optic

$6.99 US

Nov./Dec.. 2011Issue #001

pticculture through a different lens

135 North CollegeIndianapolis, Indiana


Issue 001, Jan/Feb '12

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DEPARTMENTS

Editorial Staff / 3Editor’s Letter / 6

BIG MONEY & THE SPARE CHANGE

Up-and-coming Fort Wayne grunge rockers talk about their upcoming record, playing shows around Indiana and the difficulty of getting exposure in small markets.

SAVAGE’S CHANGE OF PACE

This Muncie bar is a welcome change of pace from the typical college bars around town, and offers shockingly cheap food and beer with fantastic service.

HOMEMADE CREATIVITY

Telecommunications students at Ball State University get creative with ways to get into photography and cinematography on the cheap.

Back Page / 22

FEATURE

A profile of Muncie musician Loup B, who records knotty electronic beats and ambient washes of sound but rarely gets out of his home studio.

Ideas / 10

Places / 9

People / 6

Getting Loopy / 12

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Editorial Staff

Aaron Mikel is a senior telecommunications major at Ball State University. For this issue, he contributed photos to this page and to the “Homemade Creativity” article. He is a freelance videographer and is available for weddings and other events. He recently completed a stint as director of photography for the short documentary “Black Baseball in Indiana,” produced by the Virginia Ball Center.

Tyler Gater is a senior telecommunications major at Ball State University and contributed photos for this page and “Savage’s Change of Pace.” He is the subject of “Homemade Creativity.” He spends most of his time taking photos and build-ing his own photography equipment. He is also a road bike enthusiast and builds his own bikes out of spare parts in his living room.

Lance Johann is a senior telecommunications major at Ball State University. He is responsible for most of the photographs in this issue, including the cover and Backpage photos. He is one half of Jance Teal Productions, and produces videos and short films. He spends the time not used on photography and videography playing NBA 2K11.

Ian Baker is a senior public relations student at Ball State University with an in-terest in design. For this issue, he wrote all of the articles and designed the layout, and even contributed a few photos. He is a shockingly good cook, but people sometimes complain about too much garlic. He would like to thank his laptop for not crashing during the production of this magazine.

Ian Baker, Editor-in-Chief

Lance Johann, Photographer

Tyler Gater, Photographer

Aaron Mikel, Photographer

Nov./Dec. ‘11 3

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letter

Designing this magazine was a long process, and one

that could often be challenging and frustrating - there was a lot of rethinking and redoing. But it was always a lot of fun. It all started with just an idea, to showcase the local talent and culture around central and northern Indiana, and a blank document on a computer screen. Little by little, it started to come together. The profile on Fort Wayne band Big Money & the Spare Change and the feature on Muncie beatmaker Loup B represent the music element of this magazine, which originally was the central theme that I planned build each issue around. After some brainstorming, it seemed that an overview of the culture of the region rather than just the music scene would serve

the magazine’s purpose best, which is where the articles on Savage’s Alehouse and the DIY photography scene at Ball State originated from. In addition to the theme, I

wanted photography to be a huge part of the magazine, which is why the feature story is largely dominated by photos, and the Backpage department is based around one big photo.That’s not to say that the content

takes a back seat to the photos - I put a lot of work into the stories, and they were a lot of fun to do. My subjects were great to work with and gave me everything we needed - I hope they like the stories we composed about them.Finally, I hope that you, the

reader, enjoy this issue of Optic. I’m proud of the way it turned out, and it’s nice to see that a few months worth of work culminated in a great-looking final product. So this is the first issue of Optic,

and I hope that you like it!-Ian Baker

Letter from the Editor

22.11.11 Troubadour / Los Angeles, CA / USA21.11.11 The Independent / San Francisco, CA / USA19.11.11 Crocodile Cafe / Seattle, WA / USA18.11.11 Electric Owl / Vancouver, BC / CANADA15.11.11 7th Street Entry / Minneapolis, MN / USA14.11.11 Empty Bottle / Chicago, IL / USA

people

Cale Gerst has played in a lot of bands over the past few years, but none of them have reached the level

of success that his current one, Big Money & the Spare Change, has.

“It’s always been easy for me to get shows,” Gerst says. “But with Big Money we’re playing shows twice a weekend, and there’s always a lot of people at them.”

Gerst, who plays drums, formed the band with guitarist/vocalist Dan Obergfell and bassist Brian Spears in late 2010, playing shows along the Fort Wayne bar circuit and even making it to the semi-finals of a city-wide, radio-sponsored Battle of the Bands.

“The Battle of the Bands was awesome for us,” Gerst laughs. “We got a ton of exposure, which got us a lot of shows we probably wouldn’t have gotten otherwise. And we got to record a song out of it too.”

The band sounds like they’re channeling 90s grunge bands like Pearl Jam or Nirvana, reflected both in the band’s loud-soft-loud dynamic popularized by another band from the decade, the Pixies, and Obergfell’s Cobain-esque throat-shredding vocals.

Currently, the band has only released a low-quality demo tape and one shiny, professionally-recorded single, “This Is My (Strawberry) Jam,” but have finished recording a debut EP, which they hope to release by the end of the year.

“We’re making money from the gigs around Fort Wayne,” Gerst says. “So the studio time was the next logical step for us.”

What the band hopes to accomplish after releasing their record is to expand their touring base and be able to make more money from playing gigs.

“Well,” Gerst says. “I’m not sure if making

money would be our primary goal - I’d say it’s to get more people to hear us. But, you know, we need money to do that.”

So far, the band has only extended their reach marginally past Fort Wayne. They’ve played very small shows in Muncie, usually at the very top of the bill.

“Nobody knows us in Muncie, really,” Obergfell says. “So when we play we always get the worst slot and nobody is at the venue by the time we play. But we’re friends with a few bands and venues in Indianapolis, so that’s the big goal for right now. To play down there.”

The band has the talent and the work ethic to become popular - the only thing that they need is for a little luck to drop them into the right situation. d

Big Money & the Spare ChangeFort Wayne’s Up & Coming Grunge Rockersby Ian Baker / photos by Ian Baker

Days.The new album from Real Estate.Available October 18.

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Savage’s Change of PaceMuncie bar offers a different atmosphere than most

by Ian Baker / photos by Ian Baker and Tyler Gater

places

Savage’s daily specials:Monday: 50 cent PBR and $5 sandwich combosTuesday: $2 Mexican imports/$1 tacos/$3 nachosWednesday: determined weeklyThursday: $2 Three Floyds pints Sunday: $2 Sierra Nevada pints/50 cent wings

Savage’s sandwich combos (typically $9) are best to try on Mondays, when you can get a sandwich, side, sauce and PBR for only $6. Pictured above is the Chicken

Cordon Bleu Ribbon - a beer-battered chicken breast with ham, topped with Swiss cheese and horseradish sauce on a toasted bun - along with onion rings. Other sides include french fries, mozzarella sticks, and fried jalapenos. The bar also offers a variety of burgers and other sandwiches, such as the Nachopeno burger, topped with nacho cheese and jalapenos. d

Savage’s Alehouse, located on the corner of High and Washington Streets in downtown Muncie, offers a much different bar experience than most other offerings in

town. It combines the beer snobbery of downtown bars like the Heorot and the Fickle Peach with food that’s a notch above anywhere else in town.

Savage’s, in addition with their massive selection of craft beer (although not quite as large as the Heorot’s, it’s roughly equal to that of the Fickle Peach) and inventive food offerings, is unequaled as far as the term “friendly atmosphere” is concerned. The bar staff is helpful and inviting, the service is fast and the patrons are welcoming. There’s pool to be played and sports to be watched.

The bar also makes a name on being an incredible value. Every night has some kind of themed special, on both beer and food. There’s also a running special on Pabst Blue Ribbon, which is at most one dollar every night.

There are bars in Muncie that offer some of the same things, but none of them do those things as well or all at the same time like Savage’s does. A great bar to go out for a night of drinking, a bite to eat, or just to hang out. d

Savage’s Chicken Cordon Blue Ribbon Sandwich, with onion rings and bistro sauce

The bar also offers a wide selection of 22-ounce “bombers,” as well as 40-ounce bottles of Pabst Blue Ribbon.

Jance TealProductions

eight hundred west wayne street, muncie, indianavimeo.com/user5911076

Nov./Dec. ‘11 9

ideas ideas

Homemade CreativityStudents take photography and videography into their own hands

by Ian Baker / photos by Tyler Gater & Aaron Mikel

A handful of telecommunication students at Ball State University are taking the do-it-yourself aesthetic and applying

it to a venture typically defined by expensive equipment. Photography and videography have always embraced creativity, of course, but it’s interesting to see people go outside of the box when, really, they’re already outside of the box.

These students are by no means photography purists - anything is fair game in terms of photo manipulation. They’re masters of programs like Adobe’s After Effects and Apple’s Final Cut Pro, and they know just about everything there is to know about the varying lenses that they can attach to get exactly what they’re looking for. The picture to the right is a prime example of their ideology - it looks natural, but really isn’t.

A huge aspect of the art of these students is their ingenuity when it comes to using equipment. A lot of the tools at their

command are homemade, works-of-art-in-and-of-themselves pieces, such as the homemade “steadycam” on the left. A camera affixes to this device to hold it steady while shooting handheld video - this one in particular is made of just a collection of found PVC pipe and screws. These usually sell between $700 and $1500, but this one was made from just around $20. This DIY mindset is about saving money, sure, but on a deeper, broader level it’s about bringing an expensive hobby to the masses and making it accessible for almost everyone. The cost of a digital SLR camera is still relatively prohibitive for a casual photographer or filmmaker, but the rest of the necessary equipment can be assembled on the cheap.

One of the biggest innovators in this “scene” is Tyler Gater, pictured to the right, a senior student in Ball

State’s telecommunications program. He got into photography around the time he first started using the cameras the university provides for students.

“Oh, they sucked,” he says. “So I bought a good one and started making add-ons for it, and I started helping my friends make their stuff, and now it seems like a lot of people doing some of the same stuff.”

Gater doesn’t claim to be the first person in the world to build his own equipment, and he certainly isn’t - but for a small, local group, he’s kickstarted a new way of thinking and operating.

In addition to the photo manipulation and DIY aesthetic, this group is remarkable because they are

truly passionate about their art. Most photographers surely are, of course, but what sets these ones apart is the devotion to capturing just about everything in a spur-of-the-moment, by-the-seat-of-their-pants fashion. They take their cameras to bars, parties, and places that generally don’t see a lot of professional camera equipment, and make the best of the surrounding circumstances to create great art. d

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GettingLOOPYstory by ian baker

photos by lance johann

Tom Beal is fidgety. Well, maybe fidgety isn’t the right word, but Beal, who records music as Loup B, doesn’t sit in place very long. He’s constantly up and moving, twiddling with the knobs on his keyboards, rearranging loops on his computer monitor and changing the pitch on his MIDI controller. There’s tons of music on his computer, most of it never heard by anyone but him.

“I’m never quite sure if I want to share it with anybody or not. I have lots of songs I’ve probably never even listened to or remember making.”

He’s modest about his composing ability - one song is so complex and intricate I have to stop him to ask how long it took him to finish.

“That one I remember took a really long time,” he says. “I was working on it for, like, a week or something, trying to figure out exactly where everything was going to go.” He takes a sheepish pause. “Well, actually after that

first week I ended up getting drunk and finishing it in a few hours.”

Beal admits that he works best under the influence of alcohol. Nearly half of his compositions have been finished that way.

“It feels really dumb to say,” Beal says - he’s making these caveats all the time. “But I guess that it always just sounds better to me when I’ve had a few beers. Crisper. Easier to see where the pieces fall.”

But Beal’s best composition to date - according to him - came under different circumstances. He motions for me to put headphones on - “You should always listen to music with headphones, there’s so many details to miss without them” - and shows me a song called “Cerulean Gem.” The song sounds like ice - cold synths tones abound - but it has an undeniable warmth to it.

“I made it while the power was out at my house, and I had to make it really, really quickly,” he

Muncie musician Tom Beal talks beats, booze and blackouts

Nov./Dec. ‘11 13

## Optic

says. “I had until my computer’s battery ran out to put together the whole thing. It was really nerve-wracking.”

But successful, right?“Well, yeah, it worked!” Beal laughs.

“It ended being really awesome, forcing yourself to work within this really strict deadline. I wasn’t overthinking certain elements, just going with it.”

I sit with Beal as he composes a quick song, asking constantly if one loop or bass tone sounds right, should he change it, no, it sounds dumb, I’m starting from scratch, etc. He’s second-guessing himself a lot, something he says he didn’t do at all when he made “Cerulean Gem” - perhaps a strategy he should stick with.

Regardless of his method, Beal is an undeniably talented composer and producer. The sounds he squeezes out of his instruments are unique and all his own, and he experiments with off-beat tempos and unresolved chords, leaving you with a confused and unsettled feeling when listening to his music.

“Most of the stuff I listen to isn’t really shiny, happy synth-pop,” Beal murmurs before going on a tirade about the true nature of dubstep. “Everyone thinks it’s all these wobbly sounds and really noisy remixes of like, Rihanna and Katy Perry, and it just isn’t.”

While dubstep is certainly the base of that music, Beal isn’t happy with the direction one of his favorite styles has veered off in. He’s more interested in the future, citing acts like James Blake and Jamie xx as key influences to his sound.

“I just love the textures they use,” he says, “The way that they use bass is really different than how anyone else is using it right now,

Nov./Dec. ‘11 15

"People think dubstep is all these wobbly sounds and noisy remixes, and it just isn't."

Nov./Dec. ‘11 17

Of course, Beal’s aversion to overindulgence is something of a breath of fresh air in the internet age, a time where acts like Odd Future and Main Attrakionz release four or five long mixtapes over the course of a few months. Beal’s approach to putting out music, keeping it short and sweet, is a rare philosophy.

When I ask him which of his wildly varying styles will be represented on his upcoming release, he’s a little unsure.

“I’d like it to be a healthy mix of the stuff I do. Like, maybe one really heavy bass song, one that’s more synth-driven, so on and so on.”

After we finish eating, I say that I’m looking forward to hearing the EP whenever it’s released. Beal thanks me for the meal, and drives off.

ddd

When I follow up with Beal a day or two later, he tells me he’s nearly done picking out the tracks and sequencing them, and he

plans to have it up for download in a few weeks.

“Yeah, it’s turning out pretty well,” he says. “I’m using some of my photos for the artwork, and I’m really excited for people to hear it.”

He should be, after a few years of toiling in obscurity. Picking five or six tracks out of hundreds is no small task, and Beal has been at it for a week or two, organizing them into folders based on how good he thinks they are.

“It’s been challenging, I suppose,” he says. “But, I mean, I get to look at all this stuff I made three years ago. It’s like a trip down memory lane or something.”

He’s certainly come a long way since then. Beal showed me some of his earliest recordings, from when he was seventeen (he’s now twenty-one) - they’re very basic, slight songs, a skeletal beat with some barely melodic piano plinks.

He still doesn’t know how to play piano formally, but his untrained approach still works - he understands the very basics of

how the instrument is played, just not the notes or appropriate lingo.

“I didn’t know how to play when I started, and I still don’t - which is why I would have a hard time playing live - but I’ve made it work,” he tells me.

His production values have gotten much better as well - he started out using free program Frooty Loops, which he describes as “simplistic and really limiting, cheap sounding,” and now uses Propellerhead Reason, an expensive production software with a steep learning curve.

“I sat in my room watching tutorials for a really long time,” Beal says. “But it’s really paid off.

And once he releases his first official recording, everyone else will be able to see if it paid off as well. d

and I’d love to be able to emulate that or even expand on it.”

Beal isn’t solely influences by dubstep, though, also citing Gold Panda’s “You” and basshead Clark’s Totems Flare as being important to his development as a producer.

ddd

Later, I take Beal out to dinner to talk about his future plans for his music. Over tacos, he tells me he’s finally gearing up to release a five-song EP over the internet.

“Just to give people a taste, kind of show off a little, you know?” he tells me between bites. “I’ve been doing this forever it feels like and nobody has heard my music.”

Part of that is Beal’s own insecurities, and another part is the lack of a proper release model for him to utilize. He’s never had the means to release a physical edition of his music, with proper packaging and artwork, and he didn’t want to go the do-it-yourself route and burn CDs to hand out.

“Stuff like Mediafire and Bandcamp make it a whole lot easier to get your music out there,” he says. “I never wanted to burn CDs because I never wanted to go up to people and give them out, and then see them in the trash or something later.”

He tells me he wants to keep it short because it will simply be an introduction to his sound - a longer, full-length album might turn people off or be too much for them to digest.

“I’m trying to keep it easy for people to handle, and not seem cocky, putting out some double album as my first album.” he sighs.

Nov./Dec. ‘11 19

optic

Documents

ball state university

contributed photos

backpage photos

virginia ball center

director of photography

photography equipment

welcome change of pace

muncie beatmaker loup