Ever play with model planes as a kid? Well, now Model Planes can play for you…play guitar that is! Matt Noeth and James Cooper, in addition to being members of this Jamaica Plain band, are UMB students. But how do they do it?
“With difficulty,” answered Cooper, the drummer and a junior in the music department.
“One of our guitarists is getting his degree at Harvard in applied physics, so his brain is eating itself on a weekly basis,” added bassist Noeth, a junior seeking his degree in music education.
“Once we’re out of school we’re just going to be working a series of shitty jobs whilst trying to make it as performers anyways,” Cooper added. So, for them, it will just be more of the same: Working long hours and playing in their free time.
“It’s just sort of the life story of being a musician,” Noeth interjected, “you find the time to do the thing you love to do. And if you take that time in stride, you enjoy it… that’s what it’s all about, that you enjoy it.”
Both Noeth and Cooper agreed that “if they made it big” they would still finish school, each having only two or three semesters left until graduation. “I wouldn’t go three years to U Mass and then suddenly say, ‘Oh, I’m out of here!'” explained Cooper.
But they didn’t seem to mind the proposition of never hitting it big. “To me personally, it’s just about being able to play and being able to express myself. If that’s the furthest it goes, then that’s fine with me,” said Noeth. Cooper, on the other hand, admitted to still dreaming the dream of going on tour, being recognized, being paid to play in front of thousands, and having all the fame associated with success and celebrity in the music biz.
Although they’re not superstars recognized on a global stage, they have a niche and some close followers. “It’s not like I can’t walk down a street in downtown without someone stopping me and asking for my autograph,” Cooper said. “But,” he amended, “we certainly have our small followings and connections within the communities we play in.”
Since their foundation was in Jamaica Plain, it is naturally one of their most frequented concert locales. They recalled an instance in which they were playing at a yoga studio after the patrons left. “It was one of the largest small-venue crowds that we played since we started,” Noeth recalled.
The audience was sitting cross-legged on the plush floor and the crowd overflowed onto the sidewalk. But, did any of the yoga people stay to watch Model Planes perform? “I don’t know,” Noeth said, and no one ever will.
Despite under-appreciation from the yoga community, their ability has not gone unrecognized. After a concert in JP, Model Planes was recognized in the Jamaica Plain Gazette for their performance at the event. They also have formed bonds with other local bands.
How did the name Model Planes come about? “We didn’t have any name for, like, three months. We had to come up with a name that everyone [in the band] was happy with,” said Cooper. All five members had their own opinions about the name. They eventually settled on Model Planes because none of them particularly hated it. One of their previous moniker permutations was Oedipus and the Motherfuckers, “but [the name is] not so useable from a public relations, marketing perspective,” Cooper mourned.
Other than Cooper and Noeth, members include Bryan Hassell (guitar), Alex Cullen (guitar and synth) and Daniel Stone (guitar and vocals). Check out their Facebook page, and try to catch a show!