Township: A Family Portrait
By C.D. Di Guardia
Photos by Lara Woolfson

Meeting the family can be the turning point in any relationship. As such, it’s always a special moment when one first sits down on the couch in the uncharted family living room and feels ... right at home.Township is the ideal family: look across the coffee table and there’s big-bearded, longhaired Marc Pinansky, smiling like he already knows you. Over on the other couch toying with a magazine is drummer Greg Beadle, with guitarist Carter Tanton spinning around on the ottoman in the corner — both in front of bassist John Sheeran, who leans casually on the wall. They are indeed the Family Township — and luckily for the Northeast music scene, the family business is picking up.

When Township’s entry into the WBCN 2007 Rock ‘N’ Roll Rumble was announced earlier in the year, there was a good deal of surprise. At the time they weren’t as widely known as the Rumble’s other brawlers like Protokoll and Eli Reed — at least, not until they won the entire competition. That seminal string of shows, perhaps the band’s tipping point, quickly reinforced to local fans, press, and any remaining doubters the talent inherent in Township’s trade. Despite the group’s relative infancy (they’ve been playing as a group for less than two years) their cohesion is as immediately apparent as the classic rock influence at their ideological core. An important part of that ideology, it seems, is the sense of fraternity the band members exude on and off stage.
It’s no surprise, then, that a band this down to earth and tightly knit had little trouble finding a common voice and tone. Township’s organic breed of rock came naturally, according to Beadle, who says, “We didn’t put a whole lot of thought into it.”

“We just wanted to jump out and have everything in place,” agrees Pinansky. “We wanted to get people turned on by the songs; I didn’t want to start a band unless it was people I was comfortable with.” He started by showing Beadle some songs he had worked out on tape. Around that time, the band brought in more members and grew into what they now refer to as “a very natural thing.” While their sound hasn’t changed much, Township has evolved both as a function of time and personnel changes.
“[Collaboration] has been effortless,” awes Pinansky. “I’ve never been in a band like this.” The word “effortless” rings particularly true for Township — whether it’s cathartically flailing onstage or writing a new song in the practice room, the band hasn’t encountered many obstacles.

Township is definitely not a band that lets the sound of its own wheels make its members crazy. “We had played a handful of shows; they were always decent shows,” explains the bearded singer/guitarist. “We were kind of choosy. A lot of people knew about us even though a lot of people weren’t coming to our shows.” Eventually, though, Township made a name for themselves thanks to explosive onstage energy.
Each member of the band is engaging to watch live; from the animated lead singer to the bassist’s amazing haircut to the guitarist’s foot-stomping to the maniacal drummer — it’s an entire four-man effort on stage for Township. Tanton, perhaps the quietest member of the band, always takes stage left, while the lanky Sheeran takes the right side. Tanton whips his head around with such force that bystanders may fear for the stability of his neck, while Sheeran marches up and down, cradling his bass like a beloved machine gun.

Beadle sits to the rear, a stick-throwing dynamo, hitting all the accents perfectly and holding the rhythm down relentlessly. Beadle is a whirl of energy behind the kit, at times looking like he is standing just to get a little extra force on the drums. In front of him is Pinansky, who constantly redefines the role of the frontman. He howls into the microphone like Roger Daltrey, jabbers and rambles like Phil Lynott, and sails through songs like Ronnie Van Zant — yet he maintains an aura of authenticity entirely his own.

Like other local power acts such as The Rudds and Bang Camaro who riff on time periods of past, Township sports a sound heavily rooted in the beginnings of hard rock circa late-1960s/early-1970s. What separates them from other musical revivalists of eras past is not originality of songwriting or novel fusions of influences, but rather an undeniable sense of sincerity exuded from their on and off stage personas. It’s the combination of this sincerity and their acute self-awareness that allows the band to incorporate a subtle humor into their music. But perhaps Township’s most important family value is humility, which the band has in spades.

While Township is a relatively new force in the Boston music scene timeline, the band members have been around the musical block. Pinansky was the force behind the semi-legendary Runner & the Thermodynamics, Beadle a member of Cancer Conspiracy and Sheeran a guitarist for Spittz. Sheeran’s guitar background is evident in his bass chops, synching up on the fills with Tanton and playing his own mini-leads. Carter Tanton is the “new guy” in the band, and while he had little trouble joining the Township family, he admits that he had his work cut out for him in terms of complementing Pinansky’s guitar lines.

“A lot of it, I really had to stretch to understand and play well,” says the young guitarist. He has seen his own skill open up in answer to playing with this A-list team of musicians. “It’s like I get it and then I learn it and I can kind of play it how Marc plays it.” He trails off and comes back: “There are certain things that I normally wouldn’t do, but ....” He makes the universal face gesture for “Wow,” while the rest of the band smirks at his self-deprecatory remarks.

Despite their growing amount of local praise, the band did not expect much out of the WBCN Rumble. “Sure, we think we’re the greatest band ever,” jokes Pinansky. “We thought that if we could at least get out of the first round, we may turn on a few people.”
“We thought the next round wouldn’t look so likely for us, but we’d have fun trying,” agrees Beadle.

Township was crowned king of Boston bands by Rory Stark and Lee Bronson of The Campaign for Real-Time on April 20. Though some of the suspense was doused by the word PIHSNWOT easily read through the piece of paper in Bronson’s hand before he called their name, it wasn’t a surprise given the band’s performance that night. When handed the crown, Pinansky gave the crowd one of those winning, disarmingly gentle smiles and said, “I dig this.” It’s not certain what the band plans to do with the sizeable winnings that come with being grand champion of local rock. In an interview before the finals, Pinansky joked that he was going to get the other bands’ names tattooed on his arms. That plan is presumably off, although they do plan to use the financial nest egg, as well as the other parts of the prize package, to extend their recorded library; as of now they only have an EP for sale.

Township believes in taking things naturally and seizing the day while the day is there to be seized. “People sort of think we should be playing in arenas, not in this big grandiose type way, but we like to write songs that excite us and excite people,” grins Pinansky. “Every song is like a climb up a mountain. Man, why not?”

“You only get until the magic fairy comes down and you get to make records and go on tour, and you only get half an hour to 45 minutes. It’s like, ‘That’s my favorite song; no that’s my favorite song,’” he says excitably.

Perhaps it was this musical exuberance that won over the Rumble judges, and promises to win over audiences in the Northeast and beyond.

www.thefamilytownship.com