I’ve been asked to do this before, in one way or another, and have always had the smarts to respectfully decline.
To write a brief history of the independent rock scene in Champaign-Urbana is to fail before beginning. I’d have a better shot at taking Indiana to next year’s Final Four. Alas here I sit wondering where to begin, knowing there’s little way to do this justice. So I’ll forge ahead blindly and give you a snapshot of the C-U scene that is most dear to my heart while being necessarily incomplete and completely beholden to the personal biases, tastes, and friendships that inform these views.
With the proliferation of music archives on the World Wide Web, perhaps the tiny subset of information that I share here will help you further your own investigation into the area’s rich history. Maybe you’ll begin to visit the local bulletin board OpeningBands.com where participants discuss topics such as these from time to time. Maybe you’ll find audio archives online from guys like Andy Switzky, Rod Van Huis, Rob Arroll, and Peter Eggleson and those may lead you down still different paths of discovery. Maybe you’ll find the Over End Ever master tapes in some murky corner of Allen Hall and find the reason for launching your own record label or buying your first guitar.
Better yet, maybe you’ll finally be that person brave enough to launch the archival C-U band site boasting hypertext on every band and musician willing to toss in their own two cents. Please do because bands like Designer Mustard Gas, Mary Me, Wonkavision, The Shakes, The Martyrs, Club Crack, Area, Ack! Ack!, Hardcore Barbie, The Field Triggers, Bale, Little Engine, The Last Straw, Feaze, Jumpknuckle, Superhero Forehead, The Judy Gang, the Mango Zowies, Pink Awful, Grout Villa, The Signalmen, Otis and the Elevators, Beezus, Grover, The Farmboys, Tiny, Demoted To Hugs, Load, Proof Of Utah, Third Stone, Lost Luggage, The Dead Relatives, The Flat Earth Society, Love Cactus, Rectangle, Reaction Formation, Hundred Acre Wood, The April Crash, and Williwaw deserve a shot at posterity and there just isn’t room to do so here.