The venue may not have been packed with people, but SLO Brewing Co. was full of energy when Marcy Playground played last Wednesday. Marcy Playground is primarily known as the band behind the 1997 number one single “Sex and Candy,” and is on tour promoting its two most recent releases, “Leaving Wonderland … in a Fit of Rage” and “Indaba Remixes from Wonderland,” on an album made up of remixes contributed by the online community Indaba.
John Wozniak, lead singer and guitarist for Marcy Playground, said he was driven to write the “Leaving Wonderland” album while going through a dark time in his life.
“I had some real relationship issues,” Wozniak said.
Wozniak had broken up with his girlfriend (now wife) who had subsequently left town, and a year passed before they made up, during which time Wozniak wrote much of “Leaving Wonderland.”
“It’s about the loss of innocence,” Wozniak said. “It’s about you know, growing up. You know, stopping being a kid and actually going, ‘Oh god, I actually have to be an adult now.’”
The remix album came about when Wozniak met founder of online remix community Indaba, Dan Zaccagnino, at the South by Southwest music and film festival in 2009.
“We just started hashing out ideas like, ‘We should do something together!’” Wozniak said. “You know, he liked the band and I liked the idea of online music collaboration.”
Zaccagnino and Wozniak ended up putting together an online contest, where members of Indaba could enter remixes of any song off of “Leaving Wonderland.” Out of 350 entries, the band picked 13 songs for an album.
At the show, Marcy Playground played several songs off its newer albums, along with older classics which fans appreciated. People in the audience frequently yelled out requests for their favorite songs, to which Marcy Playground obliged.
When someone cried for “St. Joe on the Schoolbus,” Wozniak cast a glance to bassist Dylan Keefe and drummer Shlomi Lavie, and the trio immediately jumped into the song.
Near the end of the show, the band played the inevitable: its big hit, “Sex and Candy.” The song has become what Marcy Playground is best known for, but Wozniak said that its composition was mostly a mistake.
“I was trying to write sort of a funky, sexy song, and failed miserably at it; it became this sort of laconic, lackadaisical song instead,” Wozniak said.
At the time, Wozniak said he still really liked it.
“I remember thinking, ‘This is like something Mick Jagger would sing!’” Wozniak said. “No. Not at all. Not even a little bit.”
When it came time to play the song, Wozniak invited all the women in the audience to come onstage and dance.
KT Silva, a fan of Marcy Playground’s music, went to the show to celebrate her birthday with friends. She said it was a special treat for her to go onstage to dance during the band’s number one hit.
“I really liked the ‘Sex and Candy’ just because I got to dance on stage,” Silva said.
English sophomore Kristie Siebert was another concert-goer thrilled to dance on stage beside Wozniak and Keefe.
“I wasn’t going to, and then I just realized I’m not going to have a chance to do that again,” Siebert said.
Michael Gossard of Acidic, the opening band for Marcy Playground, said he and his bandmates will gain a lot of experience from touring with such an established name.
“We are so happy to be on tour with Marcy Playground, because they’re great people, great musicians, and they’ve been really good to us,” Gossard said.
Acidic, which hails from Los Angeles, will be opening for Marcy Playground all the way up to Seattle. Even though the members of Acidic have an average age of 19, Gossard says that being on the road has made them more mature.
“You feel as though you are a lot more worldly than what you actually are,” Gossard said.
Check out the Q & A with Marcy Playground member John Wozniak:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juOu9HsM7Ko[/youtube]