Local rock band signs record deal

Courtesy photo Deja NormÕal band members at practice. Foreground founder Mike Mains, vocals and guitar; L-R Brett Pudak, guitar; Chris Morrow, bass and piano; Karl Woodward, drums; and Matt Bailey, piano and bass.

MOUNT PLEASANT - Deja Norm'al, a northern Michigan rock band with members from Lake City and McBain, recently signed a recording contract with a New York City record label after winning an online battle of the bands.

Now the group is shooting their first music video, preparing to record their first CD and getting ready for a summer tour.

The contest, called “Hey! 10-34 Records, Sign My Band!” started with 500 hopeful rock groups posting their original songs on MySpace.com Web sites.

Known locally for appearances at First Night and the YTeens Live Music night, Deja Norm'al got a heads-up about the contest after band member Chris Morrow of Lake City unknowingly contacted the founder of 10-34 Records.

Chris heard and admired a group online called Darling Waste and e-mailed band member Lance Williams. After exchanging e-mails the two groups decided to meet and play a show together in southern Michigan.

The two groups “hit it off” and Deja Norm'al discovered that their new friend Williams was the founder of 10-34 Records, “a fiercely independent label,” and a talent scout. He encouraged the band to enter his label's competition, a label known for using grass-roots tactics “to bring the best young artists to the forefront of music.”

The band took his advice and created a MySpace page to showcase their original music.

Staff members in New York whittled the first 500 competing bands down to 100.

Next, on Jan. 4, 16 finalists were announced and online elimination rounds began.

Bands were rated half by a panel of five judges and half by fans voting on MySpace. Each week the bands squared off against each other. The band winning five times in a row would walk away with a recording contract and a national tour.

Deja Norm'al members said they worked hard to get their fan base involved, knocking on doors of CMU dorms, calling and blogging - urging everyone to listen to their music and vote.

In the end it was their original music that drew the numbers, advancing them week after week until they were the last band standing.

On Tuesday, Feb. 7, Deja Norm'al thanked their online friends for helping to get them signed.

“It's been crazy,” Mike said. “We couldn't believe it. We've always believed that if you give everything to something you love we might have a chance. It just blew our minds! A lot of doors have opened to us. We went from a band wanting to make a CD and no way to fund it - to now being signed and having a record label. And they are putting us on an entire east and west coast tour this summer.”

The group is also shooting a music video for “Goodbye Mr. Perfection” that they hope it will get airplay on MTV through their label.

Mike described their music as “piano driven indie rock” or “moody piano rock” and he emphasized that his faith influences everything they play. He added that the group's name means already the same - that we already are what God created us to be.

“The journey for me is to become everything that God has destined for me and to share his love,” he said.

Karl Woodward, the drummer and a 2004 graduate of Lake City High School, said the whole thing hasn't hit him yet.

“Really,” he said, “I don't think it will hit me until the CD is done and we are out in California.”

The group has been playing together for more than two years. Family friend Sue Boike said it's a dream come true for the band.

“I know that Mike has wanted this all of his life,” she said. “They have played all over from New York to Wisconsin. They went on tour last summer and played several places - wherever they can get in, especially Christian rock summer festivals. They're a good group of guys.”

Band members agreed there are big changes ahead. They know the tour will be hard work with many temptations they haven't yet faced.

“Just because we might not be in the area,” Woodward expressed, “that doesn't mean we don't remember where we come from.”

“There's a lot of girls that say - oh my gosh you guys are so cool,” Mike stated. “We try to keep our heads. We are doing this not to glorify ourselves or out of selfish ambition.”

For more information and tour dates, or to listen to a selection of their songs, visit www.myspace.com/dejanormal.

Your local connection

MYSPACE - Deja Norm'al won their record deal through a competition that took place entirely on MySpace.com. Wikipedia defines MySpace as a social networking Web site offering an interactive network of photos, blogs, user profiles, groups and an internal e-mail system.

MySpace history states that Tom Anderson created the site in late 2003 to offer a place for aspiring musicians and bands to share their music and concert locations.

“Two years ago, MySpace was an unadvertised, small musical community offering a way for musicians to gain exposure for their music. Now it's the largest online community on the net,” the history page reported. USA Today stated in a recent article, “If you're a teen in America today, the place to be is the social networking site MySpace, which has virtually exploded in the last few months.”

The latest issue of Newsweek reports that MySpace is “the exploding social networking community of 54 million registered young people.”

Teen users create a MySpace page that defines who they are online. The page is like an online office with pictures of their friends and images of themselves. They post music videos of their favorite groups and photo albums of the latest events in their lives. Teens also wander from page to page, finding new “friends,” meeting new people and finding out what's cool. If you have a teenager, chances are they have a MySpace page. Safety tips for using MySpace are posted at www.WiredSafety.org.

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