In anticipation of this weekend’s Summer Camp Music Festival, we look back to our very first moe. cover story, from February 2001.

moe.’s new album, Dither, made me hallucinate. I saw American flags and apple pie and the Constitution streaming like toilet paper across this great nation. Granted, the opening track is called “Captain America,” but it really was the band rather than the song that inspired this vision.

Rock ‘n’ roll is the soundtrack of the modern American dream; it’s all about ingenuity, drive and power. It’s about reinventing yourself whenever the mood suits you and having the freedom to change your mind on a whim. It’s even about being a mutt and not apologizing for it – of distilling a diverse heritage into something that’s new and improved. And moe.‘s mission statement epitomizes these ideals – the band is one of the last true vestiges of rock ‘n’ roll we have. A perfect model of the underdog who could, the band has risen through the ranks with sheer grit and a creative spirit that keeps it in a continual state of evolution.

So it’s no surprise that Dither is an entirely fresh chapter in the moe. saga. The band’s worst nightmare is stagnancy, closely followed by being pigeonholed and labeled. Throughout its nine-year history, moe. has engineered a sound that is the synthesis of pretty much every style out there. The band’s muse seems to thrive on a diet of diversity, bingeing on every influence moe. has ever had – no small task to say the least.

No Dithering Around

While the band’s previous major label releases, No Doy and Tin Cans and Car Tires, stretched the band’s range, Dither is an experiment in how far moe. can go. “Captain America” is pure, big sound; “Faker” is a country fringe-tinged ballad; “The Ghost of Ralph’s Mom” has hints of synthesized, ‘80s nostalgia; “So Long” sounds like a gunfight at dawn with a belly dancer officiating; “New York City” comes dangerously close to an Irish jig; and “Can’t Seem to Find” is all harmonica and nylon strings. There’s even a cover of Big Country’s “In a Big Country.”

There are also plenty of riffs and solos and vocal phrasings that are traditional moe. (although that seems like an oxymoron) all the way. It’s not that Dither doesn’t work as hard as previous albums, it’s just that it seems more relaxed. These guys’ chops are just as ferocious as ever, but perhaps they’ve grown into their skin – grown out of the idea that they have something to prove. And perhaps they’ve solidified the essence of their sound to a point where they feel safe going out on big limbs.

The most daunting of these limbs has got to be experimentation versus fan reception. Whether the humble boys of moe. are prepared to accept the challenge or not, they have a full-fledged subculture following them. And that’s when a very tricky tightrope act begins for a band. Who are the band members writing music for now – themselves or their fans? Dither was written for themselves. It’s a great album, but it’s a little different. While it’s a testament to moe.‘s experimental impulses, it’s also a lot more pop. The “p” word has become demonized through the MTV years because it’s true that a whole lotta sugar-packed shit has been churned out.

But as moe. guitarist/vocalist Chuck Garvey recently pointed out, Elvis was pop and he was the man. Still, will moe. fans support the band’s study in a pop resurrection? “We were actually talking about this a couple of hours ago,” Garvey sighed. “We’re really happy with this new album; we think there’s some very cool stuff on it. But Rob said, ‘We all know that some of our fans are going to look at this and say, ‘This sucks.’” Recent moe. shows have included several tracks off Dither performed in the band’s more typical live style, and while all were well received, moe. wonders whether fans will have an allergic reaction to the reworked album versions.

The moe. the Merrier

Dither may incorporate some new sounds, but it’s not as far as moe. ultimately wants to go. “Some of our favorite bands are bands that have taken chances and evolved on an album-to-album basis,” continued Garvey, “and while it would be great to be able to do that, I think it would be neglecting what some of our core fans like and expect out of us. You want to be able to be completely experimental, but I don’t think we could go the way of Sonic Youth for a whole album and expect people to go along for the ride. They might feel a little abandoned or something – maybe when people are a little more comfortable with what we do and really understand that we like a lot of different styles of music. Variety – it’s the spice of life.”

Ironically, this sentiment is echoed in a completely unrelated song, Dither’s “The Ghost of Ralph’s Mom” : “The more things change, the more they stay the same/The more they stay the same, the more I go insane…” Who wants the ghost of creativity past hovering about?

Garvey reflected on the potential pop fallout from Dither. “There are always going to be people who do that, ‘I saw them back when they were cool,’” he said. “But I don’t feel like we’re selling out, because a lot of my favorite music is pop music – maybe not the mainstream, ram-it-down-your-throat radio format that we have today, but it was pop music.” One of the most damaging misconceptions being fueled today is that “radio-friendly” and “sell-out” are synonymous. The ability to write a good hook in an interesting package is nothing to be ashamed about.

moe. may be hailed for its improvisation but the group has always been focused on composing well-constructed songs. That’s why its jams are so good. “We’re all dedicated to making sure that there are some good, basic songs to start with, and then we can stretch them out live,” explained Garvey. “We really try to make cool, concise, potent songs on their own, and hopefully, that translates onto an album.”

Oddly enough, moe.‘s flirtation with pop has come at its most independent time. With a big adios to Sony 550, moe. will release Dither on its own label, Fatboy Records. Garvey explained, "It came to a point where we realized that the label really wasn’t doing much for us, that they didn’t really care," explained Garvey. "It’s much better to be doing this on our own label – now we have no one to blame but ourselves.

“The main thing that they really dropped the ball on was advertising, promotion, trying to get us played on the radio anywhere,” he continued. “It’s as if we didn’t exist. Actually, while we were on the label, some people didn’t know who we were. And also, when we were off the label, you could go in there and people would think that we were still part of Sony 550. That was our major label experience. Feel the love.” moe. gets the last laugh with a gentlemanly rebuff in Dither’s “New York City.”

We all knew this time was coming. As fabulous as it was having moe. as a best-kept secret and regardless of the whens and hows, we all knew the band would continue to find a larger and more diverse audience. It’s doubtful, however, that we’re in any grave danger of a corporate blowout complete with moe. action figures and such in the near future; this is the band that calls its merchandising arm “moe.crap.” Commenting on the band’s corporate mission statement, or lack thereof, Garvey stated, “We’re a pretty sarcastic bunch of bastards. If we take ourselves too seriously, it probably won’t be fun anymore.”

Warming to the subject, Garvey continued rather earnestly, "I don’t look down on merchandising because it’s really hard to do this for a living. Merchandise is our source of income. Touring doesn’t make a lot of money. People think if we pack a theater, we must be loaded, but it costs a lot to do this.

“It’s a creative outlet, too,” he added. “And then, well, someone once described it to me as having a vendor gene: being good at selling yourself. Personally, I’m not very good at that, but at the same time, I don’t look down on that as a sell-out thing to do. I think people expect it, too. To have a T-shirt that says, ‘This is my band.’ We’re not going to make lunch boxes or anything.”

Jamming in Japan

This past Labor Day weekend moe debuted a three-day, seventeen-band extravaganza it has dubbed moe.down. This will inevitably become an annual pilgrimage, and perhaps even more popular than its already famed Halloween and New Year’s shows. “It was really cool to sit down and make a list of all these different musicians that we like, and try to get them to come play and then have them actually say, ‘yes,’” said Garvey. “It was great. It’s a big step from where we were six years ago.” And, not surprisingly, the event brought together an array of musical styles with artists like Les Claypool, David Grisman, Charlie Hunter and Ani DiFranco.

The boys of moe. have been playing rock ‘n’ roll ambassadors of late as well, with a five-show tour of Japan last September; the Tokyo date sold out two months in advance. Turns out that Japan loves moe. almost as much as America does, and the band was happily shocked by it reception. “It was five days of extremes,” remembered Garvey. “The fans were great. I expected them to be more reserved and collapsed between songs, and polite. They were pretty rowdy, actually.” Bolstered by tape trading, steadily increasing overseas sales and additional exposure from the worldwide coverage of the last Woodstock fiasco, moe.’s reputation preceded it, and by the time the group got to Japan, the fans were even singing along.

Garvey said the idea of live improvisation is really catching on and several Japanese bands, including Big Frog, which played with moe., are experimenting with the concept. Speaking of the Japanese audiences, Garvey said, “At least to me, it appeared to be a new element to them – to have that kind of freedom in their music. It’s a different energy than is normally part of their culture, I guess. It was a very cool experience for us.”

The power of the improv jam is nothing new to American fans, and no one does it quite like moe. While most bands agree that exploring their collective consciousness in search of new ground is what keeps their music interesting for both fans and themselves, moe. takes the concept and pushes it further by adapting its the-more-styles-the-better attitude to a live show. The band can put a metal-infused jam in the midst of a bluegrass ditty and really make it work. The next song might morph from rock to jazz while the next is an all-out hoedown.

“Anything goes,” said Garvey. “A blistering, power-chord, Metallica kind of riff is pretty satisfying every once in a while. I couldn’t deal with it all night, but then again, I couldn’t deal with jazzy noodling all night. We like the variety, and if whatever happens to come up and be something that everyone is willing to chase after, it’s fun.” It’s good for the fans, too. What’s more fun than hearing moe. dig itself into what seems like an impossible hole, and then manage to not only get back to a song, but do it with grace and good humor while lighting a few ears on fire to boot? Garvey promised this wasn’t about to change no matter how weird the studio albums may get.

Of the many descriptions moe. has received recently, one of the greatest was from Rolling Stone’s David Fricke, who has been quite supportive of the band and has also suggested that moe. will be around for the long haul. Endearingly humble, Garvey was audibly blushing when asked about Fricke’s projection. “That’s definitely a pretty cool endorsement. I tend to trust what he says,” he joked. “To have someone who’s such a genuinely nice person and who’s been in the business for a long time be interested in what we’re doing is great. I’m all for it. I’m going to tell my mom!”