Jackson Free Press

Two years ago I went to an all-ages show at Musiquarium. As I entered Banner Hall, I heard this massive buzz from upstairs. My jaw dropped when I entered MQ, because there were well over a hundred kids packed in the room, jumping up and down to a heavy riff scratched out by a handful of fans who were no more than 16.

The bar, for that day's purposes, was stocked only with soda. I glanced over at the fellow tending the bar—Woody Conwill, drummer for the John Black Attack and the Atomic Brains—he had a grin as big as outdoors. The band was Fletcher. We were the only people in the room over 18. The music was good, there's no denying it, but ragged. I stood there wondering what force was shaking the fans back and forth, pumping their fists into the air, sweat pouring down their faces—it was so hot that day, and the AC wasn't prepared to handle a hundred jumping bodies.

Then I got it. After seeing a million shows in a million bars and dozens of stadiums and converted Art Deco theaters, music just wasn't as special to me as it was when I was that age. It may have been the first time these kids heard live music. They were with their best friends, it was their favorite band, and it probably felt like the best day of their lives. I realized then that Jackson had a secret: one of the best music scenes in the South. If you're not a teenager, chances are you'd never notice.

My curiosity about this unheard music and the people that made it—almost all teenagers—became stronger. What spark brought more than 600 fans to a recent show featuring Norma Jean, Plastic Glasses and As Cities Burn—bands whose names I had never even heard. This was music filled with all the expression, talent and sincerity of the best new underground music anywhere, ranging wildly from emo, punk, indie, artsy-atmospheric art rock to heavy rocking metalcore. Often a band would change their style, changing from a breakneck punk to a power-pop band that played three-part harmonies. The music grew along with the players themselves.

Nobody loves it more than Emmi Dees; at 20, she serves as that quiet hero every music scene needs—the booking agent. Dees and her cohorts Alex Warren and David Sprayberry have brought dozens of touring bands to Jackson with their booking company Set Ablaze, and helped schedule out-of-town tours for local bands.

Emmi told me about the very first show she ever attended at the University Pub (now Seven*, 206 Capitol St.), back when Fletcher was called Foxxe. The guitarist's distortion pedal was busted, so she stood by his amp, switching it on and off for him whenever he'd look over and nod her way.

The key to any community, musical or otherwise, is a sense of belonging, and those sorts of experiences cement you into friendships for life. There was absolutely nothing like this when I was in high school. Back then, you just weren't in a band. Even if you had an instrument and could sort of play, there was nowhere to practice—and certainly no place to play.

This scene allows a growth of music, at an earlier age and at a faster clip than any I'd ever heard. Three-quarters of Fletcher are just now 18, but they've played in seven states. Most bands would just now be forming over bootlegged beers at Southern or State, not having tours of the Southeast and a record under their belts.

Everyone I talked to said the same words over and over: community and family. It wasn't that it was just tough on bands to play when the U-Pub, the MQ and the CLB in Clinton closed, it was that they had lost members of their family, and the ability to introduce others to the music.

That desire to introduce others to this music is what drives Chaney Nichols as well. At 29, he's a senior citizen to many of the bands he adores, but that doesn't stop him and his wife Leah from attending many of the shows—and recording the bands. The Jackson-based label that Nichols founded, Esperanza Plantation, is home to Fletcher, Questions in Dialect, Bellador, A Becoming Walk and Arkitekt. So far, they've released three full-length CDs and one seven-inch record.

Nichols insists that Esperanza isn't a company, per se; rather, they're a collective dedicated to music. The growing all-ages scene in Jackson is a never-ending source of joy for him, because of a peculiar quirk you can't get with a regular show at Martin's or Hal & Mal's: the older teens with cars often bring their younger siblings, so the music passes from older sister to younger brother to younger sister, and so on.

There are thousands of music-hungry teenagers in the Jackson area, but the music's traditional home is the local bar. Laws of man and money mean bars don't want people under 21 even near them. All-ages shows satisfy that hunger.

Esperanza is helped along by Palmer Houchins, 20 (who also writes for the JFP). Houchins, along with Lou Frascogna, brainstormed a series of shows at Soulshine Pizza and other sympathetic venues under the banner of "All Ages*Low Wages." The highlight of the series was when Fletcher played a CD release party on a Monday night—with 350 kids in attendance, and the band selling 250 CDs rapid-fire.

That's the other secret about this scene: Not only does it nurture musicians and music at a younger age, it provides a much-needed boost to Jackson businesses. Restaurants aren't usually packed on Monday night, but they are when they've got live music from a local high school.

Yet it's always been tough for Dees and Houchins to find venues for their bands, and the friendly ones seem to disappear a year after they first emerge. The void was partially filled when Horizon Baptist Church stepped in. Gary Maze, senior pastor, would rather host the teenagers than having them somewhere else. "We're committed to being available to young adults, and providing a safe place for the bands. That's important to us, and it's been a pleasure to create relationships with the kids." It's probably no coincidence that Maze, who is also the executive director of Jackson Youth for Christ, has a kid that plays music—his son Josh, 16, is in the band Tandem.

A music scene is nothing without bands. For years now, Fletcher has been a mainstay, and remains one—even with three members at Ole Miss and one at Mississippi College. I caught Jimmy Cajoleas, the guitarist with the broken distortion pedal all those years ago, on the phone. At 18, he's a rock veteran, just without all the Jim Morrison excess—though he does have that same mane of wild prophet hair. "I'm grateful to be a part of it. It's so much bigger then anything I could have ever imagined." When I ask him about bands that play the all-ages shows, he names 15; I've heard of five. "Well, there's us, Plastic Glasses, Tandem, the Rockwells, City Lights, Percival, Jonezetta, Questions in Dialect, Astoria, Korban, Julius Leonard Margoly, Kerygma, Dead by Eight, and A Black Medic. Oh, and have you heard about King Elementary?"

Fifteen bands, with more starting up every day, names changing, drummers running excited into rehearsal with a new record that you have just GOT to hear, that changes the way they sound forever. There is a hidden future in Jackson, and it is filled with music, an unheard music outside the mainstream rut that bars and stadiums have been stuck in for decades. You just have to dig a little to find it.

Emmi Dees told me that she's had bands from all over tell her Jackson was the best place they'd ever been—"that in the months of touring this was the best town, with the best response, the most fun, the best merchandise sales. Everybody says that this is the best place there is."