John’s Black Dirt History

It was an accident

It all began with Brett, Mike, and Seth having brunch at the Uptown in Minneapolis. Seth played in Mother’s Day, Mike in Snag, and Brett was a recent transplant from Washington D.C. who had done some touring bass playing with Unrest and looking to play some music. We thought it would be fun if we got together and made some noise. A week or so after playing together (maybe more, it was a long time ago), our friend Patty Walsh put us on a bill at the 7th St Entry. We weren’t a band, we had played together once (or twice), and now we had to write some songs!

For the first gig, our name was Kennedy’s Johnson (get it, double entendre stuff right there), and we switched instruments, like a musical musical chairs. We continued this “style” for a year; You can hear the sounds on our first three singles.

Collectively we decided that it might make more sense for us to play our respective instruments. So Mike went behind the drums, Brett on bass and guitar, and Seth on guitar.

Along came Grass Records out of New York, approaching us for a record deal. It was a way to put out an actual album and be distributed and everything! Although we were a bit difficult, we wanted to retain some publishing rights and demanded a vinyl pressing of the first album; Perpetual Optimism is a Force Multiplier. Remember kids, CDs! No one was putting out vinyl LPs.

Fast forward to the recording of our second album. Mike had played with Dave Fridmann in Mercury Rev back in Buffalo, so let’s see if he would record us. That would be a coup, we thought! Dave came up to Minneapolis after recording the Flaming Lips Clouds Taste Metallic in Oklahoma. We wet up at The Terrarium and recorded Horrible Moments of Upness.

In a few bumpy moments, Dave injured his ankle in one of our warehouse soccer games. The dude got himself to the ER and recorded the rest of the album in a walking boot positioned on the mixing console.

Horrible Moments of Upness was recorded and mastered. Unique original art was created by Matt Franzen, and we were sure it would be something that would make people take notice. The hammer dropped. After repeated calls to Grass Records with no call-backs, we get a call from an intern informing us we were dropped. They hadn’t even listened to the record and had an intern do their bidding.

We all had plans that didn’t involve Minneapolis, and because none of us were from there, there was no anchor keeping us rooted. Amicably we split. Seth moved back to his hometown of Chicago, Mike to Brooklyn, and Brett finished his Ph.D. at The University of Minnesota.