Near Misses and big hits

Near Misses and big hits

Two weeks ago, Ashley and I met our friends Larry and Claudia at Tulsa’s kind of upscale shopping area, Utica Square for their summer concert series. Utica Square has “Fifth Night” on which ach Thursday musicians play in a staged area in the streets crisscrossing the mall area. People load up their lawn chairs, ice cheats, dinners or sit at one of the nearby outdoor table restaurants and tune into whatever music is playing that week. People sit. People dance. Kids wander the area. We sat, having a beer and dinner that Claudia packed for us all.
That night, the musicians were a local band, Admiral Twin. They have been around for almost 20 years in one of two different incarnations. I first started listening to them in the early 90’s at a Tulsa club called “Eclipse.” At that time, the band was sort of managed by a guy, Don Holman, I had taught, shared music tastes with and also knew his mom from the school. The band also included two guys from Sapulpa High School.
Don had me listen to a cassette by the band, which I immediately bought. They were good, and multi-talented. They mixed in a variety of instruments not common to pop music and started to gather quite a local following. Ash and I made several trips to the Eclipse to see them and another band with some Sapulpa guys, Dragonfly. Dragonfly had their brief touch with possibility, one night opening at Cain’s Ballroom for Todd Rundgren and then fading into inactivity.
Around 1999, the Tulsa band Hanson hit it big with the pop song “Mmmm-bop.” They were pretty young but the tune was a bubblegum classic. I still have it on my IPOD because there is no denying, that whether you think pop is art or not, it is one of those songs that forces you to hum it, remember it and catch yourself singing along.
The song won national attention andHanson was offered a national tour. They selected the Melodramatic Wallflowers as their opening band. But, the band had been going through a few changes itself due to some conflict name-wise with the now nationally recognized “Wallflowers” fronted by Bob Dylan’s son, Jacob and a bit of turmoil that resulted in one of the band members, Steve Rankin, leaving the band. Steve’s parents live right down the street and I have run into him several times in the neighborhood.
The now named “Admiral Twin” went into the studio to record some new songs, along with some remixes of a few of their older tunes. The resulting CD was called “Mock Heroic.” That CD was a pretty great, slick pop work of art.
Touring with Hanson, a new CD for sale nationally, and a more streamlined, less esoteric sound made it appear that Admiral Twin was on the cusp on big things. There’s no doubt the band was better, both musically and artistically, than a lot of the bands raking in the cash. Unfortunately, the fates and airwaves are not always rewarding of good musicianship, but often of look, and plain luck. Just plain fickle.
After the tour, just when the band should be promoted and raised to a new level, the company they signed with folded. Hanson went on to score a few more songs, and still record today. As a matter of fact, they are planning a new national tour this fall. Admiral Twin, named after the local landmark, the Admiral Twin drive-in, struggled to gain a new contract and opportunity.
The band continued to play and record, appearing all over Tulsa, at any venue possible. I saw them at clubs, at Mayfest, etc. The chance kept evading them and finally, frustrated with the failure to get that chance again, the lead singer, guitarist left the band to take an accounting job in California.
That left the band as a 3 piece, still determined to carry on. Mark Carr, bass player and Sapulpa native, still continues on with the band. I usually talk to him each time I see them play. He has his day job, but the band continues to write new music and intersperse their show of covers with some of the original music.
At Fifth Night, I sat in my folding chair, enjoying the band. They played a set heavy with Beatles, Cars and some newer stuff and a few of the tunes off their newest CD effort. Next to the stage, a friend of the band manned a booth selling Admiral Twin T’s and CD’s.

Many times, I have heard local bands, guitarists, or singers that destroy some of the ones who end up on repetitive replay on the music channels and radio. In a cruel twist of fate, that put them in the right place at the right time, while these yeomen musicians battle the smoky bars and outdoor city festivals so people will hear their music. It is a heroic effort and I admire them for continuing to pursue the things they love, regardless of its profitability. I am eternally a fan in their Mock heroic effort to play in front of the big crowd again. Or maybe they are just “The Unlucky Ones.”