Technical Triumph

In the old days, my dumb friends and I promoted shows regularly and booked just about any band we liked, but The North Atlantic sticks out above most others. TNA played a style that hit at a time when indie and emo was dominated by the likes of Braid and The Get Up Kids. Their debut album, Buried Under Tundra, did heartfelt much better than most, due in no small part to frontman Jason Hendrix's emotive vocal style and utter onstage sincerity.

"Originally, we were just this Fugazi kind of thing with a dirty tone and a clean tone," Hendrix says. "But our backup guitarist left the band mid-tour, and we had to figure out how to be a trio for a show at The Knitting Factory in New York City."

It would turn out to be a blessing in disguise, as their follow-up, Wires in the Walls, was a complete departure from their earlier sounds, in the best possible ways. Forged in the style of bands like Godspeed You! Black Emperor and the golden days of Modest Mouse, Wires' new focus on experimentalism, coupled with Hendrix's foray into the world of effects pedals and a borderline obsession with The Clash B-sides, meant a record that could go from poppy to heavy to soulful without jarring the listener. Meanwhile, songs like "Scientist Girl" or "The Lotus Eater" showed they could still hold onto their original songwriting ideals.

"I think one of the marks of it being a good record is that I still don't know where a lot of it came from," Hendrix says. "Things were flowing lyrically for me in a way that was weird and that I'll probably never be able to duplicate … we weren't interested in making a record that sounded like everything else."

The North Atlantic would eventually split. Jason would wind up in Chicago, the drummer, his brother Cullen, wound up in Denver and bassist Jason Richards would attend art school in California. Hendrix still played in bands like Big Science and An Unfortunate Woman before forming Loose Drugs, a wildly experimental and improvisational rock band that never actually writes songs and still produces thoughtful long-form pieces that cull from all corners of the guitar-driven musical world. He'd also taken a job at Chicago's legendary music venue, Metro, and discovered a calling he never really knew he'd had: guitar tech.

"Everyone at Metro starts in security, and from there I got load-in shifts for productions and then into stage managing, and then I spent a year working monitors," he says. "So one night Sia came through, and their crew member was having visa issues, so they needed a guitar tech, and I helped them out; two days later they called from [Washington] DC, and I wound up working with that crew for a month."

Shortly after the Sia job, he worked with a band called Grouplove, which paved the way for two years with Tegan and Sara. A little over a month with Guster followed before he was offered his current position with indie titans Death Cab for Cutie.

"On a basic level, guitar techs tune guitars and set up the guitar rig, the amps and the pedals, but you can get a lot deeper and take people's guitars and make them play better than they ever thought they could," he says.

So if you're a lover of the guitar, a born tinkerer or both, how do you break into this exciting, globe-trotting career? Check Hendrix's top three tips:

Work for a venue.

"A lot of people think they need to go to school to know how to do this work, but the smartest way to go about it is to get a job in a venue. You'll start to understand the touring mindset and what people are looking for, and you'll meet the people."

Don’t be afraid of your guitar.

"Unlike amps, there is nothing that will kill you if you're messing around, and the worst that'll happen is you have to take it to a professional."

Read up.

"The information is out there in books or the Internet. Find it and immerse yourself."

Santa Fe Reporter