Tonight’s show at the Historic State Theater marks Moon Taxi’s second visit to the venue this semester.
The Sept. 9 show was a huge success for the Nashville-based band as far as forming a fan base in Starkville goes.
The Wednesday night crowd made up of music lovers and frat kids alike sang along with the band to songs from its album Live Ride and begged for more songs to be played when the show was over.
With the band’s home being in a music-hungry area of the South, many would think Moon Taxi would be frequently playing at various venues in Nashville instead of traveling, but lead singer, guitarist and occasional harpist Trevor Terndrup said the band enjoys hitting the road.
“We love Nashville, but there’s nothing better than going to another city and seeing that people know our songs,” he said. “It’s a real honor for us.”
Those lucky enough to have seen Moon Taxi perform live should be glad the band was bred in the churning waters of Music City because of the city’s effect on its self-sufficient sound.
“Nashville is so cut-throat, so industry-driven so we had to come out with the ambition that we wanted to be able to make it on our own,” Terndrup said.
And make it on their own, they did.
In April, the band, namely Terndrup, Spencer Thomson (guitar), Tommy Putnam (bass), Wes Bailey (keys) and Tyler Ritter (drums), became the winners of the first-ever Music City Mayhem contest.
The contest, created by Nashville independent radio station Lightning 100, put 32 bands in a single-elimination tournament and one-by-one, the bands fell at the feet of Moon Taxi.
“You know, we almost didn’t enter the competition; we had a friend at Lightning 100 who convinced us to do it,” Terndrup said. “And we knew some of the bands that we were competing against. It was an honor to be put on the same level as some of those people.”
The band is labeled a jam band, but a review on jambase.com, a reputable Web site for music lovers, said it is “a jam band in the same way Little Feat or Bob Marley & The Wailers are jammers. Like these ancestors, Moon Taxi synthesizes divergent elements into a cohesive, concert-ready rush.”
Because of the jam band label’s tendency to denote a show filled with 14-minute guitar solos and multiple transnational songs with no soul, many bands view this as a bad thing, but Terndrup has a different view on what the genre brings to the table for Moon Taxi.
“It’s a blessing, really, because some people only go to jam band shows,” he said. “But it’s a strange line we walk – we want to blur the lines between jam and rock. While we do transition songs, we are very lyrical-based. Everything comes back to the message of the song.” With an album full of original songs and 10 to 15 new songs recently written and each show being altered from its predecessor, there are plenty of messages to choose from.
“Every show is unique as far as setlists and light shows go. Everything is fresh; you’ll never see the same exact show more than once,” he said. “[And] songwriting is a democratic group effort. Once someone has that spark or the notion [for a song] is started, it turns into this open group forum.”
Moon Taxi’s future holds a few shows with American Hasidic Jew reggae musician, Matisyahu.
“He’s done a great job blurring the lines between pop, reggae and rock,” Terndrup said. “It will be one of our bigger shows, we are really excited about it. Maybe there will even be a little freestyle with him on stage, who knows.”
For future shows, more information on Moon Taxi and to hear or purchase music, visit myspace.com/moontaxi or ridethemoontaxi.com.