The Proper Musicians politely accept all fans

By JOHN BENSON

entertainment@vindy.com

When you’re in an up-and-coming local band, any eager audience will suffice. However, Cleveland-based rock act The League of Proper Musicians — Chris Hatton (guitar, vocals), Twon (bass, vocals), Mike Reyes (drums) and Jason Seich (percussion) — has discovered its music is attracting a patchouli-wearing crowd.

“It seems like we’re starting to be received in the jam-band scene,” Hatton said. “I’m cool with that. I think it’s the fact we have grooves, and a lot of the stuff is really funk based. I guess if it’s music you can dance to, the jam-band thing, they get into that because they like to dance around a lot. The only thing is, we’re a little bit more edgy than some of the jam bands. I come from heavy music, originally. So I feel like I put an edge on everything, but if someone likes it, that’s all I care about.”

Though Hatton feels the quartet leans more toward prog-rock and fusion, he gladly accepts the jam-band label.

In fact, he’s just hoping anybody gets into the group’s recently released third studio effort, which (follow along) is actually the band’s second self-titled affair.

“We’re going Peter Gabriel style,” Hatton said, laughing. “We’re just going to release a bunch of stuff self-titled. The new CD, we had a friend of ours paint the album cover, which is identifiable by a devilish character. So we’re thinking people call it the devil album. It’s a really cool painting.”

Among the new songs Hatton said the band will be playing at its Saturday show at Barleys is the groove-oriented “Drink Like I’m Drunk,” the Latin-based “Make it So Hard” and the super- funky “Pistachio Cup.”

Apparently, the band also kicks out a few unexpected cover songs.

“Lately, we’ve been doing ‘Give it to Me Baby’ by Rick James,” Hatton said. “We’ll also do ‘Long Train Runnin’’ by The Doobie Brothers. That one just freaks people out wherever you are. Everyone gets real, real happy.”

Wait, Hatton is actually saying a Doobie Brothers song gets audiences excited? Doesn’t that seem more like an ironic move by a hipster indie band?

“Well, we play a lot of weird gigs like VFW charity events and stuff like that where the crowd is like 40 and up,” Hatton said. “And it’s like you bust out Doobies for that crowd, they’re freaking out. But yeah, it might not work at the Beachland Ballroom. You have to feel the room out and see what the crowd is up to.”