Promotional photo provided courtesy of the girlfriend of one of the guys in Sour Mailbox, few rights reserved.
SAN FRANCISCO - At a poorly attended CD release party at a local dive bar, Ted Lunder, frontman for indie group Sour Mailbox, proudly reaffirmed the band's conviction never to sign a contract with a nationally recognized music label, none of which have ever approached them.
By the end of the night, as many as three CDs were given to friends.
"So many bands I know just can't wait to sign million dollar deals with big companies when they could just as easily work at Starbucks and not have to compromise their integrity," said Lunder, drinking a cup of coffee from the aforementioned establishment. "They're not impressing anyone with their greed or awesome, awesome music."
Sour Mailbox consists of four well-meaning musicians, none of whom have any idea how to create memorable noises of any kind. Their style, while too unrefined to categorize, also lacks any originality that might at least classify it as avant-garde.
The band, which typically performs at open mics and friend's basements whenever they work up the motivation, has wildly succeeded in avoiding the interest of Warner Music Group, EMI, Sony Music, Universal Music Group, and all independent labels. Sour Mailbox feels its music is only made stronger by its enduring resistance to corporate influence.
"If they had the balls to approached us we would shut 'em down faster than one of my shreddin' solos," said lead guitarist Jack Orrington, tapping indiscriminately on his out-of-tune Squire Stratocaster, concluding on an unknown chord.
"Bands like Nickleback, or I don't know, Radiohead, they have their catchy choruses and song structures, but who wants to hear that?" added Orrington. "Not me, that's for sure."
Sour Mailbox's long term goal is to be remembered as "the guys who stood up to the music industry, and never backed down." While they have had little trouble fending off the major labels so far, the band is hopeful for a big confrontation that will make them feel really good about themselves, and give them lots of "cred."
"We won't sell out no matter how much they beg," said Arnold Stubbs, the group's fourth bassist since its inception. "I was talking to this chick about the band for like, half an hour yesterday, and she said she thought she might have heard of us. I don't know what a big label could offer us that would give me a better feeling than that."
A typical set for Sour Mailbox consists of strained vocals, irregular drumming, repetitive chord progressions, and lots of buzzing, crackling, and feedback. Together with the band's forceful lack of stage presence, these elements are championed by the group, which believes the whole package creates something 'unique,' and therefore 'good.' This sentiment, however, is not always agreed on by stray listeners.
"It's not that their music is 'bad'… OK, it's bad," said Nate Shoemaker, who happened to wander into the CD release party in search of a restroom. "The music filled me with an overwhelming sense of 'I'm going to need a lot of drinks to make this tolerable,' and 'I see the bathroom is for customers only.'"
These criticisms do not phase the members of Sour Mailbox, but instead fills them with a self-righteous disdain for the corporate music structure they staunchly reject out of convenience.
"If we were doing it for the money - which we could make if we wanted, believe me - we would be saying 'screw you' to all of our loyal fans," said group drummer Eric Tripp. "Our responsibility is to that one guy still at the bar at the end of the night, even if he's totally hammered and has no idea who we are."
"We refuse to play for anything more than a few free beers," added Tripp. "All the venues on the scene know better than to offer us more than that. We laid down the law from day one."
"It's all about playing that opening slot on Monday night, to people who couldn't care less," continued Tripp. "That's the real music that people want, way more than some dime-a-dozen platinum record."
