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THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
WWW.KANSAN.COM
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 11,2001
Schwen Davenport, Eddie Schubert, and Craig Loo shake the stage as they jump around on the back of the trailer. Full Feature, a rock band, performed in the parking lot at the Hy-Vee, 4000 W 6th St., on Saturday morning.
Today's feature: Rock Band serves up full plate of rock, rap, good times
STORY BY LOUISE STAUFFER PHOTOS BY J.E. WILSON
"What's up, Hy-Vee?!" Eddie Schubert yelled to the Saturday-morning crowd at the Hy-Vee parking lot. Schubert, the lead singer of the band Full Feature, was ready to rock.
ture. The band was performing for a charity event at Hy-Vee's lot, 3504 Clinton Parkway, with an audience of a few friends and some shoppers passing by. But it could have been a packed night at Sandstone Ampitheatre in Kansas City, Kan., by the way Schubert was dancing and jumping from the stage to the people in the grass.
As the band pumped in-your-face rock music, the event coordinator pulled Schubert aside and mentioned that a neighbor from three blocks down called and complained about the noise. The band reacted by turning the volume up, and with Schubert making the announcement, "Hey lady, buy some ear plugs!"
Full Feature is a rock band full of contagious energy, smart-ass lyrics, a funky rock sound, a rapping guitarist and a lead singer with crazy moves.
Full Feature lead vocalist Eddie Schubert unleashes the fury into the microphone at the band's show Saturday.
From headlining at The Bottleneck, 737 New Hampshire St., to playing for a charity event in front of a grocery store. Full Feature knows how to have a good time in any situation.
time in any street.
"What makes a great show is if the audience is enjoying it — it doesn't matter where we are," the drummer Ben "Boyd" Brasel said.
"Three of us were friends in high school, and two of the guys (Craig and Marshal "Assman" Loo) are brothers, so we were all close before we became a band," Brasel said.
Great chemistry on-stage and a close bond off-stage help the band make playing music together enjoyable.
Craig Loo, bassist for the band, said playing in Full Feature was intense.
"We all have a lot of energy, and when we're on stage, we tend to get wrapped up in our performance," he said. "We just try to convey a positive attitude." Working together,partying together
Brasel said the formation of Full Feature happened in an unusual way. Everything started with Schwen Davenport,
the band's lead guitarist, and a drum set.
"Schwen got a drum set, kind of as a birthday surprise, intending for someone to start playing them," he said. "I ended up picking them up."
At the same time Brasel began the drums, Craig Loo picked up the bass guitar. The band calls Sept. 9 its anniversary, because on that day in 1993, the group of five played together for the first time.
After relocating to Kansas City from Lawrence in August of 2000, the band shares an eight-bedroom house and members said they wouldn't change a thing about their living arrangement
"I just don't know any other way." Brasel said. "We're a band that not only works together, but we party together."
Since the band's move to Kansas City, its fan base has grown. However, it has met some frustrations with the move. Since 105.9 The Lazer's format switch, no radio stations in the Kansas City area play local music on a regular basis.
play in St. Louis." Unlike other towns such as St. Louis or Des Moines, we have no support from radio stations here," Craig Loo said.
But Full Feature still enjoys performing in Lawrence where it has a strong fan base.
One of Full Feature's regular gigs is to play before each home University of Kansas football game in the northwest corner of the stadium. But the placement hasn't drawn a big audience yet, so the band is trying to relocate to a different place.
Full Feature got the football gig from doing KU events in the past, and receives about $300 for each performance.
The sound around Full Feature
Full Feature has the heart of a rock band, but layers of funk, reggae and rap influences add depth to the band's sound.
"We're funky, but rooted in rock," said Craig Loo, whose rapping adds a hip-hop sound. And Brasel said that while rapping wasn't present in all of the band's songs, it was a part of the music from the beginning. "It's just always been there — it just fits. A couple of the guys listen to hip-hop, so that influences our sound a little," he said. "Our music is kind of like a melting pot."
CONCERT
- What: Full Feature
- When: Before every Kansas home football game
- Where: The northwest corner of Memorial Stadium
"He and I used to switch around, but then around November or December last year, we decided that things would be better this way," Craig Loo said.
The members have changed their original roles in the band since the beginning. Craig Loo and Schubert used to share lead vocal responsibilities, but Loo now plays bass guitar and Schubert is lead vocalist.
Brasel said the band plays about 80 percent of its own music and about 20 percent covers at their shows.
percent covers us in "We play cover songs to keep interest, but we try to concentrate on our own material," Brasel said. Some covers the band plays include Weezer's Say it Ain't So, and Bob Dylan's The Hurricane.
Aside from the unique sound of the band's music, the lyrics are also special. Craig Loo describes the idea behind a song A Carton for You as not being completely about smoking.
He said that the idea came to him one night when a girl had one cigarette left, and didn't give it to him.
"It came to me about two or three in the morning," he said. "I started imagining that she was in love with me, and that she started wondering why you can't buy love."
SYWAS or Screw You With a Smile, Girl in the Corner and Sidewalks are some other songs the band plays at its shows.
Brasel described the band's lyrics as easily digestible.
"We just want to be a fun party band," he said.
The future sound for Full Feature
Full Feature has plans to travel to Fayetteville, Ark., to enter the recording studio for the third time. The band will begin recording its first full-legnth album in the third week of December and has started preparing to record this past month. Brasel said the album will be an improvement from the band's last recordings.
"The first time we got into the studio, we didn't know anything about recording, so it just turned out OK. It got a little better the second time," Brasel said. "This next album is going to be more of a masterpiece
— it's going to be something new.
For more information about the band, check out www.fullfeaturemusic.com.
Contact Stauffer at 864-4810