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IF YOU GO

Todd Steed and the Suns of Phere

WHEN: 3 p.m. Sunday; 8:30 p.m. Sept. 9

WHERE: Sunday as part of Boomsday XVIII along Neyland Drive; Sept. 9 at Disc Exchange, 2615 Chapman Highway, Knoxville

HOW MUCH: Both shows are free

CALL: 523-7263 (Boomsday); 573-5710 (Disc Exchange)

ON THE WEB: www.toddsteed.com

By Steve Wildsmith

of The Daily Times Staff

For years, attending a rock show with Todd Steed involved was like walking through the door of the carnival funhouse.

You pay the admission, and you have a general idea of what"s behind that enticing and mysterious tent-flap -- something bizarre, something amazing and always fun. But you never know what you're going to get until you step inside.

Steed, a veteran of the Knoxville music scene since the early 1980s, has built a reputation for the unusual and entertaining. Starting with Smokin' Dave and the Premo Dopes, he's done more for the Knoxville rock scene than just about anyone else still playing locally these days. Along the way, he's entertained with a variety of one-off shows -- the Haulin' Oats Boys, Half-Ass and the Semi-Colons -- that can't rightly be called "side projects" because they usually came and went in one night and basically gave Steed a chance to goof around with his friends.

In the past, Steed has gone to great lengths to push buttons and stimulate conversation, especially with Smokin' Dave and the Premo Dopes. One night, the band's opening act was a group of friends on stage playing poker. Another night, the trio had a cardboard cut-out of Lionel Ritchie on stage, and the band has accumulated 10 or 11 "theme" songs over the years.

Along the way, Steed amassed a collection of fans and peers that never knew what to expect at each show, other than some really good music. With his most recent album, "Heartbreak and Duct Tape," Steed continues that trend, pulling what's perhaps his most unexpected surprise to date -- growing up.

"I would say there are some more mature songs on the new record, and although I've always written songs like that, I almost never put them on records," Steed said during a recent interview. "Ultimately, I see myself more as an entertainer than a writer or a musician, but I'm more comfortable now including other human experiences that I would maybe leave off the records before this one.

"Several had little hints of what you might call `grown up themes,' like `Alcohol' on `Huh?' and `Dying Song' And once I started wandering into that territory, people responded to it. I like writing those kinds of songs, because the human experience isn't just funny, and it isn't just sad. I think it makes it a better record to go through the full range of emotions that people go through.

"And there will be more of that in the future, I can assure you, and there will be stupid, useless, silly songs that make you feel good, too," Steed added. "When I did this record, I basically thought to myself, if it's a good song, it goes on. I'm not going to use any other standard. Too serious, too silly -- it doesn't matter. The only standard was whether it was something I liked and was somewhat happy with."

The end result is the most sharply written collection of songs in Steed's lengthy career, as well as some of the best (and flat-out rocking) playing, courtesy of a loose collective of area musicians known as the Suns of Phere. After Smokin' Dave called it quits in the early '90s (although the band still gets together a couple of times a year for reunion shows and the like), Steed put together a number of new projects -- The Opposable Thumbs and Apelife, most recently -- but it was his 2003 album "Knoxville Tells" that saw the Suns of Phere coalesce into a musical juggernaut.

In addition to Ed Richardson (of Apelife), Tim Lee (an area solo artist and session player for an untold number of local bands) and Jeff Bills (formerly of The V-Roys), Steed asked a who's-who of area musicians to lend a hand on that album. He ended up getting former V-Roys Mic Harrison and Scott Miller, Dixie Dirt's Kat Brock, singer-songwriter-playwright R.B. Morris, guitar god Hector Qirko and even A.C. Entertainment founder Ashley Capps to add their skills to the album. The end result was a witty, poignant, occasionally grim but often uplifting album about life in and around Knoxville.

"I'm really happy with that record and all its rawness," Steed said. "It just seems like that record to me was one of the most natural accidents I ever had, and it felt really good to have it. How it all happened was that I just got out of the way and tried not to think about it. There was almost a bit of magic in there; magic and luck.

"After `Knoxville Tells,' I didn't feel like making a record for a while. But when you get your orders from the muse, you report for duty. In the back of my mind, I knew I was going to do what I wanted to do, but I want people to like it, too. I knew I didn't want to do another Knoxville record -- I'd done that as well as I can do it -- so basically the idea was to put my favorite songs that I had been writing in the last two years on there."

Instead of a revolving door of guest stars, as on "Knoxville Tells," Steed opted to stick with a core group of musicians for "Heartbreak." Holing up with former Superdrag drummer and area studio wizard Don Coffey Jr. at Studio 613 in Knoxville's Fourth and Gill neighborhood, Steed and his compatriots cut a set of flat-out rock songs and a set of more introspective, acoustic tracks. The former is highlighted by the album opener "Status No," a rollicking, drum-driven candy bar of guitar rock goodness; the latter's high point is "IWDWIST" ("I Was Drunk When I Said That"), which features Brock on vocals and marches gently from the somber to a repeating refrain that demands an increase in volume.

"I get tired of my vocals after five or six songs, and I'm sure other people do even faster," Steed said with a chuckle. "I'm a huge fan of Kat, and it's no secret my love for Dixie Dirt. At first, we were going to try and do a duet, but then I said, `Man, this sounds a lot better if you do it.' So I e-mailed her the lines, and she just put them together and made a song out of it."

Brock also wound up on the album's cover because, as Steed put it, she was the only person in the recording sessions for "Heartbreak" who agreed to put duct tape on her shirt.

"Sometimes it takes me a while to see it, but every record, I think, has a couple of themes running through it because you're writing all the songs around same time," Steed said. "On this one, I think, there's a bunch. One of them is the struggle to fight against phoniness or just the clutter in your life, trying to separate what's real and what's fake. The other, I suppose, would be change."

Speaking of change, Steed is already looking ahead to his next album, which he describes as more acoustic but with a lot of rhythm to it ("It's not going to be Dan Fogelberg," he emphasized.) He hopes to include more acoustic instruments in the mix, and he said it will have a more cohesive sound as well.

"Ultimately, I make records that I think will be enjoyable for me to make, and I hope someone else will like them too," he said. "If you can somehow figure out the trick to putting out something you like and that resonates with enough people to break even, you can do this indefinitely."

Todd Steed and the Suns of Phere will also open for Blues Traveler at the free Autumn on the Square concert on Oct. 6 in downtown Knoxville.