26 DEGREES OF JULIE OCEAN

God bless.

Friendship Flower Shop turned into Julie Ocean (a song from the Undertones' third album). Inspired by Orange Juice and early Aztec Camera, Terry Banks was in St. Christopher on Sarah Records (also in The Saturday People, Tree Fort Angst and Glo-Worm with Pam Berry). He met Jim Spellman (Velocity Girls + The High Back Chairs // with Jeff Nelson who was in Minor Threat) through Peter Cortner who was the singer from Dag Nasty. (FYI, Jim Spellman was recently tased) Years later Terry met Hunter Bennet who was the bassist for Dag Nasty and spent time with post-Government Issue outfit Weatherhead. Drummer, Alex Daniels on drums was in Swiz , Severin and Sweetbelly Freakdown. Suburban Voice (Al Quint of No System) interviewed Swiz about not being on Dischord, Rites of Spring, Ignition, and Soulside. So basically, Julie Ocean straddle's D.C.'s Dischord scene and the lesser known indie-pop scene (think Tommy Keene, The Slickee Boys, Pam Barry + Slumberland Records // which was inspired by K Records which was inspired by Discord).

Julie Ocean play every 2-3 weeks with no tours insight. However, would fit to tour with Scotland's Teenage Fanclub; whose Norman Blake (BMX Bandits) is set to tour with Daniel Johnston’s band in July along with Jad Fair and John Slugget from Half Japanese, Yo La Tengo’s James McNew, Mark Linkous from Sparklehorse, and Scout Niblett. Julie Ocean's debut album, "Long Gone and Nearly There," is out now on Philadelphia-based Transit of Venus Records, distributed by Redeye, and also available via iTunes, eMusic and Amazon. The album was produced by Geoff Sanoff (Luna, Fountains of Wayne, The Secret Machines.) The next show is July 11th at the Rock and Roll Hotel in D.C.

Most of this name-dropping stuff is from an interview with Terry Banks on Aquarium Drunkard:

We’re just sort of trying to write poppy, appealing songs that get in, make their point and stop. It’s not wildly different from anything anyone in the band has done previously, but it’s come together quite easily and we have a lot of fun doing it. It’s a very stress free sort of band and it’s been sort of a breeze so far, so we hope to make another record and keep doing it for its own rewards.

But you know, scenes are funny because from the outside they might look bigger than they are. But I have this theory that local band scenes are always the same 23 people cross-pollinating over the course of a few years, whether you’re talking about Chapel Hill or Athens or Minneapolis or D.C. They’re usually pretty small and pretty insular so you get the same people pairing up in different combinations over time and occasionally a new person will come in and expand the gene pool a bit, but it never really gets bigger than a couple of dozen people, I think.

Oh, and I directly walked behind Kevin Bacon between 62nd and 70th on Madison two weeks ago. THE MOTHER FUCKER MOVES!