Sat. Feb. 27

Late last year, I did a bio for the rock trio, Freerider, which is emerging after years of, well, not being Freerider. They’ve released their CD of 1993 and are beginning to gig, playing Copperfield’s Saturday Feb. 27 with Hillblock, You and What Army and Anomoly. For Freerider, which is on first around 9,  it doubles as a benefit for Operation Troop.
    "Whether we want troops on foreign soil or not,” says bassistTodd Erickson. “The fact is they sacrifice so much to serve and protect the USA.  Operation Troop Aid is a 501c non-profit that delivers care packages to US troops serving all over the world. We hate war but love OTA." (You gotta mention "Freerider" at the door when you come in; do so and 1/2 the proceeds go to OTA. You can also suport OTA at http://operationtroopaid.org )
   So, who Freerider?
   Here’s a version of their story and the second chance they got.  
   You don’t get a lot of those in the music business. Especially after your first attempt fizzles and you more or less put your music-making days behind you and embark upon other pursuits. Especially when you move out of your 20s and into things like families and alternate careers.
    But here is Freerider, a hard rock trio originally from Boston, back at you, with a CD called “No Ride Denied.” It was originally recorded in 1993 and first released nearly ten years ago.
    Why has it been re-released? Why does Freerider – lead singer-lyricist-bassist Erickson, guitarist Steve Coyne and drummer Jeremy Waybright - exist again?
     Second question first.
     “We’re too stupid to quit,” is how Erickson puts it. But that’s really not true. For one, they’re not stupid and for another they actually did sort of quit – or at least they put Freerider on the shelf for years. They were all in different parts of the country, pursuing other projects – construction, studio work, teaching - during the past decade. They reconnected through MySpace last year and reunion discussions began.
    “We really do respect each other,” says Erickson. “There’s a lot of camaraderie and intelligence at the table. This thing won’t go away. We’re like a cockroach. Spray us with bug juice and we wake up the next morning and crawl across the kitchen floor.”
    Which leads to the first question, about the CD. Why take an indy record that didn’t exactly bust the charts ten years ago and rev it up again?
    “We’re gotten a hold of something pretty life-changing,” says Erickson, who readily acknowledges there’s a big heap of  Band-From-Nowhere-Gets-an-Unexpected-Break aspect to this leg of Freerider’s trip.
    And the break is …
    Linking up with Harmonix – the Rock Band and Guitar Hero company based in Cambridge, Mass. Harmonix, which is partnered with MTV, is not just a game company anymore. It has a new digital music distribution system, Rock Band Network, and Freerider is among the first group of indy bands to be part of it.
    This means what?
    “Many gamers already purchase and play "DLC" (downloadable content) from the Rock Band Store,” says Erickson. Rock Band has up to five million subscribers, a lot of those folks joining when they purchased the Beatles Rock Band. 
     Before its launch, Harmonix did sample marketing of unknown artists within the games and the store and it went very well, with a few songs actually making $35,000 just off a song in Rock Band.
    These weren’t even songs by real bands. “These were fictitious bands made by Harmonix employees to test market their idea about indie music in the game,” says Erikcson. This suggested that folks shopping at the Rock Band Store had a hunger to discover new music.
     Freerider was chosen by their old pal Jeff Marshall, the Network’s executive producer who knew the band from his days managing the Boston rock clubs Spit and Axis and running the Monolyth record label.
   “Jeff thought we’d be perfect for this,” says Erickson, “with my history with the Boston scene and tenacity, being on the cusp of something cool.” Erikcson had played in the post-punk band Shake the Faith before forming Freerider, which was originally called Mere Mortals. (Mere Mortals became Freerider when the band members discovered there were other Mere Mortals out there in the rock world already.)
    “Jeff said: ‘This is like you’ve been a mechanic all your life working with a really crappy set of tools and you’ve done ok,, but somebody hands you brand new tricked out snap-on tool chest with everything you need to be successful in the new age of being a mechanic. That mechanic still has to decide to get up and go to work everyday. He’s given us a bright tool box and I’m doing everything to taken advantage.

     The Rock Band Network deal, for Freerider, means they can connect directly with an audience they previously had no way of reaching through typical means. A generation of fans younger than their potential fans might have been when the disc was first released.
     Here’s how it’ll work: Gamers will be able to shop for all genres of music, play 30 second samples of songs and comments of the groups inside Harmonix that approve the songs for upload to Rock Band Network.  Unlike MySpace, CD Baby or iTunes, the songs will be "play-tested" and approved by a teams of pro gamers, programmers and musicians to ensure the songs meet quality and playability standards. 
    Says Erickson: “People at Harmonix realized with the success of online distribution music, indy music will control the music business for the next decade.”
    “With Xbox, you build a persona and play the songs,” he continues. “So indy bands participate in biggest interactive game on the planet.  RBN provides gamers access to previously unreleased or unknown artists.. And they can buy a digital copy of a song we’ve licensed to Harmonix that will only play in Rock Band 2. We’ve re-mixed each song that is being submitted to Rock Band Network,

   Jeremy mixed the songs in his ProToolz studio at his home in Hollis, NH, then e-mailed me the digital files for manipulation and programming for Rock Band purposes.  The "I've Got A Nickel" Rock Band re-mix is already in our music player ready for re-mastering and distribution on iTunes, etc.
   We have a built in audience of people on Xboxes looking for content to put in their games. Freerider gets blended in Nirvana, Cheap Trick and AC/DC.”
    A song will be sold for $1 or 160 Xbox points.
    “The modest hope, says Erickson, is to “gain a loyal following of Rock Band gamers who spread the word about Freerider, buy our songs and steer fans to our music sites and shows. Our wildest dream would be a Freerider song becomes a runaway smash in the game and propels sales of our music in to the millions of units.  Either scenario is entirely possible.”
      “My hopes,” says Coyne, “is someone in this network of not-well-known bands will have a massive hit. Something will emerge because of it. We hope we can be the ones with the hit. That sound never really went away, which is another stroke of luck for us. We sound like the new batch of bands.”

Tix: $10.

98 Brookline St., 617-247-8605 www.copperfieldsboston.com