For the majority who don’t know, Chuck Jager are a band made up of students from the University of York. It was formed at the beginning of May 2010. The sound that has emerged from this formation of four York students has been described by York Vision as, “catchy pop-rock…an unusual mixture of folk and indie.” The band performed a collection of modest gigs round York during its infancy in the summer term of 2010, but have lined numerous gigs up throughout Freshers’ Week this year, in the hope of spreading the Jager ‘love’. From Goodfest to The Big Bang, Chuck Jager will be present and gigging for the duration, so keep a beady eye out.
As the bassist of Chuck Jager, when first asked to write this piece on the birth of the group and my day to day band ‘experience’, I was obviously hesitant. How would Chuck Jager fit into the colourful history of band formations? It clearly can’t measure up to the likes of the creation ‘Jimi Hendrix Experience’, a lone guitar prodigy plucked out of London musical obscurity by the girlfriend of a Rolling Stone. Nor does the York band’s conception echo that of a well known Liverpudlian quartet, whose cosmopolitan early years saw their frequently changing line up accompanied by a period of residency and deportation from Hamburg.
To be frankly honest the Chuck Jager band experience obviously does not compare to such enthralling stories. However I thought it could be useful of provide a profile of the group in order to give any willing or unwilling listener a literary insight into the band to accompany it’s ecoustic one. So here it goes…
17th May 2010 – Birth of the Band: Enthusiastic frontman and rhythm guitar player, Rory brings together a collection of his York friends to start a four piece Indie/Rock group. Line up includes Luke Hurst on lead guitar, American exchange student Sean Ryan on drums and Greg Kearney on bass. The group start gigging in a damp shed at the back of a run-down student residence.
Early June 2010 – Birth of the ‘Sound’ (Friends reference anybody? No?…): After a few of us contracting T.B. From the damp shed, we decided to spread our York wings and began using some decent equipment by booking a number of sessions in ‘Melrose Recording Studios’, where (during what seemed like endless jam sessions) a few of Rory ideas evolved into ‘real’ tracks.
Mid June 2010 – Birth of the Chuck Jager: After years of hard practice honing our tunes, we decided to name the band and to get out gigging. The name came on pretty standard post-practice Duchess dabble. Somebody basically suggested something about an alcoholic beverage called Jagermeister, someone else suggested something about ‘chucking’ some Jagermeister, Sean was banging on about some American WW2 pilot called Chuck Yeager… I wasn’t really listening. But what I do know is that the conversation ended in Rory standing up and christening the band Chuck Jager – And there you have it, the most interesting anecdote you’ll ever hear.
Late June/ Early July 2010 – The Big One… Chuck Jager performing at ‘Jamnesty’: We performed probably our biggest gig to date, headlining in the Basement at York cinema. It was all for a good cause, full of other great acts and free sandwiches: we’d hit the big time. It was a great gig to perform at and we had a really good time. This gig marked an end to Chuck Jager’s summer term fun.
Refuelled by the holidays and with new songs in hand we hope to have a lot more fun this year, starting with five gigs this freshers week. Chuck Jager will be at The Big Bang, Alcuin, Goodricke, Derwent and Vanbrugh. With a growing university band scene, nows the time to check out York’s live music. Along with Chuck Jager, bands such as Taming the Savage and the Archetypes are all worth a listen. Get Involved…