Austin-based Spoon brings experimental rock to Bloomington

Jim Eno seemed like a normal guy around the office. His co-workers at Advanced Micro Devices, a computing company in Austin, Texas, brushed off his band Spoon, which he drummed for, as a hobbie. Despite the fact that Spoon's recent release Kill the Moonlight, was put on the best albums of 2002 lists for magazines such as Spin, Rolling Stone, Blender and GQ, his fellow employees saw Eno as a talented guy who just took off work to follow a dream, one they were unsure if he would achieve.\nIt wasn't until his band recently appeared on Late Night with Conan O'Brien that Eno says his friends finally realized his band isn't playing hole-in-the-wall clubs. \n"My bosses had been cool at letting me take a leave of absence," Eno says. "But when I was on Conan, that made everything legitimate. They were like, 'I guess he doesn't play in smokey bars.'"\nEno will be taking another leave of absence from his day job to play at 8 p.m. on March 29 at Vertigo Live Music Venue. as a part of Static Fest, a three day music festival promoted by WIUS. \nEno, lead singer/guitarist Britt Daniel, bassist Josh Zarbo and keyboardist Kevin Lovejoy, have experienced critical acclaim, succeeded in getting radio airplay and have amassed a devoted fanbase across the nation -- all without giving up their day jobs. \nBut this path was not an easy one for Spoon. \nSince its formation in 1994, Spoon has hopped from label to label in its never ending journey to receive national attention. \nFollowing its promising debut, Telephono, on the small label Matador, Spoon was offered a chance at making it big with Elektra, which release the 1998 album Series of Sneaks. But Elektra dropped Spoon only months after its release when it didn't catch on quickly enough, Eno says.\nHe says Elektra did no real promotion for the album, yet expected immediate attention.\n"They didn't give us a real chance," he says. "They throw the song to radio and if people don't have the record then you're dropped. What you'll find is it's about business. It's the bottom line. If you're not making money you're gone. Gone are the days of artist development and taking risks." \nJust when it seemed like Spoon would become another major-label casualty, it reemerged with Girls Can Tell, writing and recording all of the tracks in Eno's personal studio. Eno says the band was extremely satisified with the product. Only now, Eno and his bandmates needed to find a label.\n"We wanted to find a home because we thought we had a really good album here," Eno says.\nGerald Cosloy, founder of Matador Records, tipped off Merge Records, a small California-based label, which successfully signed Spoon.\nWith the album already complete, Eno says Merge understood the band right away.\n"By handing them a finished record, they know what they are getting," Eno says. "Merge has just been great so far. They love music and they really work individually with artists."\nMerge Records' director of publicity, Martin Hall, says Spoon was a good catch for the label.\n"We were obviously aware of Spoon," Hall says. "It was such a great album that we're glad to have them."\nWith a smaller label, Eno could experiment and stray from its pop formula practiced on Girls Can Tell. On its latest release, Spoon experiments with beatboxing, keyboards and infectious percussion to play a backdrop to Daniels' Elvis Costello-inspired vocals.\n"It took a while to sink in for a lot of people," Hall says. "From Merge's perspective, we wanted to capitalize on the success of Girls Can Tell, but we didn't want to stop Spoon from throwing a curve ball. Sometimes it works. Sometimes a curve ball gets knocked out of the park. Good thing it worked."\nEno says part of the success with Kill the Moonlight was that they were given the freedom to produce anything they wanted without label interference.\n"We trust Britt and Jim," Hall says. "We don't have an A&R guy telling them what kind of music to make or saying, 'I don't hear a single.' They produced Girls Can Tell on their own and they could of course do it again."\nYet, Eno says Spoon didn't plan on making Kill the Moonlight so different. It just happened.\n"We wanted to make it a little weirder," he says. "But we don't have a masterplan. We have an idea. It's basically we do things on a song-by-song basis. There is going to be an overall feel from the artistic mood we are in at that point, but most of it just happens that way."\nWith its newfounded success, Spoon's hometown of Austin, Texas, is finding its place in the current music scene.\n"Austin has a really good punk rock scene," he says. "Austin is always great as places for every band to play. A lot more people stereotype it and think it's all country music, but hopefully it'll receive more attention." \nPart of giving back to its hometown came when Spoon was asked to play on "Austin City Limits," a show that airs on TV stations around the country. Eno says it meant a lot to the band members since the show is mostly country acts and they were asked to play on the show's 25th anniversary.\nNate Hileman, a senior and director of promotions for WIUS, is organizing Static Fest. He says he expects a strong turn out for Spoon at Vertigo Live Music Venue.\n"They're a well respected act, and coupled with three particularly great bands all on the same bill, I don't know how anyone who likes rock music can't come out to the show," he says.\nHileman says he will personally enjoy the show.\n"I've been a fan of Spoon's music for at least six years now," he says. "Still, I have never seen the band play live. One night in the middle of January I was watching PBS, not very unusual on my part, and on came 'Austin City Limits' featuring Spoon. While watching a great performance by the band I thought how cool it would be if I could bring them to play for the radio station. A few calls later and I had worked out an arrangement to bring them here." \nAdvance tickets for Static Fest shows on March 29th and April 9th are on sale now at TD's CDs and LPs (322 E. Kirkwood Ave.) and All Ears (401 E. 10th). You can listen to WIUS and find information about the station at www.wius.org. Advance tickets are $10. Day of sale tickets are $12.