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A Musical Life: Thayne Coleman

Courtesy photo

Thayne Coleman has recorded two albums as frontman of The Travel Guide. He’s also a member of the Wichita collective The Wonder Revolution in which he plays drums. The Travel Guide is working on a new studio album that should be released later in 2014. Coleman counts, among his influences, Bruce Springsteen, Wilco, and John Updike.

My name is Thayne Coleman. I play guitar, and sing for a band called The Travel Guide, and I play drums in a band called the Wonder Revolution.

I started playing drums in church and taught myself guitar and began writing because nobody I grew up with ever wanted to write their own songs. The thing I think about the most are dynamics. The church music I was raised on, despite how anathema I'm sure it is to most indie rock bands, is full of dynamics. Now I like to think about how the principles of dynamics can apply to tonality, harmony, rhythm, and lyrical narrative and the way a song can seem to tighten and decompress through tension and release.

I think the best songs include everything. They aren't simply sunny and consonant or dark and dissonant, but constantly flowing and evolving through different shades and colors. The rhythm can rush and hurry one second, but pull and drag the next.

Jedd Beaudoin is host/producer of the nationally syndicated program Strange Currency. He has also served as an arts reporter, a producer of A Musical Life and a founding member of the KMUW Movie Club. As a music journalist, his work has appeared in Pop Matters, Vox, No Depression and Keyboard Magazine.