The Ghost Dinner Band is playing at Penuche's on Feb. 25 at 9 p.m. We put our fear of ghosts aside for a moment and got in touch with them for a quick preview.
Let's get this right out of the way: How many of you are ghosts?
It's hard to say – we haven't done any tally recently. As for our name, it's a secret that we won't give any more information about until the truly right time comes. It's confidential at this point. We get asked about it a lot, and we apologize to anybody who's let down by a little bit of mystery.
What do ghosts like to eat for dinner, anyway?
Probably souls. Other ghosts maybe? Maybe it's that Ecto-Punch that they had back in the day as a promotion for Ghostbusters. (Ed. note: It was “Ecto Cooler, and it was delicious).
How scary are your performances?
We've had little kids run away from us in horror for sure. Also, there's usually a lot of screaming at our performances. Mostly from females. I guess they're easily startled.
You describe yourselves as “a whole century of rock music thrown at you in an eclectic time warp.” How deep do your roots go, musically? Also, does that mean you cover “The Time Warp?”
From Bach to Beethoven, from Presley to Costello, from White Stripes to Black Keys, from everything we've ever heard. We've always listened to everything we could get our hands and ears on. Therefore, you may be hearing a grunge song from the '90s with clicks, pops, and giggles of the psychedelic '60s. You may be hearing an old traditional folk song from down south, while wanting to believe it's a Tom Waits song. It all comes from the same place.
Also, we've talked about playing “The Time Warp” before, and now we may think more about it, my love.
What sets you apart from all the other guitar-driven hard jam-rock bands out there?
It's all up to your interpretation. It's all just bands tearing their organs out and laying them onstage in front of you. It's up to you to decide whether they're yellow, green or blue. Whether they smell like roses, licorice, or tiger droppings. All that we can say is that we haven't heard any other band around here playing what we're playing, or anything close to it.
You've played in Concord a couple times now. How much do you love playing here (on a scale of “a ton” to “way more than history's greatest minds could have ever imagined”)?
We've always gotten a great reception from the wonderful people of our state's capital. We always love coming out there to purple up your ears, and we look forward to doing it again soon. Darling place, it is.
Will we see you on stage at the Granite State Music Festival this summer?
You absolutely shall. By then, our new album shall be out and you will be in store for a lot of new material, and a lot of old classics and of course our signature pieces. We are all gut-wrenchingly excited.
Your first album, In Nightmares, is available on iTunes. When does the new album drop?
Our album will be out in March. In our opinion, it is much better and much more “us” than our first album. We think people will like it. If they don't, we don't mind, for we have already started writing for another. You can't please everyone, but maybe if we focus on one person at a time, we will succeed in pleasing everyone before the world crumbles.
Any last words?
Why? Are you about to kill us? That would be quite rude. Thank you for your time and we hope to see all of you readers out in the action someday soon.
