This is my favorite band of all time, albeit for very personal reasons.

Crossposted as my first blog entry:

Would not be released
Could not be denied
I try to say the words
But get tripped up inside
You can murder them with guns
Poison them with lye
You can take a person's life
But you can't squelch his pride
--from "Would Not Be Denied"

I discovered Buffalo Tom quite by accident in the summer of 1995. I spent almost six months of that year on tour, playing Huckleberry Finn in a bombastic production of Big River that toured the country. I was a pretty good Huck Finn, if I do say so myself, and that performance still stands as one of the roles in my "career" that I am most proud of. But that isn't the point. The point of all this is Buffalo Tom, and it was while on this tour, nineteen years old, no longer a child and still not yet an adult, that I discovered them.

The tour had a four day stop in Boston, Massachusetts. I was one of the youngest members of the cast. I might have been *the* youngest. I don't recall. After performances, the cast would go out and drink themselves into a stupor. I was nineteen, as I said, and unable to join them unless the after-show gathering (as it sometimes did) involved a case of beer in a hotel room. Then, I could partake. Partake I certainly did. As if I had earned the right. Usually, though, the after-show gathering would be out in public and Boston was no exception. We were in Boston for four days and I spent a lot of that time alone. A lot of time bored. Even at nineteen, the magic and vigor that surrounded me on stage was hard to maintain hours later. So, here I was, nineteen and pensive, left to my own devices in Boston, Massachusetts.

I spent most of that time aimlessly wandering. Eventually, after hours of meandering, I would end up in a coffee shop somewhere, imbibing caffeine as I wrote my little stories in the notebook I always carried with me. At 19, I always carried a notebook.

On the third night of wandering aimlessly, I stumbled across a bar that had a huge marquee that completely lit up an otherwise dark street. The marquee read:

TONIGHT ONLY
BOSTON'S OWN
BUFFALO TOM
ALL AGES

The last line of the four was what really intrigued me. Here was a bar I could get into. I couldn't drink, but I could definitely hear some live music. "I could do with some live music," I told myself. "Who knows? It might not suck." I paid my $10 cover and went in, preparing to feel ambiguous later about "Boston's own."

Ten dollars well spent. I was treated to a 3-piece band that were not punk but clearly had punk influences. A grungy band that managed grunge without emulating Pearl Jam, a popular trend for most bands in the 90's. A band that utilized irritating electronic gaffes, such as feedback and accidental reverb, to their advantage. A 3-piece band that had a sound fuller and more complex than anything I had ever experienced before. They wore their influences on their sleeve, no question. I could hear a similarity to The Velvet Underground. I could hear hints of Dinosaur Jr. And that use of feedback, that low raspy voice? Close my eyes and I'm at a Husker Du concert. And *that* was the kicker. They sounded just like Husker Du. (Note: It'll turn out that, once I heard a record, they sound *nothing* like Husker Du, but live, they did. They have at every concert of theirs I've seen since.)

Buffalo Tom impressed me. They moved me. This was a 3-piece band that sounded like nine. The music was melodic and dark. The lyrics were ambiguous and open to interpretation. And I wondered to myself, "Why aren't these guys famous?", without knowing that they already were. Albeit famous with a lower-case "f", but famous just the same.

And then they played "Crutch" and I was hooked forevermore. These lyrics were sublime, everything I was feeling. Everything I was contemplating as a 19-year-old who worked way too hard for recognition.

I'm lying across the tracks
And I'm on the train ride back
And I'm in between the cars
And I'm in between the stars
And you're all above the moon
And you're all above the moon

I cannot tell you what those lyrics mean to me. What they meant or what they mean. I would sound like an idiot because I don't know the right words. I simply do not have the vocabulary to explain what those lyrics did to my teenage mind.

Two weeks later, I'm home on a vacation of sorts. No performances scheduled for four days, so we all get some time off. Time at home to see our families. Our friends. Four days to contemplate the stage and if we really want to spend the rest of our lives doing this. Acting, I mean. Acting for not much pay, next to no recognition. Little compensation beyond the knowledge that you might be throwing your life away for the sake of art. At some point during those four days, I turned on VH-1 and saw the video for a song called "Summer." By Buffalo Tom.

Amen! This heavenly band has been signed. They have an album. An album I can buy. And so I went and did just that.

The album was called Sleepy-Eyed and I learned when I went to Record Service to purchase it that this album was their *fifth*. This band was already "famous" and had somehow passed me by.

I bought all five albums that day. I took those CD's home and reveled in their majesty. Every album was better than the one before. More importantly, every lyric spoke to me. Every song was a beacon pointing a way for the person I was at the time. I could now, in the privacy of my own home, turn on my stereo and be right where I was when I first discovered them. And where I was when I first discovered them was very important at the time. Important because, for the first time that tour, I wasn't alone. I didn't know anyone, sure. I knew not one name of any of the fans gathered there that night. But there I was in a smoky bar surrounded by strangers that for a moment were friends. Friends formed from the union of music. I felt like I had discovered something new, something I could go home and brag about to my friends. This was *my* band because I discovered them, even if by accident. I discovered them on my own terms. I didn't listen to them because Rob told me they were good or because Mike thought I would like them. This time was the reverse, my friends were hearing them for the first time through me. Buffalo Tom is the one thing I brought home from that tour that is still with me to this day.

I have seen them live seven times. Since they broke up, I have seen Bill Janovitz, their lead singer, perform solo three times. Solo, he's always laid bare. Just him and his acoustic. With no backing band, his songs are reduced to the skeletons they were when they first got written. It's sort of like being there when he first thought them up. Every time I've ever seen them in Champaign (once for the full band, three times for Bill solo), toward the end of the set, they call out for requests. And be it the full band or Lonesome Billy, I always yell out "Crutch" and it always gets played. As a matter of fact, my copy of (arguably) their best album (entitled Let Me Come Over) was autographed by Bill at an acoustic show at the Highdive in December of 2000. His inscription says: "To the 'Crutch' guy." This means that he remembers me. He remembers that, in this area, this song always gets requested. And he knows who did it, the requesting. He knows that its me. I do realize how horribly pathetic I sound right now. How star-struck I appear to be. But think about it like this...how would you feel if your favorite singer/songwriter recognized you? In closing, lyrics from their song "Flushing Stars," a personal favorite:

When the sidewalk opens it lets you into better things
I learned that long ago opponents lash with wicked things
And I'm calling you, calling all cars
But you're all waiting for me to come down from the stars
But you can't wait forever, there's no time
But you can't wait forever, there's no time
But you can't wait forever, there's no time
But you can't wait forever, there's no time