Strange Brew - 1968-70

Late in 1968, Monte Schofield, Brooke Passey, Brent Nielsen, David Davenport and I started a rock band called Strange Brew. We took our name from the title of the song made popular by the group Cream. These are the chronicles according to the best of my memory.

I was not having fun in school. I was trying to be an athlete like my father and older brothers. A friend of mine had told me "Girls will not like you if you don't play basketball or football." I was good enough to make the team, but never got off the bench. Dad got off work one time to come watch me play basketball. With 30 seconds left in the game and our team well ahead, I was sent in the game. The ball was thrown to me, I threw it back, the game was over. Dad congratulated me on a game well-played. Reflecting on the situation, I asked myself, "Why don't you do what you are good at?" My course was set. I went home, called the coach on the phone and quit the team. I needed to be in a band. Now all I had to do was find one.

Monte Schofield and I had been very close all the way from first grade. We both played trumpet in the school band and had sung several times in a folk group with Shane Kunz and Robb Lawson (Robb and I had the same birthday, I was one hour older, the only thing I ever beat him in). Monte and I recruited various people in earlier bands. Jeff Rydalch played organ for a while and Kevin Miyasaki played drums, but for some reason they did not continue. We needed a bass guitar player. We talked to Brent Nielsen and he said he was game. He also said his dad would let us use the upstairs dance studio across from the high school (many of the neighbors complained about our practices). We needed an organ player. Monte recruited David Davenport. I wanted to play guitar, but we needed a drummer, so I got a set of drums and we let the games begin.

Our competition was stiff. It seemed everyone had a garage band in the late sixties. Kelly and Joe Keele, known as The Shadow People were our main competition at Sugar. The group known as The Affection Collection were from Idaho Falls. They had actually made a record Apple Blossom Time which was played on the radio. Whenever they were in town, we were out of luck.

The local chapter of the Lion's Club sponsored a yearly Battle of the Bands, which was great. The idea was to enter your band in a local city competition, such as Rexburg, Sugar, Teton, St. Anthony, etc.), and win first place. Then you qualified for regionals held at Rexburg. Then on to State. What a great chance to extend our 15 minutes of fame another thirty seconds or so.

We learned a lot from the first go-around, namely that we actually needed to practice to be successful (what a concept!). We also needed uniforms. So, we bought bright yellow, striped and flared, bell-bottom pants (move over Brady Bunch), matching shirts and neckerchiefs. I never knew who was in charge of costume design, but it seemed like a good idea at the time. Our senior year we went up against the Shadow People in Sugar and lost. We practiced like crazy for the competition in Driggs. Only one band showed up to compete against us. It was a group from the college who thought they could easily beat us. They were wrong. We went away with all the prizes, as well as some individual trophies. Now, on to regionals.

We spent hours and hours getting ready for the Rexburg regional competition. The gym of Madison High School was packed with bands in each corner. We had drawn one of the last in the order of performance. When I saw the judges hand in their score cards before we were through playing I knew we were in trouble. The Shadow People emerged victorious from the shadows (pun intended). Even though Kelly Keele and I were both drummers for rival bands, we were very close friends and remained so for years. We even played a drum duet for the marching Digger Darlings in a competition at Ricks College.

We had many great experiences playing for dances. I recall one dance at Sugar when Mom and Dad came to listen. I'm sure it was not their type of music, but they sat quietly and pretended to enjoy the noise. The upstairs bedroom I slept in was often congested with drums, amplifiers and microphones. Uncle Rod told Dad he would not put up with that five minutes! Dad said, "Listen, as long as they are here, I know where they are and what they are doing. I would rather have Scott and all his friends right here in my home." That was a philosophy I tried to maintain with my own children.

I had the kind of relationship with Dad that was based on trust. I would tell him when I was going to be home and he would trust me. I never let him down, so the trust ran deep. I asked him if I could take his '68 Ford Torino to West Yellowstone to play for a dance we had booked. I told him we would be home around three in the morning. He said OK. We were packing up after the dance at about 12:30 a.m. when a group of local high schoolers approached me and said they wanted to invite us to a party. They said they wanted us to go "hot-potting" with them. I said I did not know what that was. They said they sneaked into the park to party in the hot pots along the river. I naively said we had not brought any suits with us. They burst into laughter. It dawned on me that our lack of attire would not be a problem. We had just finished the rock and roll, so all that remained was the drugs (plenty of alcohol) and the sex. It was the first time any of us had ever been invited to such an event. I suppose most teenagers would have jumped at the opportunity (Fantasy Island was a popular TV show at the time). The thought came to my mind, "If you do, there will be no mission." I knew I could never face Mom and Dad, and besides that, I knew Neal and Dale would beat the tar out of me. I said the only thing I could think about: "I promised my Dad I would have the car home by three."

The high school kids all laughed, then they realized I was serious. They walked away in disbelief. We packed up our things and drove back to Sugar City. We had been invited to an orgy and turned it down. It was a defining moment in my life. If I had gone, I would most likely never have served a mission, married in the temple, or qualified for the blessings I have received. I would have broken my mother's heart, disappointed my father, and been killed by my older brothers. Gladly, it was a positive experience, and yes, we were in attendance at priesthood meeting the following Sunday morning.

The band members were very loyal. I had participated in Declamation, which was a literary competition held at the high school. I had won the right to go to state and present a series of poems I had written. I told Miss Carey (we often called her "Miss Scary") that we had a dance in Montana that night and I would not be going to state. She was not happy with me. But, the show must go on.

We really were a "strange brew" of teenage kids, living in a time when we could go into a bar in Montana, where we were too young to even be in there, but negotiate a deal with the owners to provide the entertainment. We usually got $125 a night, which was pretty good. The best part was when we had back-to-back performance on Friday and Saturday night.

We had a close call in Deer Lodge, Montana, when we started to set up and the local union representative asked to see our union cards. We did not have one. This middle-aged woman gave us the run-around and threatened to shut down the show before it ever started. When we told her to take a hike she said her son-in-law was the sheriff. We were out of our league, being bullied by more seasoned adults. We ended up paying $50 or so for the privilege of playing, and the promise we would never come back. After the show, someone threw a brick at Brent Nielsen's car. We turned around and chased them long enough to get a license number. We spent most of the night filling out police reports at the local station. We were definitely not in Kansas, and a lot further from Sugar City.

We were playing for a street dance in West Yellowstone. The parking lot was marked off with a wooden snow fence. The local high school had hired us for the gig. A skinny kid about three inches shorter than I introduced himself as the bouncer. I thought, OK, right. We had been playing for about 45 minutes when two huge cowboys, each over 6'4" came staggering in to the dance. Their liquid refreshments had already been previously sampled. They started pushing around some of the boys and trying to dance with some of the girls. We were right in the middle of a song when I saw the bouncer come running across the parking lot, jumped up in the air and kicked one of the cowboys right in the butt. Just like it had been planned, all the girls moved to the outside of the dance area by the fence and every boy in the place jumped on the two cowboys. It reminded me of the National Geographic movies where arm ants take apart giant beetles and haul them away.

We did the only thing we could think of: We kept playing. Bodies were flying everywhere. A kid came rolling across the parking lot and hit into my bass drum. He got up, shook his head, and then ran out and jumped into the pile of inhumanity, punching whatever or whomever was handy. Still, we kept playing. It was like watching a movie. Then the cops came. They started digging into the pile of people, pulling out teenagers and tossing them aside, trying to find the mother lode at the bottom. They emerged with two battered cowboys, still lucky to be alive. They informed us the dance was over.

As we were packing our stuff, the bouncer came up to me smiling, "That was great, wasn't it!" He paid us our money and thanked us for a great time. I realized it was not the size of the dog in the fight, but the size of the fight in the dog.

It was as time when the places we were playing were dark and lined with "glow-in-the-dark" posters of Jimi Hendrix and the Beatles. Black lights made these posters glow, along with anything else that was white. The cigarette smoke was often thick and we had to get home in time to shower before going to church on Sunday morning. I recall watching people fall drunk on the floor during some of our performances. I remember thinking that we could not do this forever, nor should we. Sometimes it was like a field trip into Hell. Other times it was pure fun. Most every time we came home with our ears ringing. No doubt we did some damage to our hearing (what did you say?). I will always remember traveling together, getting hotels, booking dances, learning new songs, making things up as we went. What a true adventure. We had the chance to find out a lot of positive things about ourselves.

Being in the Strange Brew was clearly the most fun I had in high school. I have often been grateful that I was no good in athletics and that I was not successful in those terms. Now, over 40 years later, many of my athlete buddies have bad knees, hips and other assorted left-over high school reminders of their glory days. I am so lucky to still be rockin' after all these years.