------Feature • Nick Moss------Blues School Grad By Evan Gillespie with him. “From Jimmy, I learned to really listen The story of any bluesman is a story of to what was going on and to play off of the his education in the blues. It’s about whom next guy,” he says. “I was no longer just he learned from, whose style he built upon playing a single part.” and what part of the country influenced him Moss had learned a lesson that was per- the most. The blues is a traditional music haps surprising, yet also essential to under- form like no other, and that’s just the way standing Chicago blues. Chicago blues, it it is: who you are as a bluesman today has turns out, depends a lot on musicians with everything to do with where you came from. For Nick Moss, that’s even more true than it is with most blues players. ------Feature • Dirty Comp’ny------It started in the hospital when Moss was 18 and recovering from kidney surgery. He’d played bass in some bands, but that’s not who he really was. He was a wres- tler and a football player, things he didn’t think he could be any more. A New Jam Flavor His brother tried to cheer him up by bringing his bass to the By Kathleen Christian “What we’re trying to do is be creative hospital and then by suggesting – create new music for people to hear, hope- that they slip out and go across I’m going to leave the world of radio fully create a new sound,” Rogers said. “Ev- the street to a blues club, the Wise rock on pause while I venture forth into ery time we get together we put something Fools Pub in Chicago’s Lincoln the local music scene this week and expe- out there that we’ve never heard ourselves. Park. Little Willie and the Night- rience the real thing. From the PA of every Whether it’s bad or it’s good, it’s something cats were playing. That’s where it Walgreens and Kroger, I’m perpetually we’ve never heard.” all began for Moss. He could see bombarded with pop ditties and auto-tuned Dirty Comp’ny can even expect to hear himself becoming that guy, the voices singing catchy hooks. It makes me new things at their own live shows. Their bluesman up on stage. long for something a little less clean and goal is not just to create music behind closed Moss’ decision to become a over-produced. doors and take it to the people, but to be a professional musician paid off Maybe the salve for my wounded ears jam band that simultaneously inspires and quickly. Soon he was is just a little dirt. Dirty Comp’ny, a band gains inspiration from their audience. playing bass in Jim- NICK MOSS that keeps their licks like their company, is “The more we know each other over my Dawkins’ band Saturday, August 24 • 8 p.m. one of the newest additions to Fort Wayne’s time, the better we can take the jam,” Mey- and later moved on strong people skills. nightlife. With their first gig back in January, ers said. “We turn songs back into one an- to The Legendary C2G Music Hall “Listen to early opening for 80s cover band Brother, they other. We can really get down and wail and Blues Band where 323 W. Baker St., Fort Wayne Muddy Waters stuff gave crowds a taste of the gritty music yet to really go outside of the box.” he played with with Jimmy and Otis come. Outside of the box is pretty solidly drummer Willie Tix: $20 adv., $25 d.o.s, , Spann and Little Dirty Comp’ny describe their style as where the whole band’s thinking is. Though “Big Eyes” Smith. $35 gold seating thru Walter,” Moss says. rocking blues jam with a hint of metal, and the group has recorded a couple of demo That’s where Moss’s Neat Neat Neat Record Store, “It almost sounds they have a mix of personalities to match tracks you can hear on their Facebook page, education began in as if they’re playing their two-tone style. Patrick Ryan on lead Meyers said they’re more concerned with earnest. Wooden Nickel Music Stores on top of each other, guitar, Chris Patallita on bass, Mike Rogers getting their music to the man on the street “I loved Willie,” & www.c2gmusichall.com but they’re staying on drums and brothers Ben Gabet on rhythm and less about recording an entire album. he says of Smith. out of each other’s guitar and Sam Meyer on vocals make up “It’s important to get your music out in “He was like my second father.” way. It almost sounds like they’re all soloing the mix of musical tastes that create this front of people. You write it and you take While he was with Smith, Moss made at the same time.” fresh new sound. it out and see what peoples’ reaction is,” he a major change: he switched from playing All this talk of old styles, traditions and “The Harley people say we’re too hip- said. “We thrive off of people having a good bass to playing guitar. The instrument change the great old-timers makes it sound as if pie and the hippie people say we’re too Har- time, and if that just means bringing people was part of his exploration of the possibili- Moss plays the kind of Chicago blues that ley,” Patallita said. “We’re somewhere in the to a bar and playing late into the night, then ties and options he had on stage, and Smith has been the same for the last 50 or 60 years, middle, but there’s a lot of people who like we’re down to do that.” was helping him figure out what it took to and his playing has at times been described to cross that line, too.” Playing to the crowd and putting their play the blues the way it was supposed to be as nostalgic. But Moss knows that an ac- Their raw, animated songs do indeed musical creations out into the world – these played in Chicago. knowledgment of tradition and influence blur the lines between blues and metal, go- are the things Dirty Comp’ny are working “With Willie, I learned how to play the doesn’t mean you’re not an innovator. It just ing places neither genre usually goes. Mey- towards. It’s why they research, write, re- Chicago feel,” Moss told Chicago Blues means that you came from someplace real. er’s gritty vocals play a large role in their write, practice and push for more shows. Guide. “You know that lag-time-behind- “I don’t consider myself a 50s or retro unpolished sound. Though he has the face Theirs is the real, raw music I wouldn’t mind the-beat feel that Muddy Waters made so or vintage Chicago blues torchbearer. I grew of a young musician, he carries the voice hearing as the backdrop to my day in place famous? That was one of the most important up in Chicago,” he says. “Everything I do of someone who has seen his fair share of of whatever song has been churned out by lessons – to learn the feel and timing of how know, I learned from the old-timer Chicago troubles and wants to sing to you all about the latest hit machine. this music is supposed to be played.” musicians. So anything I play is going to them. “We all have soundtracks being played Moss hadn’t learned everything yet, sound like Chicago.” The soulful artists that influence their in the back of our lives,” Rogers said. though. After leaving Smith’s band, he went You should understand, however, that music are what you might expect from a jam “Whether you’re playing it on your phone on to play with Jimmy Rogers. The switch despite the debt he owes to his teachers and band. Blended in with their own hard-edged or in your car when you’re coming home, from bass to guitar had moved Moss toward the traditions of his city, Moss has always sound, you can hear bits and pieces of influ- there are things we choose to listen to, and the front of the stage, and in Rogers’ band been himself. He went out on his own in ential idols like The Allman Brothers Band, they make us feel a certain way about life. he learned how not to lose sight of the fact The Meters and the String Cheese Incident And we’re just trying to be the background that there were still other musicians on stage Continued on page 16 in their music. to somebody’s life.” August 15, 2013------www.whatzup.com------5