Rob Derhak thinks of Charlottesville fondly. The bassist, vocalist, and founding member of the band moe. recalls playing here “back in the old days,” when there was “that old bar behind the railroad tracks.”
Trax? “Yeah, I think that was it,” he says, but it’s like he still doesn’t quite believe it all happened.
Derhak’s band, with its funkily punctuated name, has been anchoring the jam rock scene for more than 30 years. And while a lot has changed since Derhak and moe. played Trax around the same time as DMB, Phish, Widespread Panic, Taj Mahal, and various Grateful Dead members, some things have remained remarkably consistent.
Yes, Trax is long gone, and moe. will play at the Jefferson Theater when the six-piece returns to Charlottesville on March 22. But the jam rockers will roll into town with a lineup that’s seen only one change since 1999: Al Schnier on guitar and vocals, Chuck Garvey on the same, Vinnie Amico on drums, Jim Loughlin providing percussion, and Derhak slapping the bass. The lone addition is Nate Wilson on keyboards.
Consistency has been key for moe., but the band has not been without its troubles. Derhak battled cancer in 2017, and took six months off due to the illness, putting moe. on hiatus in summer 2017. Derhak willed himself back on the road in early 2018.
COVID-19 capsized the band’s 30th-anniversary run in 2020, and in 2021, Garvey suffered a stroke. “2020 sucked—it sucked for everyone—but we tried to do everything we could,” Derhak says.
Schnier, Garvey, and Derhak formed moe. in 1990 while attending the University of Buffalo. Loughlin joined soon after. Amico came along in 1996. The experimental rockers’ breakout album came in 1998, with Tin Cans & Car Tires, headed up by the whimsical hit “Nebraska.” In 2007, moe.’s eighth album, The Conch, reached No. 1 on the Billboard Heatseekers chart.
moe.’s 2020 full length, This is Not, We Are, includes eight new songs, one (the Garvey-written “Undertone”) making its first appearance anywhere, along with older road-worn tracks like Derhak’s “Skitchin’ Buffalo” and Schnier’s “Crushing.”
The album epitomizes moe.’s one-of-a-kind songwriting style, honed over the decades, which draws on each band member, but somehow finds a way to land on something cohesive, something distinctively moe.
“It’s funny that it sounds that way, because it always feels like it is coming from all over the place,” Derhak says. “As a songwriter, I sit down and just start with the barest bones … and we’ve done it with each other for so long that we show up, keep an open mind, and give it that thing—I don’t know if it’s homogeneous—but it’s our sound.”
If every jam band has its own angle, Derhak figures he and his bandmates’ standout quality has always been their punk attitude, a finger in the face of all the improv troupes that take themselves too seriously.
But punk is a balance, Derhak admits. moe. also takes its music and songwriting, not to mention touring and playing live shows, quite seriously.
“The best part of playing every night and every gig that we do: Whenever we get into the improv sections and we start jamming, we are creating something new,” Derhak says. “For me, it is always about creating.”
On December 31 of last year, moe. evolved into its latest iteration. The band is known for its New Year’s concert runs, and when a recovering Garvey emerged at the Fillmore Philadelphia on NYE for “Meat,” it was the first time fans had seen him in 13 months.
Derhak says Garvey is not at 100 percent just yet. His speech is limited, and moe. won’t be performing songs where he provides lead vocals anytime soon. But Garvey’s voice box on “Nebraska” and reinvigorated guitar playing during the New Year’s Eve 2022 performance set the stage for what’s to come.
“The feeling right now is, ‘let’s keep rolling ’cause this is great,’” Derhak says. “The first time Chuck came out on stage on NYE, the first song he played, I started crying. I just didn’t know he would be as good as he was. It was like, ‘Okay, he can play again,’ and then something hit him and he tore into his guitar.”
At this point in their careers, Derhak and the rest of moe. are among the jam rock scene’s old guard. And Derhak says they relish the role. And they also appreciate the younger bands coming up and keeping the scene alive among the next generation.
“The one thing I can tell you is that the hardcore moe.rons, the ones that have been down since day one, they come to the shows and meet up with their friends, and it is all a family,” Derhak says. “They have found family in this group, and it all revolves around the show and the music. I still see the connection.”