Live Music Alert: Jon Wayne and the Pain, Thursday, Jan 7, Crosstown Lounge, Grand Forks, 10 pm, $5 and a free beer.

It can be said that Jon Wayne and his band mates are certainly not shy. In fact it was a bold act that first connected the band members. “We have just taken opportunities sometimes, maybe too forcefully, maybe with a little disregard to some of the set rules sometimes. It seems it has worked out good for us all together.”

Wayne, a Jamestown native, had moved to Fargo 2000 and played with a band called Happens Often. “That was a band that had the same style of music that we play now,” Wayne said, “but not the same level of commitment, including myself. As a first project, it was not very organized or committed, but a lot of fun.”

Then in 2005, he decided to check out Wookiefoot’s famous Playhouse. “I didn’t know anybody there,” he said. “I brought my guitar amp, a mic, and a mic stand. I set up my acoustic guitar in the basement where Chris Hicks was there playing with somebody, and I just set up and played over them. They must have wondered, ‘Who is this jerk?’ But they ended up really liking the music.”

That was the birth of Jon Wayne and the Pain. They brought in Jeff Moon, who became the first of four bass players, for the band. “We went through quite a few of them in the last five years.” But the band has had to deal with more major issues than a revolving door of bassmen. Wayne has had to struggle with staying sober.

Currently a heroin addict in recovery, Wayne had been battling his own demons for years. In fact, his move to Fargo a decade ago had been to try to get sober.  “It didn’t work so good, but I had a good time there for awhile,” he admits. Even when Jon Wayne and the Pain first started, the band’s musical success was directly affected by Wayne’s using.

“I struggled with staying sober, and it was kind of a rough four years,” he admitted. Then in 2009, he stopped using—no drugs, no alcohol, and it has made a remarkable difference in how far the band has come. “We realized that nobody was going to do this for us.  I’m not going to have somebody lead me to the pearly gates of musical success and hand me the book on how to do this. I get to learn it myself. With that mentality, that’s where I’ve be at and us in the band, me, Chris Hicks, Charles Torgerson  (who is from Grand Forks originally) have actually had a great year of music, touring and playing with some of our most treasured musician friends. We played with Eric Wilson from Sublime, which was a great honor. On more than one occasion we played with OG from the band Slightly Stoopid. They’re a bigger band who we’ve loved for a long time.”

That success not only is due to the band’s obvious chops and Wayne’s skill with song crafting, but because he’s been participating fully. “For me, it’s been an amazing year, and it’s just been a direct result of just showing up in life. It is amazing what happens when you just show up.” 

Not only does Wayne continue a daily routine that he goes through to stay spiritually fit, but his bandmates keep him honest. “I definitely have not done this on my own….We’ve done it as a band collectively….They know that if I don’t stay sober that our success as a band goes right down the tube and that their friend Jon Wayne isn’t Jon Wayne any more. That’s something that has been realized by them, by my own painful experience, from my own trial and errors, that if I don’t stay sober, we don’t have a band. They are completely supportive and I’m so grateful to them.”

Wayne has seen a positive note in the regional music scene, which like countless others across the country, are supposedly rife with drugs. “I happened to be into more harder substances than just weed and alcohol, which is more common. So I’m grateful that I don’t happen to see people doing heroin backstage at shows. I’m not saying that wouldn’t happen, but I don’t see much of that.”

Interestingly, Jon Wayne and the Pain offer reggae music to their audiences, a genre noted for peace and love and a laid back philosophy of living in the now. In some ways, Wayne has taken that living in the present moment as part of his personal lifestyle. Because when he is present, he is fully participating in life, sober with a lot to offer his audiences.

Jon Wayne and the Pain now can truly celebrate a great sophomore album, made with conscious intent and great talent. It captures their live shows while having the polish of a studio album. It shows their hard work and commitment and the many weeks of touring to test out material on their audiences and to bring them a great show.

The Crosstown Lounge in Grand Forks is one of the places, Jon Wayne and the Pain will be bringing their CD release show. “Grand Forks is a dancing city. It’s one of our favorite places to play, especially at the Crosstown Lounge. Brad at the Crosstown is a really great guy, and he’s been really good to us,” Wayne says.

Come on over to the Crosstown and catch the spirit of Jon Wayne and the Pain.

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 7th, 2010 at 7:19 pm and is filed under Issues. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.