Clean Out That Garage - And Start A Band!

They blew into Spokane the other day, two strangers armed with saxophones and a trunkload of books.

Bill Hargrove and Bob Ratcliff are latterday Blues Brothers on their own offbeat mission: to get the musically timid off their fannies and out tooting their own horns.

Or twanging guitars.

Or banging drums …

The two Boise men don’t care what musical instrument you play as long as you play something.

“If I can learn to play a sax, anyone can,” says Hargrove, 47, a public affairs officer for the Idaho Board of Education. “We want to show people who want to play music that there’s a way to do it, and here it is.”

Hargrove and Ratcliff believe the country is on the verge of a garage band renaissance thanks to teens playing alternative music and nostalgia-driven baby boomers. Even Seattle’s billionaire computer nerd Paul Allen, for example, has a band.

I think it’s great. Any aging rockers who missed the joys of playing during the glory days of Elvis and the Beatles deserve a chance to scream “Louie Louie” or “Gimme Some Lovin”’ before arthritis sets in.

Hey, if Mick Jagger can keep rolling, why can’t we?

But before blowing a wad on a new Fender Stratocaster, you should invest $14.95 in a copy of “The Garage Band Method,” the book Hargrove and Ratcliff wrote and self-published.

Take it from an old garage band man, this is one of the slickest easy-to-understand approaches to playing music I’ve ever seen.

The book is chock-full of catchy illustrations and conversational asides. Clever shortcuts will put a beginner on stage quicker than a minute waltz.

That’s what happened to Hargrove. In 1991, he started taking lessons from Ratcliff, a professional sax man.

Six months later, Hargrove was playing in a garage band. Within a year, his blues combo, Men in Shorts, was performing gigs in public.

Hargrove was so impressed with Ratcliff’s streamlined approach that he talked the musician into collaborating on a “how-to” book.

The method works. During their visit, Hargrove and Ratcliff were guest artists during a beery rehearsal with my own garage band, The Spam-tones. For a relative newcomer to music, Hargrove plays well and can solo in a variety of keys.

Ratcliff, 32, is on the other end of the scale. He’s one of those lightning-fingered virtuosos who could sit in with anybody from Count Basie to, well, the Spamtones.

“Garage bands are alive and well,” adds Hargrove. “We just want to turn it into a growth industry.”

Ratcliff, a Washington State University student, just finished his master’s degree with an emphasis in jazz studies.

He ignores the tedious old approach to music of practicing endless scales and arpeggios. Boooring. Ratcliff instead teaches simple variations of the 12-bar blues as the foundation for playing.

The blues is so imprinted on modern music, says Ratcliff, that it’s everywhere - from Chuck Berry’s “Johnny B. Goode” to Glenn Miller’s “In the Mood.”

Not long after he started playing, Hargrove wrote of his new-found passion for music in a “My Turn” column for Newsweek.

The rise of radio and recordings, he argued, has made too many Americans passive spectators when it comes to music.

Once upon a time not too long ago, every home had a piano and a household of people who could at least scratch out a few tunes. We’ve unfortunately become a nation of listeners instead of players.

“The Garage Band Method” is a practical call to musical arms.

“So forsake your CDs, throw off your headphones and take back the stage,” Hargrove wrote in Newsweek. “Start playing music for yourselves and your friends. You have nothing to lose but whatever ails you.”

, DataTimes MEMO: “The Garage Band Method” ($14.95) can be found at the Bookseller in Coeur d’Alene.