BY MIKE BREEN

Photo By Dale M. Johnson

Promenade (L-R: Scott Cunningham, Steve Sauer and Jason DeBruer).

On the popular VH-1 biography series Behind the Music, you can divide the episodes into two categories. There's the great installments, the ones where band members overdose, die and come back to life (Mötley Crüe, you're the best!).

Remember the legendary episode where Leif Garrett, still hooked on smack and looking like a bloated street-hustling pirate, meets the man he helped cripple thanks to his allegedly-in-the-past addictions? Not surprisingly, those are always the highest rated shows -- witnessing celebrities bottom out is one of America's favorite pastimes.

And then there are the hastily thrown together BTMs that look to flesh out an hour on a "hot" artist who barely has a good enough story to fill your standard one-page record company bio. Creed's and-then-it-all-went-wrong moment was the most comical, as its arrogant, no-talent blowhard of a singer lost all of the group's seed money in a pyramid scheme. Those poor, miserable bastards!

If Cincinnati-based Pop/Rock trio Promenade -- one of the higher profile local acts playing this week's MidPoint Music Festival (see Round Two) -- were a Behind the Music subject, they wouldn't rank with Aerosmith (no monster drug problems or band-killing fisticuffs ... yet!). And they haven't lost the little money they do have in a hair-brained get-rich-quick scheme (yet?).

But, relative to the local music scene, Promenade's tale is an interesting and occasionally surreal journey. On the eve of the release of their highly-anticipated new album, Part One, the tight-knit trio gathered at the downtown home guitarist Steve Sauer and bassist/singer Scott Cunningham share (drummer Jason DeBruer fittingly lives about a block away) to discuss their decade-plus existence. It's all about longevity, rebirths, lessons learned and longtime friendships.

Wait! Don't change the channel! There's also schoolboy uniforms, blond wigs and gold mannequins!

No, Promenade's members aren't weirdo fetishists and Part One isn't a concept album about getting lost in a department store overnight as grade-schoolers. But the mannequins and uniforms are a big part of the band's "darkest hour" in their own imaginary Behind the Music.

Cue melodramatic narrator: "And then, things took a turn for the worse."

'The band's darkest hour was right around the corner...'
Sauer, DeBruer and Cunningham gather around a table in their concrete backyard with various adult beverages and smokes in hand. There's a haze of disgust floating in the air when asked about the excruciatingly long delay between their last album and Part One, which finally sees the light of day Oct. 11.

Save the Radio, one of the best locally released discs of the last 10 years, came out in 2000. Riding high on the buzz, which made Promenade one of the most popular original acts on the Cincinnati music front, the band was ushered hastily into the shady world of the music business. At the ripe ages of 25, the three were flattered by the attention and eager to sign a "development deal" with a Michigan-based company called Ashley Talent International (ATI). ATI, which also booked tours for washed-up '80s and '90s acts like Quiet Riot, Vince Neil, Gin Blossoms and Sponge, saw potential in Promenade's hook-laden sound and boyish good looks.

Though the band now admits to being naíve, the company's track record of getting artists signed to major label record contracts was perfect. All five of the bands they'd worked with had scored deals with labels like Universal and Atlantic.

"They talked it up a lot and we fell for it," Cunningham says. "They basically said, 'We'll get you a major label record deal.' They just made it sound so sweet."

Almost immediately, the members were butting heads with ATI, disagreeing on most of the "artistic" and "image" decisions they felt were critical to breaking them. Sauer remembers the exact moment he knew they'd made a mistake.

"The minute I knew we were in trouble was when we went up to Detroit for a photo shoot," he recalls, now able to laugh at the absurd scenario. "We walk into this black studio and they've got two gold mannequins with blonde wigs on and glam outfits and beads. And they put us in schoolboy outfits. And they had little kids with sparklers running around. That was their idea of a sweet photo shot. That's when I was like, 'Uhhh.' "

(The band defiantly refuses to let me even see the photos, let alone run them with this story.)

The contract with ATI was for a year (it officially dissolved in April of this year) and, with the company uninterested in recording an entire new album, sessions they had begun two days after releasing Radio were put on hold. Thankfully they'd teamed up with local promoter/manager Richard Waring and Immigrant Management, who served as their go between/advice guru.

Instead of getting some unseasoned kids from the Midwest eager to do anything they told them, ATI had landed strong-willed artists with a knowledgeable backer.

"All of the other groups that they had signed didn't have a manager, so they signed on as their managers too," Sauer says. "So the bands would just do whatever they told them to do. They didn't realize we weren't going to agree with everything they said, and it got real frustrating on both ends."

The band rode the contract out and did manage to score some good regional shows that spread their name outside of the Cincinnati area. Oh yeah, and they got to meet "famous people."

" 'Hey, I want you guys to meet somebody, this is Kid Rock's bodyguard,' " Cunningham mocks, adopting a weasely, nasally cigar-chompers' voice.

A year later, the group was ready to record its next album, but, not mindful of their funds after signing a "sure-fire" deal, lack of money became an issue. A dark cloud hovered for a while.

"We put so much hope into (the ATI deal) that when it ended we were all depressed and didn't know what to do," Sauer says.

"I started drinking more," Cunningham recalls. "We all grew beards."

Photo By Dale M. Johnson

'But things were on an upswing for the three good friends from suburban Cincinnati...'
Such a draining experience would break the will of most bands. But Promenade are the rare local group that's inched over the decade-long career mark and show no signs of breaking up. In fact, as Part One brazenly shows, they're at their peak, in terms of songwriting, and as a live band they've never sounded better.

A look at the local scene shows few original acts that have managed Promenade's longevity. The crucial factor is in the members' tight-knit friendship, which dates back beyond college or even high school all the way to the second-grade school yard.

DeBruer, who would actually not join the band until 1997, and Cunningham were friends as youngsters. He would introduce Cunningham to Sauer several years later while sophomores at Anderson High School, leading to an immediate musical connection that first manifested itself in a cover band.

When they decided they wanted to play their own music, Sauer and Cunningham enlisted their friend Brian Ferry to play drums. It was the early '90s, and the guys bonded over repeated listens to Beastie Boys' Check Your Head, the Red Hot Chili Peppers' Blood Sugar Sex Magik and U2's Achtung Baby. (Sauer is still a rabid fan of U2 and their guitarist The Edge, earning the nickname "The Brink" from Radio and Part One engineer Jeff Monroe.)

Promenade played the campus bars and released their first album, Francis Coming Home, a blatant display of the band's yet-to-be-diluted influences, in 1995. But when Ferry decided to leave the band soon after, Sauer and Cunningham began a year-and-a-half long search to find a new drummer. In that time, they holed up to demo songs on a four-track recording machine, which proved to be the impetus for finding their unique sound.

The drummer search ended when, over a card game at Sauer's mother's house one night, they decided their old friend DeBruer would be their new backbeat. The only problem? DeBruer had never played before in his life.

"Steve would be working and I'd just go over to his mom's house and play, daily," DeBruer remembers.

Somewhat miraculously, the self-taught DeBruer quickly morphed into an amazingly sturdy drummer and his simple, efficient style became an integral part of Promenade's distinctive AltRock style, which blends fractured falsetto vocals, compelling melodies and Sauer's creative, churning guitar parts. The chemistry translated into Save the Radio, the band's real introduction to the local music scene.

Since they'd previously played only in Oxford -- where Cunningham was attending Miami University -- most people assumed they were a new band and Radio was their debut. The band routinely played to packed houses around the city at the start of the new millennium.

'The band's tight bond was about to be tested...'
Though they admit to the occasional quarrel, the three unanimously agree that their hardcore personal relationship has been the secret to their endurance. When they're in nursing homes and nearing their final hours, chances are they'll still have each other on speed dial.

"I think of Scott and Steve as best friends and I don't really think of them as bandmates," says DeBruer. "I've never been in another band, so I don't know how things work. I don't know what the proper protocol is on how to act. But if we have an argument about something band-wise, I'll wake up the next day and feel horrible. And it isn't just because of band stuff. It was because I was having an argument with my best friend."

"We're literally three best friends that are in a band," Cunningham adds. "It's not like we were in a band and then became friends."

Of course, even best friends have their moments.

"The first time we played in Grand Rapids ... Scott, how many beers did you have before we played?" Sauer asks when pushed to come up with a tense confrontation.

"I don't know," Cunningham mumbles.

"You don't want me to tell this story..."

"No, I don't mind the story ... but I was also sick and taking cold medicine."

"He got fucking drunk."

"I think there were $1 beers," DeBruer chimes in.

"I couldn't figure out my guitar strap," Cunningham says, somewhat embarrassed.

Sauer finishes the story: "It took him about five minutes to get his strap on, in front of everybody, with us ready to start. And the crowd was so shitty, because we were playing so bad, that Scott just starts yelling at them: 'This is Cincinnati motherfuckin' Rock & Roll.' That was a quiet, quiet ride home."

'But the band would persevere past the "Cincinnati motherfuckin' Rock & Roll" disaster and create their best album to date ...'
While Part One carries over much of the band's trademark Pop/Rock sound, the overall maturation is instantly apparent. Lyrically dark and occasionally introspective, the album sashays from shimmering mid-tempo cuts like "Sleep" and "She's an Airport" to crunchier rockers like "Luscious Dream" and "The Grab." There's also more of a deep, emotive bent to the record, like the buoyant "Limb By Limb" and "Jon," a rarely played gut-wrencher about an old school chum of Cunningham's who committed suicide.

Photo By Dale M. Johnson

Promenade

A lack of money added about another year to the gap between Radio and Part One. But the band remains hopeful they can regain their local stature, and interest from labels in the U.S. and in Europe have kept them confident that this release will lead to something bigger.

The group isn't going to be as eager as they were previously, and they say they plan to concentrate solely on the music and let the business side work itself out.

"I think we just try to ignore it," Sauer says of outside interest. "That's a lesson we learned (from the ATI incident). Just ignore it and not get excited about it. Until something really serious happens, just act like it's not there."

When it came time to name the new album, the threesome was stumped. Then the idea of Part One came up as a way to keep the fire under their asses lit, forcing them to move quickly onto Part Two, which they plan to partly record in Cunningham and Sauer's house and release by this time next year. When asked if they're sick of the songs on Part One, most of which date back at least three years, they immediately and simultaneously shout, "Yes."

"We've got all of these new songs we're really excited about and we can't wait to hear them recorded," Sauer says. "These songs (on Part One), we just wanted to get them out of our system."

So Promenade's Behind the Music has another segment sealed up, and the best part might be yet to come. The story so far has ups and downs, humble suburban origins, tales of boozing and beards and a bit of redemption toward the end.

As for the band members themselves, how do they think their BTM would play to audiences? Would it be boring?

The patio goes quiet for several seconds, before Cunningham resignedly utters, "It'd be pretty boring."

"Lindsey Buckingham (of Fleetwood Mac) is an inspiration to me as far as that goes," he continues. "He was a suburban kid on the swim team. It's not cool, but, whatever, we grew up in suburbia."

"We have had funny stories, road-wise," DeBruer offers. "But it's pretty PG-rated."

"We haven't had anybody come back from major drug problems and nobody's died yet," Sauer says.

So it's closer to the Creed Behind the Music than the Mötley Crüe one?

"Yeah," Sauer says. "But without the Jesus stuff and the wife-beater T-shirts. And the bad music. But, besides that, yeah."

E-mail Mike Breen

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