"You want to be passionate about your subject," he said. "This is a subject I'm really quite involved in, and I was happy to present to people and excited for people to react to. It was a really good subject to inspire some music."
Around the same time Kuebler started writing the new record, Elena Johnston began compiling old and new concert posters. Last month, the Maryland Institute College of Art graduate published Paper Kingdom, a collection of about 150 Baltimore concert posters from 1993-2008 and interviews with local musicians. Most of the posters are from the past five years, but about a third are from the early- to mid-90s.
Paper Kingdom documents the shift from older photocopied posters (some even with directions to the club) to intricate new screen-printed posters. Johnston also noted the shift from pre-Internet days to the current generation of MySpace-obsessed musicians. The Internet helps preserve bands' legacies even after they've broken up.
But for many of these older bands without MySpace sites, posters like the ones in Paper Kingdom are among the only remaining documentation of their existence. Including older posters was a no-brainer, Johnston said.
"That makes the printed poster so much more valuable," Johnston said. "If I'd only had posters of bands from the past five years, it would have made people angry and it would have been misrepresenting Baltimore music."
The Internet drastically changed how bands marketed themselves and their shows, said David Koslowski. From 1991 to 1996, he was the singer and guitarist for the Baltimore-based rock band Liquor Bike. The four-piece is playing a reunion show at the Ottobar late next month. Recently, Koslowski has been reflecting on the differences between the '90s and today.
"We were playing with all kinds of bands," Koslowski said. "It was like a good mix tape. It would be a mix CD or an iPod shuffle now."
A decade or two ago, a handful of local bands such as Lungfish and Liquor Bike were signed to labels. But the scene here was always overshadowed by Washington's punk community and the grunge music coming out of Seattle, said photographer Sam Holden. He started seriously snapping photos of Baltimore bands in the '90s - including Liquor Bike - and played in a band of his own.
Now, Holden makes a living photographing local and national musicians. He has shot Deacon, and still goes to see local bands from time to time.
