworthy bands as Fugazi, Jawbox and Shudder to Think. The rest of the tracks were mixed by the band themselves. Gaylor said the band mixed every home recorded song right after it was cut except for a few re-mixes at the end of the session.

Before they could call the record finished, it needed some final touches. Lou Whitney, bassist for the famed Springfield band the Skeletons and owner of The Studio, referred them to a little studio in Branson to get their recording mastered. Mastering involves putting the recording through a series of processes that includes eliminating extreme highs and lows and adding more of a stereo sound. "We were there for the whole thing so we could oversee what we wanted and how we wanted it mastered," Snadon said.

Fern learned the importance of actually seeing the mastering processes the hard way.In 1996, Fern recorded a debut EP and sent it off out of state to be mastered only to find out little had changed from the version that they had sent to the mastering company. Even worse, the mastering fee had cost them a lofty $500. "They took us for a ride on that one," Snadon said. However, the band was pleased with the outcome from Branson both on the recording and in their wallets. Sandidge added that since their recording was on digital audio tapes instead of reel to reel and that the engineer was more "reasonable," it only cost $160.

Fern has gained significant exposure through their recording not only to those who buy them at their shows but also through literally thousands of PC users around the globe. "Monologue" is available on the World Wide Web at MP3.com, a web site that is home to the countless recordings from bands everywhere in the world. Fans can download their favorite songs and then listen to them without even setting foot in a record store.

"We've got a lot of response for our stuff," said Gaylor of Fern on-line. "We usually get about 30 to 40 downloads a day. One day we had 490. That was the highest." The song "Ready to Break" has become a favorite among web users. It reached number on on the "Power Pop" charts in August for most downloads in a day, and "Sentimental Lovely Day" has also made strong showings by placing in the top ten on occasion. This success on-line has in turn brought attention from some very important people.

"Just in the past two weeks, I've gotten mail from at least four (record) industry people," Sandidge said. One of those messages was from some of the heads at Mp3.com about Fern possible opening the midwest leg of a university tour that the web-site is sponsoring with the Goo Goo Dolls and possibly Tonic as headliners. "If we did it, we'd play eight days in a row," Sandidge said.

In Sandidge's apartment, a framed copy of the CD and its artwork hang on the wall above the sofa. The framed work displays not only the album itself, but it also displays almost four years of dedication to the local music scene, of the same four friends playing music together for fun and of possible living out the rock n' roll dream. "It's supposed to be a platinum," joked Snadon of the framed CD.

Judging by all the downloads and all of the well-attended shows Fern plays, it may very well someday become platinum.

Catch Fern in October at Cully's, 311 Park Central West, on the sixteenth and in November at the Pulp Party at the Jude Joint, 221 South Ave. "Monologue" is sold in stores throughout the Midwest including Kansas City, Mo. And Tulsa, Okla. In Springfield, pick up a copy at CD Warehouse and Wherehouse Music. For the latest in Fern news, log on to members.tripod.com/~fernworld.