Compass Rose introduces album at Buskirk-Chumley

Local band Compass Rose gave a CD release concert Saturday at the Buskirk-Chumley Theater for its new album “Run with the Moon.” Before the show, lead guitarist Jeff Schweegman, keyboardist Tammy Vysma, rhythm guitarist Jeremy Sublette, drummer Tim Roberts and bassist Curtis Harding sat down with the Indiana Daily Student to discuss their early years with music, recording in Nashville and their shy lead vocalist who would rather be a roadie.  

IDS How did you form Compass Rose?

SCHWEEGMAN Tammy, Tim and I were in a band called Red-Eyed Max. We’d played here (Buskirk-Chumley) before, and we started to get a little bit of notice around town. Like a lot of other bands, though, a meltdown happened. So we split that and put this together. We started looking for a bass player and went out one night. We caught a show that Curt was playing and talked to him about joining. The same thing with Jeremy happened when we were looking for a male singer.

IDS Did you all play in bands in high school or college?

VYSMA I’ve been playing all my life. My dad was an Elvis impersonator. He has a gig tonight actually.
SUBLETTE I didn’t start playing guitar until I was 21, and I didn’t know I could sing until later.
ROBERTS I’ve been obsessed with drums since I was 10. My parents bought me a toy drum set, like every kid who wants to play. I thought I was on stage with Mellencamp when I was playing those drums.

IDS So you’ve spent time in Nashville?

Schweegman When we recorded, we started out playing crappy little bars. Since, we’ve played right on the strip a couple times. We’ve played at Tootsies, which is hugely famous. It was a fantastic experience, but we were down there while they were filming “American Idol.” What a freaking nightmare.

IDS Did that help your publicity?

SCHWEEGMAN Well, it was a good experience. We played Tootsies, and somebody across the street heard us. He said, “Hey, when you guys get done here, pull your shit across the street and play our bar.” So we were walking our shit across the street, like rock star wannabes. We ended up playing three hours over there.
ROBERTS Yeah, we played a two-hour set, tore down, played another one-hour set and immediately walked across the road to play a three-hour set.
VYSMA You forgot the part where we had to climb two flights of stairs with all of our equipment. It was 105 degrees outside, and we finally realized what Jeff’s salt intake is. He had a black shirt on, and he sweated so badly that there were white lines on his shirt.
ROBERTS Yeah, I shook his shirt out over my french fries.

IDS What are your plans for tonight?

SCHWEEGMAN We’re going to do a mix of our originals tonight and throw in some covers. Tammy blows out the Janis Joplin. That’s the beauty of having male and female lead vocals. We can cover anything. One of the reasons we do well playing live is that we cover so much.
VYSMA We have a variety of things. We can do some Johnny and June Cash and rap. Curt does rap.
SCHWEEGMAN We’ll pull out some harder stuff and then go to Michael Jackson.
VYSMA Jeremy is a clone (of Michael Jackson).

IDS Curt and Jeremy, you don’t talk very much.

HARDING I’m the bass player.
SUBLETTE I’m not your typical lead vocalist. If I could sing behind the band, that’d be great. I hate being in the middle.
SCHWEEGMAN He asked if he could be our roadie.
SUBLETTE Yeah, they won’t let me do it.