KOATS

Long, poofy hair. iPods and flip phones. Printing out guitar tabs. Jamming with friends in the basement. Driving around, windows down, blasting the latest Weezer and The Strokes albums. For Minneapolis musician Chris Bartels (Elskavon, Bora York) high school in the early aughts laid the foundation for one of his longest-standing musical loves: garage rock. It was not only a coming-of-age season, but a birth-of-obsession season as well, when, bored one summer day, he picked up his older brother’s guitar on a whim. That was it - there was no turning back. The fusion between this newfound love of guitar, with his love of alternative and garage rock of that time, led to a steady dose of writing songs and riffs for the next 15 years and counting. Bartels so far has brought onboard several friends (Cory Wong, Ethan Cook, Reese Kling) to write KOATS songs with him - forever kept an only-for-nostalgic-fun garage rock project. No other agendas. Vintage, yet modern. Nostalgic, yet fresh. The concept had been on the fringes of his creative hopes for a long, long time. But, now with a wife of ten years and a growing family of his own, and over a decade to look back on everything, maybe Bartels’ growing appreciation for the ups and downs of those high school and college days was actually the key ingredient for this project. Then again, maybe the long, poofy hair will be growing back…