KUAF's music department is hosting a benefit concert at George's Majestic Lounge on Dickson Street in Fayetteville Sunday evening. It's in support of our music programming and the KUAF Live Session series. Sunday night's concert will feature Northwest Arkansas local bands Ted Hammig and the Campaign, Frail State and Resting. It was booked by independent music promoter Joe Swink of Swink Booking. Ted Hammig and Chance Wallace and Jordan Ward from Frail State met with Ozarks at Large at Furn and Garner Performance Studio last week to discuss their music, the upcoming show and what public media means to them.
Ted Hammig says his band is coming up on six years since they first began playing music.
Ted Hammig: Which is really wild. We're a rock and roll band — that's the best way to say it. We've been playing around for a long time, and we're constantly trying to play more out-of-state shows, but we love George's. There's nowhere better. We're excited to be supporting KUAF.
I was still a senior in high school when we started. My bassist texted me on Instagram, and I had known Freeman since we were young. And then David knew Andrew, my drummer, and Ben Hobbs, our guitar player, interviewed us for the Traveler, the university paper, and we brought him in. And then most recently we added Blaze Tausend, who was playing in a lot of other local bands and we brought him in. So it was just kind of an eclectic little bunch. We've made two records and performed at Austin City Limits last year. That was really fun — that was like Blaze's second show ever doing. It was fun. We have a good time.
Jordan Ward: I'm Jordan Ward. I am also a musician in the band Frail State.
Chance Wallace: I'm Chance Wallace. I'm also a musician and tattoo artist.
Ward: Me, Chance and our drummer Taylor have been playing music together under different monikers for probably the last 10 years or so. And then in 2020, we came up with Frail State, and then we put out our first single on New Year's of 2021. So we've been a band five or six years in the sense of Frail State. We've put out four EPs over that time. We've played in probably 20 to 25 states by now, I think.
Wallace: From New York to Florida to Texas and back.
Ward: I grew up here. I'm the only one though. Everybody else is from Central Arkansas.
Wallace: Yeah, I’m from Bayou Bartholomew. Which reminds me how we all met, really. These guys had a show — they were called Small Talks at the time. This was pre-Frail State, pre-Pass Comfort. This was two whole band names back before we changed anything. They came and played at a coffee shop called Poor John's in Siloam Springs. That was where I met them. And then we talked about booking a tour with my band and their band. And then we did that, and then we were like, why don't we just join up and be in a band together?
Ward: Yeah, our guitarist was quitting and then his whole band was quitting. So we were like, let's just make a whole new band with you. We kind of just merged it all together.
Wallace: And then I moved down there for a little bit and lived with them and convinced this guy to move back up here with me because I missed home.
Nourani: Where does the name Frail State come from?
Ward: There's a song called "Frail State of Mind" by The 1975 and we kind of just took it from that. We wanted it to sound like a brand. Frail State sort of sounds like a brand to me.
Wallace: It sounds kind of ominous, but not too edgy.
Ward: When you hear that name, you don't know what type of music it's gonna be.
Nourani: Describe that for listeners.
Ward andWallace: It's very eclectic. We are a real-level music stuck in DIY. I guess we're somewhere in the vein of alternative and indie, but we're really influenced by old jazz and funk music, soul music. Very into R&B. Talking Heads, Phil Collins, all the '80s. Whitney Houston. We love Wu-Tang stuff. '90s hip-hop has a huge hold on us. Third Eye Blind. Cage the Elephant. Oasis. Pretty much anything from the UK I'll probably like.
Nourani: And Resting is the other band, but unfortunately they can't be here with us today. Joe, talking a little bit about how this specific fundraiser came together — maybe talk a little bit about the work that you do and how you guys all met in the music world here.
Joe Swink: My name is Joe Swink. I am a concert booker here in town. It's been like four or five years now since I've known all y'all. I just used to work in the local music industry growing up in Fort Smith — I used to work with a bunch of rappers and all that, and then I got a job at UofA for their music program, and I met a bunch of local musicians through that. I was very much just wanting to jump ship and just photograph shows, and it just kept going. I'm pretty sure I photographed for Ted at one point a long time ago. And then I essentially just wanted to start putting on shows. I just thought it'd be really fun. The first couple ones did really well, and so other people were like, hey, will you put on a show for me? I met Frail State because I brought a band named Cosmic Cream to town and I really needed a good opener, and they were available, and we pretty much hit it off instantly from that day forward. And then Ted and I, we've had a pretty good relationship for a couple of years now — you guys have played at least 20 shows for me, and we had a little tour together. So it's just been a snowball of working with musicians and creating relationships. This fundraiser is definitely a celebration of that and a celebration of the work that KUAF tries to do with our live sessions and just through covering local musicians.
Nourani: Maybe talk a little bit about the importance — and this is for anyone — of that relationship, not even just between KUAF and local media sources, but also through local promoters and supporting your fellow musicians, and the significance of that in this community.
Swink: KUAF has just done so much legwork for our community, it's insane. I've had multiple people come up to my shows and be like, oh, I heard this on the radio from KUAF — without me ever even asking y'all to promote it. And the live video sessions you guys have done, I've had people want to play Fayetteville solely so they could do one of those live video sessions. I couldn't be more thankful. I think it's important for our community to realize how much legwork goes in from other people. Whenever you go to a show, you think it's just the concert staff that does everything, which they are a big portion of it, but there are so many things — the local promoters, local radio stations like this, even if they're not on the show but they still show up to hang out.
Hammig: All of that's so very important. The whole scene in Fayetteville is really uniquely not cliquey or gatekeeping compared to other scenes that I've played in. KUAF is part of that thing of like, everybody's kind of welcome. For me, I grew up listening to it, and so it's cool to be involved in it now because I always thought, oh, that's the radio station when I would go to the library, you know, that kind of thing. I have people keep coming to me and saying, oh, I heard about your show on the radio, and I'm like, oh, really? And they're like, yeah, they said you're the new Freddie Mercury. I was like, okay.
Ward: We've done a live tune session as Frail State and it was wonderful. We couldn't believe that there was something so accessible for local artists — free, and just amazing what you guys do for all of us.
Wallace: I feel like there's way more support for local music, and it's not just one strict genre. Considering where we're from, it's way more welcoming, especially for Frail State and any of the other bands. There's no drama here. Everyone gets along. Everyone actually wants to be friends. The promoters actually pay us.
Ward: It makes me very proud to be from here, and having made our focus as a band to invest in this community, even though we didn't necessarily start the band here.
Nourani: Now I just wanted to present an opportunity for you guys to talk about your work — anything new that you're working on?
Ward: We're working quietly behind closed doors on a full-length record, which we've never made before. We have four EPs out, but we're trying to really focus on a body of work. We're kind of sitting on so much music already. We want to just really hone in on our first actual album and try to build more hype for it, and also just get back to our roots and the music we first started making. We're trying to just really find who we are and what we want to be as a band and find the Frail State sound. We're reconnecting with each other in a way we did at the beginning — we're calling it year one, this new era, because we're trying to get back to the purity of when we started and weren't worried about the pressure. Our goal is to just get back to having fun.
Hammig: I'm in a similar place. I really feel like the Campaign at this point is kind of where I've always wanted it to be and where we've all kind of always wanted it to be — we've finally reached that place. Our last show at George's, we got a little horn section and some backing singers, and it was just a really cool thing of like, okay, this is it. We can bring other people into this as well. The audiences we're pulling, you see everybody in them. There's just no archetype of who's enjoying the music. I hear from people that it feels like a really communal and inclusive space, and that's really what we want. We have some shows coming up, but we have a bunch of songs we're sitting on — some that didn't make it on the last two records, and then a lot of new stuff — and we're starting to record again at my house. I would really love to do something on tape, but I don't know how we're going to do that. But it would be really cool.
Nourani: Ted Hammig and the Campaign, Frail State and And Resting will be at George's Majestic Lounge on April 26. You can get tickets at georgesmajesticlounge.com.
Local shops The Library, Vintage and Natural Threads will be vending vinyl. Spinners Odeon Collective will be in the front room between sets, and you can sign up for flash on-site ink from Voyage Ink Mobile Tattoo Shop if you're over 18 — or stick to their custom KUAF temporary tattoos made just for Sunday night's concert. There will also be screen printing with a special KUAF design. You can bring your own shirt or buy one there, and if you're one of the first attendees, you can pick up a free CD loaded with music recorded for KUAF Live Sessions.
Ozarks at Large transcripts are created on a rush deadline and edited for length and clarity. Copy editors utilize AI tools to review work. KUAF does not publish content created by AI. Please reach out to kuafinfo@uark.edu to report an issue. The audio version is the authoritative record of KUAF programming.
