Geri X’s novel way of accumulating fans
January 9th, 2009 by Eric Snider in NewsSt. Pete-based singer/songwriter Geri X will release her first album on a label next week. It’s called Anthems of a Mended Heart (24 Hour Service Station), and it’s definitely worth your while. She’ll be on the cover of next week’s CL. She really opened up about her life and her past, which has long been open to speculation and rumor.
I sat with Geri X and her bassist/boyfriend Greg Roteik in the small courtyard of their home. Our interview ranged over a wide array of topics. I got on my usual rant about how the Tampa Bay music scene, while it has a lot of terrific acts, can never seem to reach out past the people who are already connected to the scene.
It’s not the musicians’ fault, in my opinion. The rank-and-file folk who live around here just aren’t dialed in to going out and seeing live music by locally based acts. The people who live three doors down from me, for instance, (whom I barely know) — I’m all but certain they’re not planning to see what’s shaking at New World this weekend.
This is a dinner-and-a-movie town, or a drop-a-hundred-on-The-Eagles town.
Geri X largely agreed with me in this matter, but she has her own way of reaching out beyond the scene. You might even say it’s novel:
“We play a lot of restaurants. The reason we have fans from 13 years old to 80 years old is because we go to the places where they are. When you play a restaurant you’re playing to people who would never set foot in a venue to come and see you play. But once they get hooked, they buy your CD and come out to your shows.
So it’s not a matter of the crowds coming to us, but us going to the crowds. My favorite venues to play are restaurants. You start out being background music, but at the end of the evening they might buy a CD or drop 20 for a tip. We collect a lot of fans that are in their 40s and 50s.
If you can endure the cold shoulder you might get at first, it usually works out. Besides, if out of a group of 10 people, two people like me, I’m satisfied. I don’t like everybody’s music and I’m OK with people not liking my music.”
Geri X has played the Fly and the Grape in Tampa, 516 Burns in Sarasota and others, and she has no plans to cut restaurants out of her performing schedule.
Geri X’s Record Release show will not be at a restaurant, however. She and her band will play the State Theatre on Sat., Jan. 17 with Have Gun, Will Travel, Will Quinlan and The Beauvilles. It starts at 8 and costs $8. Be there.
Keep an eye out for a multi-media package in next week’s Loaf and on this site.
January 9th, 2009 at 10:29 pm
acclaimed ???? Please break up. a 3 chord instrumental song with a one finger lead line ?.
C’mon
I just taught that song to my 3 year old
January 9th, 2009 at 10:30 pm
oops that post was meant for the Giddy Up Helicopter story….
January 10th, 2009 at 3:15 pm
LOVE YOU GERI!
January 11th, 2009 at 2:58 am
Geez, rick. Simma down.
January 11th, 2009 at 1:13 pm
haha. this is great. thanks guys :]
January 11th, 2009 at 10:16 pm
GERI X WILL BE PLAYING 5ONE6 BURNS ON SUNDAY FEBRUARY 1, 2P-4P.
THIS WILL BE OUR 1ST ANNUAL 5ONE6 BURNS BARBECUE, 12P-4P.
516 BURNS LANE
SARASOTA
941.906.1884
January 12th, 2009 at 2:05 pm
Good story about a great, hard-working artist. If more people were like Geri, this scene would be exploding on the National stage. She gets what a fanbase is: a small devout number of people that love you, not a crapload of people that sort of like what you do.
January 16th, 2009 at 12:06 am
Yes, Geri X is on the cover of Creative Loafing.
Yes Her CD release party is this Saturday at the State Theater.
Yes, the Beauvilles, Have Gun Will Travel and Will Quinlan and the excellent Diviners are playing that show.
Yes, they are expecting it to be packed.
And I have a few words to say about that. You may want to skip it, but I am feeling nostalgic, whimsical and cheerful about this.
This represents an interesting lineup of bands from the Bay area that have all individually paid their dues over the course of time, helping anchor down a music scene here over the better part of the last 10 years, and none of us have given up. we refuse to give up.
Be it Matt Burke of HGWT’s original band Chase Theory making marks and pushing out nationally in the 1990’s, to the Beauvilles brawling over wrong notes and too much liquor in front of audiences, to Will Quinlans’ original group the Pagan Saints drunken legendary shows with shout outs from Jeff Tweedy, to Geri X’s true story of working up the ranks through the coffeeshops to a record deal, all these artists have evolved and done most of their evolving here in the Bay area, instead of moving to NYC and LA the second that they learned how to write a song that stays stuck in your head. All of these groups have changed from playing on small stages with no one there to playing packed clubs, and the occasional festival (although we still play small stages occasionally for fun!).
Artists like this, of this caliber in your back yard gives an anchor to this music scene that as of late has had its share of locals becoming touring acts, playing festivals, and making it debatable whether “Bay Area” means San Fransisco or not. And without your support, that scene withers and dies, but more likely just moves away to greener pastures. Whether someone is listening or not, all the artists playing this show will continue to write and record brilliant music, but we need you still. We need you to listen. We need you to sing along. To make the music louder and more melodic. And you need the music to make you move and shed the years off of your skin. A soundtrack to your life.
So let’s celebrate the current renaissance that is going on with music in Central Florida and attend this show. It will be one hell of a party. And buy Geri X’s cd.
It’s really really good.
Love your artists and keep them here with you people.
Love,
s.
bville
January 16th, 2009 at 12:58 pm
Amen, Shawn. Tampa and San Fran need to wage a new East Coast / West Coast war!