Shoplifting: A Love Letter to Devin Welch

I had always thought i lived in Seattle a lot longer than I did. Strange. It was less than a month after my twentieth birthday, and in those 15 or so days I had alienated most of my friends, packed all of my shit into the back of an acquaintance's VW bus (the humor of this image is not lost on me), and moved into an office-carpeted two bedroom apartment in the University District with a complete stranger. I had just finished my vanity tenure as an art department intern at Seattle's biggest record label-a position that earned me little more than a few (admittedly great) Mudhoney LPs and with no experience whatsoever, I set out to work for an independent record company.

This quest was, of course, essentially fruitless (sans a couple of tasks haphazardly handed to me from the city's floundering indies, all of which i relentlessly hounded), with the exception of one serendipitous meeting... one that would somehow serve as the unlikely catalyst for the next 3+ years of my life. After a month of badgering, I was "granted" a meeting over burritos with the owner of one particular label, whose business seemed to be thriving on the merits of his foresight in signing a wildly popular Christian band(editors note: Calling said band a Christian band is frowned upon by management) just before they hit. He asked me if I would be interested in laying out the LP version of his latest release, the first record by then hot-shit local band The Vogue. Pro bono. I, of course, jumped at the chance, having no idea what i was doing. He also invited me to his going away party, he was moving to New York, and unbenounced to me, about to fuck over all of the bands on his roster, at the home he had been staying for the past month, the Vogue house.

A little background: the Vogue were a five-piece of 18-20 year olds that had in about six months time become local celebrities, gracing the covers of two local alternative weeklies (and the tongues of most everyone else) on the merits of little more than a 7". Of the Pretty-Punk-Band-with-Synthesizers motif that had become so popular at the time, the Vogue were a bunch of kids from the privileged suburbs of Seattle who grew up in the "Redmond Firehouse" scene just across the lake from the big city (a scene that would later muster bands like Murder City Devils, Pretty Girls Make Graves, and the Blood Brothers). Growing up in a failed milltown-turned-failed-Navy town, the Vogue represented a sort of reality that seemed so foreign to me at the time: these kids had been in bands since middle school, these kids had toured the west coast, these kids played shows with all of my favorite bands, and, most notably, these kids had been releasing records in some form since high school (with then band Vade). As reasonable a reality as this might all seem to me now, at the time it was all sort of inconceivable.

I arrived at the party unbelievably early, and was greeted by the only person on the premises, a shaggy and brittle-boned skeleton with very prominent braces. I introduced myself, and though met with a little skepticism, was invited inside. Devin, who i had recognized from the one performance i had seen of the Vogue at that point (and who i knew to be a former Blood Brother), went immediately back into the kitchen where he prepared some vegan vegetable fair. We established a cordial rapport that progressed in the weeks that followed.

I saw the Vogue perform a handful of times before they officially broke, the first of many implosions that would greet Devin in the next few years of our friendship. Despite the dated sheen that unfortunately coats a lot of their recordings, the Vogue were good at what they did, with Devin's incredibly inventive playing and glaring discomfort with the presentation always at the forefront. The band lost a member--the timely keyboard--and soon became the (again, unfortunately monikered) Soiled Doves. Streamlined and yet less focused, the band was again mainly a showcase for Devin's presence, a ragged, scrawling tension. Soiled Doves lasted long enough for a single West Coast tour, recording a single for King of the Monsters and a full-length for GSL until their singer's obligations with his other band, the Blood Brothers, forced them to bail. GSL sat on the record for two years before releasing Soiled Life, waiting to cash in on the Blood Brothers' major label PR push. Shit-can number two.

At around this point, Devin, a man who I clearly admired, began discussing with me the possibility of co-curating a monthly arts and music showcase; something that at the time seemed completely out of my capacity. after a few months of discussion, we launched the Slender Means Society, a commitment that would come to mold much of what became my current place in life. Though Devin's presence began to dwindle as his commitments to music intensified, his initial support and vision made the series possible, and allowed me to gain the confidence in my capacity for creation.

Meanwhile, the remaining members of Soiled Doves--Adam Miller, Hannah Blillie (twin sister of Blood Brother Jordan), and Devin, reconvened with bassist Michelle Nolan to support Miller's then-side project, the Chromatics. Considerably more raw, a self-conscious reaction to their previously (self-)disappointing efforts, Chromatics were in no uncertain terms Adam's band... at least on the surface. For all of Adam's awkward Mark E. Smith-isms and desperately alienating stage persona, Chromatics once again relied for the most part (not to undermine Hannah's talents as a percussionist) on Devin's brilliance as a guitarist--spare, precise, and delicate. Chromatics' fate lay largely in the hands of a frontman's ego, however, and after a tour with the Gossip, a couple of singles, and a brilliantly inconsistent full-length (GSL's Chrome Rats Vs. Basement Ruts), Miller split briefly for Minnesota, and returned to Seattle with the decision that Chromatics would carry on without the other members. Shit-can #3.

After about of half-year of silently regrouping, the remaining members of Chromatics and friend Chris Pugmire debuted their new band; one that seemed much more in celebratory of their mutual strengths and convictions. The band is a chorus of intergendered vocals, erratic, extemporaneous distortions, and throbbing, urgent rhythm. To say that Shoplifting are a progression from their previous projects undermines the true artistic leap represented in their still unripened seed--it's as if the past has been soaked in acetone, melting away all of the pomp and artifice, leaving in its place a seething, pulsing open wound. In place of sonic comparisons, it's best to enter their fray in terms of ideology, as their urgency screams (and screams, and screams) the strains of Huggy Bear's politics of personal aesthetic. Though perhaps a little weighed down in performance by their particularly narrow agendas (rock not rape, dude), the band's careful potential seems to trump that of all of their previous efforts. Shoplifting has taken the past year very slowly, self-releasing a cassette, with plans for a Kill Rock Stars release in the near future. With Devin's dumb luck let's hope they can hold it together, word is they've already whittled down to a three-piece... bad sign, and have their chance to shine as The Greatest Band of All Time.

For better or worse, you've helped to make me what I am today, Devin. and I thank you for that.