Wadestock rocker learned music in Kincaid
By Bruce Symes, Register Reporter
(Iola Register)
Chris Tady has learned a lot about music and its business, not to mention life, since the days he spent in his Kincaid home years ago playing guitar to Led Zeppelin songs on the radio.
He'll bring some of those lessons, the musical ones at least, to Iola on Saturday
when his band Choad plays at the sixth annual Wadestock music festival southeast
of town.
The 1992 Crest High School graduate is 30 today, living in Lawrence and pursuing
his dream of a career in music. Choad was formed about a year and a half ago
by Tady, who plays lead guitar and sings, Tyler Feeney, bassist and vocalist,
and drummer Ed Epps. The group has been working to get established in the Kansas
City club circuit and is planning the production of its first album, Tady said.
"You have to sling some pizzas, flip some burgers and paint some houses
to keep the water and the lights turned on, but it's worth it," he said
Tuesday afternoon in a telephone interview. "We may not ever make a million
dollars, but if I can make a nice blue-collar living, as far as I'm concerned,
I win."
The Wadestock appearance will represent another opportunity toward achieving
that dream. The journey, Tady admitted, has for him been more adventurous than
perhaps necessary.
"I kind of took the hardheaded way," he said. "People kept telling
me, 'You need to do things certain ways,' but I refused to do them that way
and I had to fall down on my own.
"Then, finally, you start to realize those people might have had something,
and you go from there."
What Tady is accepting today is a sort of compromise, he said. While he's trying
to be more conventional this time in promoting Choad's growth in the business,
he's holding on very closely to the emotions and instincts that first attracted
him to music.
"I've always just loved guitar," he said. "It's not the commercialization and it's not really about playing in front of a bunch of people. As long as I could sit in a house, or in my car, and play eight, nine, 10 hours a day, I'm happy."
TADY MOVED TO Kincaid at age 11 from Wyandotte County with his parents, Louis
and Cynthia Tady who now live in Garnett. The change from a metropolitan to
a rural setting was vast, and he looked hard for ways to connect with the world.
His forays in music had been uneventful to that point, having taken violin
lessons in third grade and singing in the junior high choir.
"When I think of some of the songs we had to sing then, it just sends a chill down my spine," he laughed.
Then he discovered his parents' record collection, which included The Rolling
Stones, Jimi Hendrix, The Beatles and others. "I thought, this is where
it's at," he said.
Tady picked up a guitar and began teaching himself some basics. He played along with those records, accompanied rock songs on the radio and even played in a band or two. In addition to the vintage rock he had latched on to, he learned to appreciate other styles, like heavy metal.
"When the teen age years hit, you really don't stay in a good mood all of the time, and I was into the heavy metal stuff for a while," he said.
A mutual friend introduced him to Jeff Lassman of Iola, who showed Tady how
to tune his guitar and play some popular rock tunes of the day. "It was
like the world opened up to me," Tady recalled.
He then heard Jane's Addiction, a rock band that melded old and new styles that attracted Tady, and he found one of the major influences on his music today.
"I think for a constant inspiration, I do tend to go back to the old stuff," he said. "In the past three or four years, I've really enjoyed blues and jazz, which of course relates back to early rock, so it's an ongoing process."
Tady took his passion away from home in search of his dream. It eventually led him to Massachusetts at age 24 and with $250 in his pocket where he spent time living in his car and playing for tips.
"I look at it as a lot of fun," he said of that time, "and I learned some things. My parents kind of were pulling their hair out, though."
He returned to Kansas and stayed away from "the band thing" for a
time, enjoying his music and his guitar. He became re-acquainted with Feeney,
met Epps and formed Choad.
"Both of these cats are pretty much on the same plane as I am," he said. "It's probably the best group I've been involved with in a long time.
"We're not reinventing the wheel or anything, but I think our quality
is pretty high."
Choad cut an album, as part of a friend's college project, last year in Arizona
and will have it available for sale at Wadestock, Tady said. In addition to
that work, titled "It's All Over Now," the group was asked to participate
on the Douglas County AIDS Project benefit CD and is hoping, to record its first
full-length album soon at a Lawrence studio.
As he moves toward his dream, Tady said, he'll continue to apply the lessons he picks up along the way.
"I didn't use to think it mattered who you know," he said. "I
always thought as long as I make good music, that's all that matters. But, hey,
that's what (my) 20s were for."
WADESTOCK WILL kick off at 6 p.m. Saturday, with the first of five bands taking the stage at 7. Along with Choad, acts scheduled to appear are Anything But Joey, Slick 57, Codie and Agathy
Anything Buy Joey and Codie appeared earlier this week in Kansas City with
the Vans Warped Tour.
Agathy is an Iola based group comprised of Chance Luttrell, Dustin Barker and Chris Maddox.
Wadestock was started in 1999 as a private party by friends Kris Moore, Mark Wade, Brec Ulrich and Todd Willis. The next year they made it a public event and Jim Talkington joined the group of organizers.
Previous year's bands have included Bowling For Soup, Flipside Den, King Me, Getaway Sticks, Jade Raven, The Gadjits, and Death On Wednesday.
Admission is $10. Coolers are permitted, although bottles are not, and no one under age 21 will be allowed to enter the grounds. Food vendors will be on site.
Wadestock is two miles east of Iola to 2000 Road, then a mile south to Nebraska Road and one quarter mile west.
|
