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More thoughts on Rodney Lanier
"Long before we shared a stage together, we shared a ride to work back in 2002/2003. For a while, we lived in the same building on Louise Avenue (he helped get me the apartment) and then I moved right across the street. We both worked at a screen-print shop that opened everyday at 9 a.m. We usually got there around 10:28. Just 10 sputtering miles down I-77 South to Arrowood Road in his tiny, damp car with lots of missing knobs, important paperwork on the floor and random wires sticking out all over. It smelled like coffee and peanuts. Most days we'd split for lunch around 1 p.m. to a drab taqueria on South Blvd. Eat chips and salsa, awesome cheap wet burritos, and flirt with the waitresses. It was during these rides that he hatched the idea for having an all-instrumental band led by me and him on slide guitar and pedal steel. We'd play originals and weird old standards (as heard daily on our commute and at work on our favorite, now defunct, Charlotte radio station, WMNX, Mix 106.1 FM). The band started soon afterwards and it's still around. I'm not on-stage with Sea of Cortez these days, but I like to think that an image of me frowning still pops into Rodney's head every time he hits a bad note. If it doesn't, it will now. Oh, and one day, we were super late for work because somebody stole his car battery. Popped his hood in the night and took it. That was the only time I saw him get slightly perturbed." — Tyler Baum, ex-Sea of Cortez
"Rodney is a stellar steel player, an all-around sweet dude and it's always a nice to run into him outside the Evening Muse." — Neil Allen, the Virginia Reel
"Rodney enjoys being ridiculous, but only in ways you would not expect. For example, at the Muse one night he paid me $27.23, mostly in loose change. Why/how he arrived at 23 cents from the door I'll never know, but later he said he was just fucking with me. He's also ridiculously talented, and truly elevates any band that's lucky enough to have him. He's a rare bird in the music talent pool, as he excels at bringing a unique soundscape/atmosphere without calling attention to himself." — Jay Garrigan of
Poprocket and Garrigan
"Everyone knows of Rodney's penchant for Mexican and Spanish foods. One brisk autumn afternoon a few years back (seems like it was close to Thanksgiving) Fence Lions were rehearsing at Rodney's house. We took a smoke break out on the porch and found Rodney's new neighbors boiling something in an industrial-sized oil drum in their front yard. The Latino fellas were friendly and invited us to join them. One of the neighbors stuck his callused finger-tips into the cauldron and pulled out a sample. Rodney was the only one of us to accept. We thanked the three men and went back to our practicing. Later I asked Rodney how the strange looking meat tasted. He said it was good, but that he was pretty sure 'they were stirring that pot with a piece of my house.'" — Bruce Hazel of Temperance League
"In the studio recording with Fence Lions, while Vance (Carlisle) was recording his guitar parts, Rodney found Vance's cell phone and used it to call every ad in the back of Creative Loafing — posing as Vance — to ask for immediate emergency guitar lessons. He left messages stating that if it was at all possible please call back that day and Vance would pay for them to come down to the studio ASAP, as he was desperately in need of an emergency lesson!" — Chris Lonon of Sea of Cortez and the Houstons
"Not sure if it's my favorite Rodney anecdote, but it's my most recent favorite. We were having Sea of Cortez practice at Rodney's and there's a tune that I play a shaker on from beginning to end. I'd left mine at home so Rodney disappeared into the kitchen and came back with an empty Miracle Whip jar full of dried rice — a pretty standard old drummer's trick, but what was amazing was the jar. It was from like 1978 and in pristine condition. It was from a time when mayonnaise was great. It conjured up images of Roger Staubach and men spitting tobacco juice in campfires. I have no idea why it was in his house, and when I asked him he just kind of shrugged it off. It was the coolest shaker I've ever played." — Chris Walldorf of Sea of Cortez
"Rodney is one of the most genuine, loving and funny people you could ever hope to meet. He is talented beyond belief and has an uncanny ability to make you a better musician at the same time. He is soft-spoken and old school as hell, but with one of the biggest, youngest hearts around. He is our Rodney Bear." — Vance Carlisle, ex-Gold Coast
