Black Happy trombonist Jay Carkhuff doesn’t remember a lot about the band’s early days.
But he remembers the very, very beginning, when he and a few other members of the North Idaho College jazz band were asked by members of heavy metal band Sacrament to play on a song.
Carkhuff, who had played the trombone since sixth grade, performed in various bands and ensembles through his high school and NIC days. To him, it wasn’t a strange request.
“We did lots of crazy things back then when we were young,” he says. “That seemed normal to show up at a late night band practice out in the prairie, in somebody’s house, and give it a try.”
Though details are a little fuzzy, Carkhuff knows that first rehearsal led to others, which led to live shows. What started as a bit of a joke for Sacrament eventually became a permanent fixture of the band, who rebranded as Black Happy after they realized the brass section was a hit with fans.
More rehearsals followed, sometimes in houses in Coeur d’Alene or Spokane, sometimes in storage units.
“We would try to find any place we could where we could rehearse and set up our stuff and play together,” Carkhuff says.
After releasing a 7-inch single, the band — consisting of Carkhuff (trombone), Jim Bruce (drums), Daryl Elmore (saxophone), Mike Hasseries (trombone), Mark Hemenway (bass), Paul Hemenway (vocals/guitar), Greg Hjort (guitar/vocals) and Scott Jessick (drums) — signed to Pacific Inland Records. In 1991, Black Happy released its debut album, Friendly Dog Salad, recorded at the since-shuttered Sinkhole Studios in Hayden Lake. Two years later, Black Happy released Peghead on Macola Records.
Just one year later, after two well-received albums and extensive touring around the Pacific Northwest, Black Happy broke up. Carkhuff does remember that time in the band’s life, but he doesn’t like discussing it. The logistics of working with eight schedules and members wanting to take the band’s sound in different directions led to the breakup.
Black Happy’s final album, The Last Polka, was released after the breakup in 1995.
All was quiet on the Black Happy front for the next 15 years, until a Facebook group called “Black Happy Needs to Reunite” popped up.
Carkhuff doesn’t remember much about the conversations the members had about the Facebook group, but they eventually decided to book a handful of shows in Spokane and Seattle in 2010.
Carkhuff had performed with the Panhandle Symphony Orchestra and other ensembles here and there in the years after Black Happy broke up, but he had stepped away from the instrument altogether a few years before the reunion shows. He also hadn’t listened to Black Happy’s albums in several years, so he had to both get back into playing shape and relearn the band’s songs.
“When we were coming up with the songs for Friendly Dog Salad and, particularly, for Peghead, I was really at the height of my performing abilities,” he says. “Later in life, trying to relearn some of those parts, I had really wondered why I had made some of the parts so difficult.”
Three of those five reunion shows sold out. Despite the proof that the band was still in demand, the octet once again put their instruments away.
That was until 2018, when the band again reunited to celebrate the release of Friendly Dog Salad and Peghead on vinyl via Seattle’s Latent Print Records.
“That felt right to me,” Carkhuff recalls feeling about the second round of reunion shows.
“We’re not trying to reproduce what we did in the past, but I think it is what it is, and we like what it is.”
He had played more consistently from 2010 to 2018, so relearning the band’s songs again wasn’t as tough the second time around.
Again, several of the shows sold out. Shortly after that run of shows, some members stayed in Spokane and Coeur d’Alene, while others returned to Seattle or the Midwest.
This time though, the band didn’t let their instruments collect dust. The musicians began sending musical ideas back and forth and eventually wrote a few new songs.
“We’re not trying to reproduce what we did in the past, but I think it is what it is, and we like what it is,” Carkhuff said.
The desire to play together live and present those new songs drove the band to arrange this third round of reunion shows, at the Knitting
Factory and at the Showbox in Seattle.
Carkhuff doesn’t make any promises about a new Black Happy album, saying the band is taking things one day at a time. There is more creativity and potential for new songs than there is the opportunity for the band to get together and rehearse, he says. So for now, they’re just enjoying being able to hang out and rehearse in the same room.
But, you never know.
“There are many songs in the works, but these are two that we felt good about presenting live, and this does follow the format that we’ve always followed is to learn some new songs and play them in front of people and then record them later,” Carkhuff says.
The band announced these reunion shows on April 1, and by April 3, the band needed to add one more show in each city after the first dates sold out.
The band never wants to assume that the crowds will come rushing back, so it’s (black) happy with the anticipated turnout for this run of shows.
“We are generally pleasantly surprised by how much the people that we love love us back,” Carkhuff says. ♦
Black Happy, Light in Mirrors (Aug. 14),
The Divorce (Aug. 15) • Thu, Aug. 14 (tickets available) and Fri, Aug. 15 at 8 pm (sold out) • $45 • All ages • Knitting Factory • 919 W. Sprague Ave. sp.knittingfactory.com
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.inlander.com ’
