In the extensive liner notes that come with the new 20th-anniversary reissue of You Forget About Your Heart, the debut album by the steadfast local indie rock band Schooner, Grayson Haver Currin (formerly the INDY’s music editor) sweeps us back to a heady moment in 2004 when a new wave of Triangle bands were making a noise approaching that of their ’90s forebears.
Of that new vanguard—Des Ark, DeYarmond Edison, Ticonderoga, the Kingsbury Manx, and leading the pack, the Rosebuds—Schooner “might have been the most beguiling,” he writes, calling their debut on the Durham label Pox World Empire “a gem of sad-eyed Southern songwriting wonder, even if most people have yet to hear it.”
Here’s a chance to rectify that: its first time on vinyl, courtesy of 10,000 Hz Records, remastered by the redoubtable wax-smith Wesley Wolfe and enhanced with demos, with the original lineup getting back together to play the thing in the Cat’s Cradle Back Room on Saturday, November 2.
Schooner began as Reid Johnson’s side project to his Brit-poppy rock band the A.M. before becoming a twenty-year institution; it has since sprouted its own side project, Sun Studies. Though steadily steered by Johnson, the lineup has grown fluid since this original band—Tripp Cox, Billy Alphin, and Reid’s sister, Kathryn Johnson—stamped out its indelible first two records, bleeding youthful charisma and conviction.
We recently reached Reid by video chat at his house in Durham to reminisce about the old days and see how they feel now, two decades, and what seems like several lifetimes later.
Russell Baggett of 10,000 Hz liked You Forget About Your Heart enough to turn his record store into a record label. Would you say it’s the fan favorite?
That was definitely one that people gravitated to, and it was the first one. It’s the shortest, a pretty simple record in a lot of ways, but I still get people reaching out and saying it’s their favorite. It had a kind of youthful enthusiasm and the emotions of being in your 20s, even though the songs were in a lot of ways about heartbreak or being pissed off at the scene.
What were you pissed off about?
I’ve always had a little animosity towards any kind of scene that feels cliquey. Back then, I had a lot of friends in Raleigh and Chapel Hill and Carrboro—Durham was always the easiest place to be to me—but “What can you do for me?” was the kind of vibe that you ended up getting. It’s like kids today have to do social media to get eyeballs on stuff, and we had to bullshit with people. Sometimes it felt like fucking high school, like a coolness contest, and whoever did the most cocaine were the biggest band. [laughs] I’ve always had that little chip on my shoulder. But it’s a lot chiller now, and I feel like there’s a little more intermingling with different folks.
You get the sense from the record that the band started from the joy of friends playing together.
I had a rock band, the A.M., and started Schooner as my outlet for these more, like, sensitive songs. Some of them were about breaking up with the first person I actually fell in love with, and I couldn’t do anything about it, so these tracks started pouring out on the floor of my bedroom, a total basement four-track story. It was me emoting. But Tripp played in the A.M. with me and was always big a cheerleader, and one show when the A.M. couldn’t play, I just got a band together to do these Schooner songs.
When Zeno [Gill] wanted to record us, my sister had been playing with us for a little bit, and Tripp had been on guitar but I wanted him on bass. And Billy, who we were friends with because we were close with the Rosebuds—the simplicity of his drumming, just the facts, ma’am. It just kind of came together magically, and that was the band through our second album, Hold On Too Tight.
The last show we played was the album release, seventeen years ago. We played together a month ago for the first time. I think all of us felt it was surreal and fun to be back together. The whole practice, Billy was smiling the whole time. When I get all of the emotions, I get a little dizzy sometimes. It was overwhelming but in a good way.
Zeno and Pox World were a whole thing in the aughties. Remind us?
Pox World Empire, run by Zeno Gill, who was in a band called the Sames; he had a bunch of cool, mostly Durham bands on the label: Jett Rink and Razzle and Pleasant, Torch Marauder was on it. He was putting out a thing called Compulation, and he did three of them that featured 25 bands from North Carolina. We were on the first one of those. Ivan [Howard] had sent him our four-track stuff, and he wanted to record us.
That spot he lived on James Street in Durham was a little magic studio with all the toys and things to play with. Zeno and I always worked together really well. It was fun and light, which is good because some of the songs were dark. Mark Lebetkin, also part of Pox World, really helped promote the record to press and radio, from Tiny Mix Tapes to freaking GQ [laughs].
What did it take to get original lineup back together?
It came easy. I asked my sister first, and then Tripp and Billy were like Yeah, for sure! Tripp’s in Wilmington now, but we can practice on the weekends. Getting Nathan Oliver White to play extra guitar too, he used to play with us back then. So we have a dentist that’s playing in the band.
Always handy.
Gum health is important.
Do you think you’re going to keep doing it with the original lineup?
I would not doubt if we played more shows together. I do have a Schooner record that was pretty much done, and then the computer we were mixing on crashed. I’ve been dragging my feet since COVID, basically. We’ll probably put it out next year. I’m working on a Sun Studies record as well.
You’re going to need a Sun Studies side project soon.
I’ve thought about doing some kind of experimental thing, something just instrumental.
What if eventually you work your way back around and wind up starting the A.M. again?
Right, for sure, that seems like it would make complete sense.
Do these songs mean different things to you now than they did then, or do you see what they meant all along in a different way?
Um…yes. [laughs] I was singing some of these songs last weekend, and they were emotional for a whole other set of circumstances. It’s especially interesting when you pull that out of a new experience. Therapy helps. I can remember what, exactly, that emotion is about, and that’s the nostalgic piece—it’s nice, it’s a friend, even when it’s a heartbreak situation. But the emotions can be pulled from new experiences with the same song.
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