Roadside Monument

Roadside Monument was a Christian math rock band from Seattle, Washington who were signed to Tooth & Nail Records. They were active from 1994-1998 and then again from 2002-2003.

History

Before Roadside Monument began, singer Doug Lorig was already starting bands. During junior high, high school, and college, he performed in the bands Cow Shrapnel, Waterfront, and Seed, all of which also featured another future Roadside Monument member, bassist Todd Florence.

Roadside was signed to Tooth & Nail Records only about four months after they formed in 1994, because they had good fortune in being discovered by Brandon Ebel. They released their T&N debut, a 7-inch called My Life Is Green, in 1996.

1997 was the busiest year for Roadside. They released two full-length albums, Beside This Brief Hexagonal and 8 Hours Away from Being a Man, as well as two split EPs (with Puller and Frodus, respectively). 8 Hours was the album in which they became a prominent band on the T&N roster, gaining some popularity in the Christian underground music scene. They would ride that popularity through the end of their short career as Roadside Monument.

They broke up after the Cornerstone Festival in 1998, when Ford moved to Chicago, Illinois. They had already written and recorded another album, called I Am the Day of Current Taste, which would not release until several months after their breakup. Because Roadside Monument was already broken up, T&N saw little incentive to promote the album; so while it was still thought of by reviewers as a good, solid album, it did not sell as well as Eight Hours because of lack of advertising by the record label.

In 2002, Ford returned to Seattle, and Roadside Monument reunited as an indie band. The new incarnation of the band played local shows and lasted for about one year, when Johnson decided to end the band again because of an inability to be in a full-time touring band.

Since their breakups, Roadside Monument's members have participated in a variety of bands, such as Suffering and the Hideous Thieves (started by Jeff "Suffering" Bettger, of another former T&N band, Ninety Pound Wuss), Raft of Dead Monkeys, Pedro the Lion, and Unwed Sailor.

Critical response

Throughout their history, Roadside Monument has had several clashes with some Christian bookstore chains, who cited their songs as being "controversial". Examples of such songs included "Sperm Ridden Man" (which Lorig said was about seeing a child on a bus who was being raised by a single mother) and "O.J. Simpson House Auction". The band members did not mind that their music was not being sold in Christian bookstores, because they preferred to think of themselves as a "band" rather than as a "Christian band". In an interview with HM Magazine soon after their breakup, drummer Matt Johnson said, "... I think the problem comes in when you start using the word 'Christian' as an adjective. And when I start hearing talk like that, my first inclination is to run totally in the opposite direction.... It's just a debate that I've been over and over with people so much, that I'm not even sure what to say anymore. It's like, I'm a Christian and I play music, and if that means my band is a 'Christian band', then whatever."

Many fans of Roadside Monument like the band because of their creative sound. Their songs featured unique structure that was a blatant rejection of the verse/chorus structure followed by many popular songs. In addition, their unusual guitar parts, abnormal rhythms, and abrupt tempo changes, topped off by Lorig's emotional vocals, gained them acclaim and made the band's style almost unable to be labeled. Indeed, reviewers of the band would describe them as emo, math rock, or just regular rock.

Members

• Doug Lorig: guitar, vocals
• Matt Johnson: drums
• Johnathon Ford: bass guitar, vocals

Former members

• Todd Florence – bass guitar

Discography

• My Life is Green (7-inch, 1996, Tooth & Nail Records)
• Roadside Monument/Puller split EP (1997, Tooth & Nail Records)
• Beside This Brief Hexagonal (1997, Tooth & Nail Records)
• Eight Hours Away from Being a Man (1997, Tooth & Nail Records)
• Roadside Monument/Frodus split EP (1997, Tooth & Nail Records)
• I Am the Day of Current Taste (1998, Tooth & Nail Records)

External links

• Official homepage
• Band members page from official website – gives details about the band members' current musical projects