Hey That's My Bike...I Mean Beer: Decibel 71, Sept. 2010

Our decade-plus spent playing in bands that never much amounted to anything wasn’t, as it turns out, all for naught. Yeah, we’ve got a few 7” singles to show for our efforts, but perhaps the best thing this foolhardy pursuit of rock stardom provided was a lot of time spent in bars. A lot. Let’s just say that given the opportunity to “sample the wares” at these, ahem, fine drinking establishments, we did our fair share. And we can’t help but think that ultimately helped us land this distinguished position as Decibel’s beer writer.

It should be noted that our earliest musical endeavors took place in the Pacific Northwest in the mid-to-late ’80s when “microbrews” (that’s what we called them back then) were just starting to find a foothold on the West Coast. We had a bandmate who had already introduced us to “imports” (higher alcohol, better taste) like Sheaf Stout and Elephant Malt Liquor, but it was an epiphany when a Portland-grown brewpub chain, McMenamin’s, opened the High Street Brewery & Café a block from our apartment in Eugene, OR, in ’88 or ’89. Mind you, they were still working out the kinks at the time and the $1.75 pints sometimes tasted a little funky and frequently caused bad headaches after just a pint or two. But for an after-practice booze-up, it was still a lot better than the 40 ouncers of PBR and Coors we usedta buy from the corner grocery for $.99.

When college was done and we moved the band to Seattle, where shit was really happening—both music- and beer-wise—we truly got a taste of what good brews were all about. There are two beers from that era that are still iconic for us—Widmer Hefeweizen and Redhook ESB. We don’t really drink either of them today, but they were ubiquitous back when your choices of good domestic beer were sorely limited.

Today Redhook is partially owned by Anheuser-Busch who is owned by, I dunno, the Sheinhardt Wig Co.? And Widmer’s Hefeweizen, as it turns out, is kind of bastardization of the traditional German style. But the Pacific Northwest, as you might have heard, has a helluva lot of amazing beer now. Thus it’s not surprising that we called it quits in the late ’90s, when we realized that we enjoyed the good beer and socializing more than playing to 15 or 20 friends on a Tuesday night. We can still drink beer like a champ, but don’t ask us to play “Systematic Break.” We have no fucking clue how it goes.

Adem Tepedelen played in a bunch of bands you never heard of, so don’t ask.