We recently had the chance to connect with Will Baumgartner and have shared our conversation below.
Good morning Will, it’s such a great way to kick off the day – I think our readers will love hearing your stories, experiences and about how you think about life and work. Let’s jump right in? Have you ever been glad you didn’t act fast?
Oh boy. There have been SO many times I’ve been so glad I didn’t “act fast” that I’m not even gonna choose one example. I feel there’s a little too much popular emphasis on taking “Carpe diem” too literally, with so many people running around trying to seize any given day that the days get a little tired of being chased, grabbed, and squeezed. For me, while yes there have been times I wished I’d been a little more aggressive and speedy, the vast majority of the time I’ve found I get better results–and considerably less pain, embarrassment and regret–by carefully feeling out a situation before taking any action. I wasn’t always so much this way as I am now: I’ve always been essentially less impulsive than focused and patient, but in past years it’d happen more often that I’d think “I have to do this right now” and end up realizing that thought did not come from one of my “better angels”. So I’ve learned to trust my heart and instincts more than ever.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
I’m the bandleader of The Pamlico Sound, a rather large group (currently 11 members) playing mostly Funk/Soul/R&B, primarily in Denver, Boulder and around the Front Range. What makes us unusual and exciting enough to check out? Well, we’re not completely unique in that there are other bands around here who work in those genres and have about as many people as we do; we might be the only one who has stayed in one place and lasted fifteen years though. I think we’re also the only Funk band with a dedicated dance troupe, The Astral Rose Joys, who perform with us at virtually every show—if anyone else around here does that, I’d love to know who they are! And we’re pretty theatrical, with our whole “Jive Church” routine: I stir it up as The Reverend Will B Wrightback interacting with the Priestessisters (our singing/dancing women), the Deaconundrums (everyone else in the band) and our audiences who become the Congregation as soon as we start the show.
We have big 15th anniversary celebrations coming this fall. October 16th we’re the band at Yellow Scene Magazine’s fundraiser gala at Louisville Underground in, you guessed it, Louisville. (Louisville Underground is the nightclub located in the Tilt arcade). Two days later on Saturday October 18th we’re playing in the first Roots Music Fest, super exciting because it’s being put on by our favorite by-musicians-for-musicians nonprofit Roots Music Project and will be the biggest music festival Boulder has ever seen. And finally, an insane party at our favorite Denver venue, Cervantes’, on Saturday November 29th. I feel safe saying this anniversary party is the best lineup of bands I’ve ever put together, with us and our good friends 2MX2 and Beasts Of No Nation. These are two of the most thrilling and inventive bands in Colorado or anywhere else for that matter. We love, adore and admire them beyond description and… well, we want to share all that love and fun with everyone we can fit in the room.
Okay, so here’s a deep one: What did you believe about yourself as a child that you no longer believe?
Until I was nine or ten, I thought I was an unlikeable person. I also thought I was ugly (which of course contributed to that sense of being unlovable). Not 100% sure where these feelings came from, though I have some ideas. My parents certainly weren’t what I’d call abusive or unsupportive, even though they were often distracted with their own sufferings, struggles and pursuits of happiness. Anyway! When I was around ten or eleven, three things happened. First, I guess I’d never expressed those feelings/beliefs about myself out loud, but anyway I mentioned them both in a conversation with my father: “Of course nobody likes me, I’m so ugly.” Dad was pretty shocked. He took me into the bathroom and demanded I look at myself in the mirror. I don’t know if I’d ever really done that before–really. Because when he said “Look at yourself! You’re a good-looking kid!” I was pretty shocked. I couldn’t exactly argue with him. I didn’t look ugly at all. The second thing was I found friends–really, essentially, my first actual friends, people with whom I had fun, talked about things that excited me, was given care and consolation and gave these in return. It’s not surprising to note that while I’d been playing music since I was five, writing stuff since I was eight nine, singing as long as I could remember, and had also fairly recently shown a natural talent for the visual arts–all of these things kicked into much higher gear over the next couple of years, especially the music.
What did suffering teach you that success never could?
Pretty much anyone who actually knows me (or has followed me on social media or read any interviews I’ve done in the past) knows that I had severe drug and alcohol problems for decades. Now with over ten years completely clean and sober, in which time I’ve been actively working a program of recovery, I can honestly say that I don’t regret any of the pain of my former life. I was there, a spirit was there in me, the whole time. I learned that the people I knew or saw who I loved and admired—some of them I may have only seen for a moment or a day, but I felt admiration for them, I felt love for them—all had things I could actually emulate and eventually make integral to my own ways of living and behaving. In sobriety, and the endless (beginning-less too, in some ways) path of self-examination and what I call “outrospection”, I’ve learned that I am absolutely not unique where suffering and struggle are concerned: everyone, and I mean every one of us, not just alcoholics and addicts, not just the poor and/or marginalized but every being on Earth and beyond, has limitations and some consciousness of those. My own shortcomings and pain have shown me that kindness and care are infinitely more important—and rewarding—than any egocentric satisfaction I may get from my “accomplishments” or “triumphs”.
So a lot of these questions go deep, but if you are open to it, we’ve got a few more questions that we’d love to get your take on. Whom do you admire for their character, not their power?
There are many I could talk about endlessly, but I’ll just name two here, a record store owner and a former record store owner. Doug Gaddy, who runs Absolute Vinyl in Longmont, and Andy Schneidkraut who finally closed Albums On The Hill in Boulder a few years ago, are two of the most admirable—and lovable, partly because there is so much to admire in both of them—people I’ve ever known. It’s definitely an ingredient in my affection and respect for these two that both of them have for many years been very hands-on supporters of my bands: prominently displaying and talking up our albums, throwing them on the turntable (and CD player) during store hours, writing reviews for the press and helping us get featured on the radio. But this is just a microcosm and signpost of their overall love of and unflagging dedication to the music community and everyone in it. What else is exemplary about Andy and Doug? They may have, over the decades, made concessions to the mass market because after all you do have to keep the bills paid and the doors open—but they’ve never, to my knowledge, pretended to love, or even like, something they really don’t. It’s not just when they’re talking to me: I’ve seen both of them plainly tell customers they clearly didn’t know at all exactly how they felt about an artist or a release, no matter whether it was good bad or indifferent, and whether or not it might lose them a sale. Now here’s what’s really interesting and notable about this: in the long run, the big picture, the final analysis, these guys are not doing this because they’re cranky curmudgeons, gadfly gabbers (or whatever other quaint old alliterative phrase we might amuse ourselves with). They’re doing it because the arts and society need honest, passionate and fearless discussion in order to survive and grow. No record store owner since the 1990’s, as far as I know, has gotten rich and powerful from their endeavors. And yet, they are so rich. They have such awesome powers. I stand in awe of them. I listen when they speak. I adore them. I am so grateful to know them.
Thank you so much for all of your openness so far. Maybe we can close with a future oriented question. Could you give everything your best, even if no one ever praised you for it?
I know I could: I think a more important question is “Would I?” I hope so!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.thepamlicosound.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thepamlicosound
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thepamlicosound
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC96Ek3v_fwX0EbKfByzxvPA
- Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/user-392227439
- Other: https://open.spotify.com/artist/3AamHcWLNYbMLCrRJyivCk
https://thepamlicosound.bandcamp.com/music
Image Credits
Andrew Wyatt
