The Sandpaper
July 2005


That’s ‘All She Wrote’:
Following in the Great Cover Band Tradition
Five Talented Guys Who Aim to Please

The North Jersey-based cover band All She Wrote is all it’s cracked up to be and more, as a performance at Nardi’s Tavern and Grill in Haven Beach Saturday night proved.

With the opening strains of Green Day’s “American Idiot,” it was clear that the band of five fiery 30-somethings (give or take), all with experience in other bands prior to forming All She Wrote a year and a half ago, were intent on completing their mission – to drive a hard party full throttle from the very first note to the “Thank you, goodnight.”

Nardi’s patrons, only too happy to oblige, made good use of a dance floor that has been known to extend to all available surfaces, including bar stools and tabletops. Partway into the second number, “The Girl All the Bad Guys Want” by Bowling for Soup, a small bevy of gal pals commandeered the floor space in front of the stage, and before the first set ended the place was so crowded, the people weren’t just three deep at the bar, they were three layers deep from floor to ceiling.

Tho’ this be madness, there is method in it.

“It’s a cover band. You gotta do everything that everybody wants,” lead guitarist and vocalist Eric Stewart said of the band’s repertoire, which is an arsenal of music to suit any crowd, occasion or mood – from the last four decades and the last four minutes. The band’s priority, he said, is to do whatever the club owners want them to do, which is to give the people whatever makes them happy.

The mixed-age crowd at Nardi’s, for example, called for some Queens of the Stone Age, Maroon 5, Sugar- Cult, Sublime, The Killers, Live, Bon Jovi, Alice In Chains and Van Halen, which included Stewart’s grade-A, spine-tingling guitar solo that fluidly morphed into “Eruption” before the rest of the band came in for “You Really Got Me.”

All She Wrote enthusiastically admits to “following in the tradition of New Jersey ’s greatest cover bands.” As such, the band recognizes it has a responsibility to deliver a certain number of old-but-good surefire winners, intermingled with a few dusty-yet-delightful tracks and the just-hit-airwaves-last-week numbers. Finding the right balance is one challenge; moreover, the bar is continuously being raised as more and more cover bands arrive on the scene, seemingly students of the same proven formula.

It is not enough, of course, merely to fit a prescribed set of criteria. A band must also actually possess the talent that makes people want to remember its name – and good looks don’t hurt a bit, either. Therein lie two of All She Wrote’s most instantly noticeable strengths: every band member is a seriously talented musician in his own right, and as an ensemble they are a treat for the two sensory organs that that matter most in a bar, the ears and the eyes.

Still more impressive are the band’s precision and consistency: not a single note was missed (not one that anyone could have noticed, anyway) and the energy level started out at the max and held there, even after the musicians were glistening with sweat from head to toe. And, during several minutes of technical difficulty in which a very uncooperative microphone filled the air with ear-splitting feedback, drummer Tony Viscardi, who joined the band two months ago, never faltered. As a result, the band was able to straighten out the sound glitch and fully recover, literally without missing a beat.

“Everybody’s really skilled at their instruments,” Stewart said, which is one way in which he feels All She Wrote stands out. 

Of what genre the band members would consider their preference or favorite to play, he decided after a moment’s thought, “probably Emo (short for “emotional hardcore”) – and a lot of the new stuff.”

“We’re all products of the ’80s,” according to self-taught bassist Erich Maffei, although the band could just as easily dish some Drowning Pool, Pantera or Metallica as J. Geils. For a place like Nardi’s, Stewart said, “we stick to the more danceable stuff.”

“We play everything well,” Maffei didn’t mind adding with a small grin. 

Since staying abreast of the top 40 charts’ brand spankin’est new hits is key to staying fresh in the business, lead vocalist Darren Hamway said he is “always listening to the radio (and) always going out and seeing other live bands. I love doing new stuff – it gets stale if you don’t.” As frontman, one of Hamway’s jobs is to find and pitch new songs to the band, which get voted on and then learned as quickly as possible.

“We may learn three to five new songs in a rehearsal,” Stewart said. The band practices together faithfully one night each week, in addition to maintaining a gig schedule that demands time, energy and the expense of travel to numerous points along the Jersey Shore.

Once the songs are nailed down, putting together a crowd-pleasing set – lead and rhythm guitarist Mike Saraco’s job – is a matter of reading the room. “I watch the crowd, I watch the set list, watch the crowd, watch the set list,” he said. It also involves doing a little bit of field research, i.e., attending performances of friends’ in other bands, noting audience response to certain songs or visual aspects of a show.

“We go (to other shows) and see what the crowd likes,” Stewart said, and then perhaps try it themselves, the same way or similarly.

While bands push themselves to stay ahead of the curve, however, the appeal of the old sing-along songs is undeniable. Even when the band members were able to sneak out Nardi’s side door between sets for a change of shirt, a breath of fresh air and a chat, they were spotted and approached by a couple of girls from inside, wanting to know if they could “please, please, pretty please” request Tom Petty’s “American Girl.”

Saraco said one thing he has learned over the years is that “people who come out in the summer want to dance, and they want to dance now. People don’t come here to hear (the prog-rock group) Dream Theater or (the heavy metal band) Anthrax,” he said – “though we could do that.” Since the music of the ’80s is what the band members mostly grew up listening to and learning how to play, they have no problem satisfying the crowds’ cravings for favorites like The Knack’s “My Sharona,” Tommy Tutone’s immortal “8675309 (Jenny)” (with a synchronized headbanging thing at the end that was a very nice touch), The Clash’s “Should I Stay or Should I Go,” Cheap Trick’s “I Want You to Want Me,” Rick Springfield’s “Jessie’s Girl” and a 15- minute medley that included J. Geils Band, Styx, Duran Duran, The Romantics and Loverboy.

God-given ability aside (while Viscardi and Maffei have had formal schooling and Maffei has a degree in music communication from William Paterson University, Hamway, Stewart and Saraco are all completely selftaught), the guys maintain it’s their friendship off-stage that enables them to do what they do under the bright lights. The rest of their lives outside of playing music are closely intertwined, according to Saraco. Their girlfriends and wives, in the audience at Nardi’s on Saturday as they are at most of the shows, are also good friends.

Of the personal satisfaction they get out of performing live, Viscardi said it’s a release; Maffei said “it’s all about having fun” and that he enjoys the diversity among his bandmates. “Everyone here just loves to play,” Stewart said. “You like to be the entertainment for the people.” “I hate it when we have off,” Hamway added.

And that, dear friends, is All She Wrote. Visit them at www.allshewroterocks.com.

— Victoria Ford
victoriaford@thesandpaper.net