The way it should be

Vacationland are always ready to rock

By Josh Rogers

Vacationland play, with Trailor and Every Forty Seconds, at the Skinny, November 10. Call (207) 871-8983.

LICENSE TO ROCK: Shawn Saindon, Tim Morin, Jim Wallerstein, and Andrew Gilbert.

Jim Wallerstein, singer and guitarist for Vacationland, who looks like he could be Gram Parsons or Evan Dando (or even Jon Bon Jovi) was at his day job — bartending at the Eastland Hotel — when he got a call from bassist Andrew Gilbert. Apparently a band had just cancelled last minute at the Skinny.

“Dude,” said Gilbert, “You ready to rock?” Wallerstein, dressed in his work suit and an hour and a half from closing time, was “like ‘no — I’m ready to make martinis.’ ” But of course he was ready. “I ran over there and we rocked.”

Self-confidence like this abounds in Vacationland. They’ve only played a handful of gigs over the summer, but the boys in the band aren’t shoegazers by any stretch. “It’s about communication,” says Wallerstein. “Not being afraid to rock, not being embarrassed. We all dress well.”

Guitarist and sometime-singer Shawn Saindon chimes in: “We’re visually flamboyant.”

If you caught their first gig, you’d be hard-pressed to disagree. “Our first performance ever was at my bachelor party,” says Saindon. “We were all really drunk and we got up there and played a song. Somebody had written ‘slut puppy’ on my face.”

Gilbert smiles, “I didn’t realize that was our first performance.” “Me neither,” laughs Saindon, “until the next day.”

But Vacationland are professionals. Wallerstein recently moved up to Maine to be with his girlfriend (this writer-chick with a daughter in her 20s who still likes to pretend she’s an elf-queen). While living in New York City, he’d recorded albums with Das Damen (Ecstatic Peace, SST, Twin Tone) and gone out on the road as a hired gun in Dgeneration’s touring line-up. Arriving in town, Wallerstein mentioned to his buddy John Lomba, owner of the Skinny and singer for Thruthewires, that he wanted to “get some guys together.”

Lomba offered up Thruthewires bassist Gilbert and Tim Morin, a rock-solid drummer that just got back from an extended gig in Leeds, England. Saindon, guitarist for Thruthewires and a singer in his on right, wasn’t immediately interested in the project. “Yeah, yeah, yeah, another band in Portland,” he kept thinking. “And then I heard a rehearsal,” he says. He started singing along on the spot and some of his vocals ended up on the tape. The group was complete.

Although Wallerstein is the driving force behind the music, Vacationland benefit from each of its component parts. Gilbert brings a youthful knowledge of punk to Saindon’s Brit-rock obsession and Wallerstein’s ’70s leanings. “Our broad taste in music helps us write songs,” muses Wallerstein. “It’s like, ‘you got your chocolate in my peanut butter.’ ”

With their fixation on ’70s and ’80s rock, Vacationland could easily be another jaded Strokes. But they’re far from it. They may dress to the nines and play to the crowd, but the music is genuine — they’re not about “hiding behind a persona.” When Wallerstein was auditioning bassists in New York he kept hitting snags.

“It’s like they work on their attitude, but maybe you should be playing your bass more,” he laughs. His experience in Maine has been 180 degrees different. Vacationland gelled in a matter of months, and he’s constantly raving to his friends back in the city about the musicians he’s found up here. “They think I live with like two bears in a cabin! For the stuff that really matters,” he says seriously, “New York doesn’t have anything on Portland. There, after you’ve played two gigs it’s like ‘Oh, did you get a record deal yet?’ ‘No.’ ‘Oh, you’re over.’ Here it’s more relaxed. Artistically, it’s nice to have that space.”

Besides writing alone and in pairs, Vacationland also record all of their practices; in case they hear something that they want to add in permanently. Listening to one of these tapes sounds like you’re descending into the basement of a CBGB-style rock club on the Lower East Side, circa 1978. Or 1989. Or is that 1999? “When did we record this?” Saindon keeps asking confusedly.

üheir “Intro/Reasons Why” medley sounds like a Fugazi/Soft Boys cross-pollination, and the vocals are a blend between Jagger’s cocky sneer and the passionate scratchiness of Superchunk’s Mac McCaughan. “I love this part,” says Saindon of the crunchy chorus. “It feels like an old ’80s heavy metal moment.”

“Yeah,” Wallerstein smiles, “let me see those lighters.”

The real nugget on the tape is their paean to glam balladry, “When it Rains.” This could have been originally intended as, say, a tribute to Curtis Mayfield (Vacationland’s gargantuan record collection means that often what they refer to as their “Bad Brains song” sounds to this listener like the Get up Kids, and what they affectionately refer to as their “Stones rip-off” really sounds more like the MC5). But “When it Rains” is actually just a balls-out rock ballad.

When drummer Morin kicks into the chorus with his syncopated ride symbol, you really do feel like raising your fist in the air. Or kissing your girlfriend on the back of your motorcycle in the cold November rain.

Wallerstein and Saindon share vocal duties here to great effect. They’re even beginning to capitalize on their harmonic successes, playing their voices off against each other more with each practice. Which explains why Saindon can’t figure out when the tape was recorded.

Three weeks ago, Gilbert says.

“I feel like it’s a whole different band now,” enthuses Wallerstein. With Saindon stepping up with more song contributions (you might hear his “Addicted to the Knife” at the next show), Vacationland is certainly expanding its sound. “The band is so new right now and we’re writing like mad. We’re like five levels above what you just heard,” he boasts. And their enthusiasm is contagious.

Josh Rogers can be reached at jrogers@phx.com.