Sharon Vanorny
WheelHouse hits the links at Oaks Golf Course. From left: Kenny Leiser, Nic Adamany, Frank Busch and Mark Noxon.
As we zoom along the fairway, bassist Mark Noxon explains that he is the only member of WheelHouse who has “never gotten into” golf.
He also is the only member who has hit a hole in one. His feat is downplayed by the other three band members throughout the morning.
“I don’t want to minimize Mark’s achievement, because it is an achievement,” Kenny Leiser, the band’s fiddle player, explains later. “But he was playing the par 3 course at Vitense.”
Despite his ambivalence about the game, Noxon ruminates on the parallels between playing golf and playing in a band as Leiser and rhythm guitarist Frank Busch wait for lead guitarist Nic Adamany to get out of the sand.
“Both require patience,” he says. “Some days you’re on the fairway, some days you’re in the sand. It’s about consistency all around.”
In the bunker, Adamany gives the ball a good whack, but it catches the grassy lip above him and plops back into the sand.
“That hurts,” says Busch, also off to an inauspicious start. “Obviously, we’re much better musicians than golfers.”
No one can fault the members of Madison’s hardest-working band, WheelHouse, for not bringing their A-game on a drizzly morning in June. Having just played 30 shows in 45 days — with more than 100 scheduled this summer — the boys are overdue for a visit to the back nine at Oaks Golf Course.
Busch, who handles bookings, says the band is actually trying to work a little less. “We chose quality over quantity this year. We’re making just as much, but playing less.” Which means a little more time for golf. Oaks Golf Course gives the band time on the links in exchange for playing a free gig each year.
WheelHouse emerged from the last gasps of two other national touring Madison bands, the Mighty Short Bus (Adamany and Busch) and the Lucas Cates Band (Noxon and Leiser). In 2012, their informal jam sessions quickly evolved into something they felt was greater than the sum of its parts.
“It was a side project that was way too much fun, way too good and way too easy not to go full-time with it,” says Busch, his drive dropping in the brush.
Nearly four years on, word has spread about WheelHouse’s fusion of bluegrass and country with elements of folk and ’60s psychedelic pop.
“It’s not what you’d expect to hear from this kind of instrumentation,” says Adamany. “That wasn’t by design; it just happened.”
But a band is also a business, and the members of WheelHouse run it like one. They’ve cut out middlemen to book, promote and manage their shows. “When people see us loading up our gear, that’s what we get paid for,” says Adamany. “Living this lifestyle, it’s sink or swim.”
Good bands give performances; great ones create experiences. Fans were treated to the latter at Wisconsin Brewing Company in May. Midway through their two-hour set, Busch, Adamany and Noxon sank into rhythm-keeping oblivion as Leiser, during his solo, seemed to tap some secret scale of beautiful screams and mournful wails from somewhere deep within.
“In this band, everyone plays to their skill set,” Noxon says. “We’ve found our comfort zone.”
Amid a packed performance calendar, the band is recording songs for its next album. One of the band’s songs made the soundtrack for the movie The Sixty Yard Line, featuring Isthmus co-owner and former Packer Mark Tauscher.
“In other industries you can be super-talented, work hard and expect to rise to the top,” Adamany says. “In this industry you need that X-factor, luck, but I think people can create luck.”
Even during down time, the band’s energy and work ethic shine. Moments before tee time the band sucked down their drinks and grabbed their clubs, despite the wind and rain.
“It’s a fine Scottish morning,” declared Busch from behind his aviator sunglasses. “The show must go on.”
Number of shows scheduled for May through September: more than 100
Maker of WheelHouse Whiskey: Yahara Bay Distillery
Number of 2016 MAMA awards: Three
Where to see WheelHouse: Come Back In, Tuesdays, 5-8 pm
