'Root shuffles into Pig

Ann Arbor band Taproot has been placed under the blanket label of rap-core. Although the group does have heavy riffs and a singer who occasionally raps during verses, the term fails to do the band justice.

Odd guitar noises, unexpected time changes, occasional drum machine beats and a knack for songs that burst into surprising twists and turns raise Taproot beyond a mere rap-core band.

Topping all of that off is the fact that they are an exciting live band to watch.

The group is comprised of singer Stephen Richards, guitarist Michael DeWolf, bassist Philip Lipscomb and drummer Jarod Montague.

Richards shared the group's formative experience: "Mike and I used to be in a band called Skumbag. Long story short, Mike and I were already in an earlier form of Taproot. Mike was the guitarist and I was the drummer, Phil and Jared both lived in a

ADRIANA YUGOVICH/Daily TapRoot will appear tomorrow at the Blind Pig.

party house with my cousin on Sylvan street, so I would come over and play some Metallica tunes with these boys and tease them on how shitty they were.

"Then one day they got good and Mike and I ended up hooking up with them. That's how Taproot got together."

While most bands who play aggressive style music usually opt for names that carry with it a sense of aggression, the group chose Taproot because, DeWolf said, "Thesaurus! I was looking through a thesaurus and found that name."

"We were looking at good folk band names to ripoff!" added Richards. Montague included, "Actually if you look up Taproot on the Internet you could probably find a folk band from New Jersey."

Taproot has been busy playing everywhere possible, mantaining a perpetually visited website and dealing with a brush of nearly getting signed. Referring to the Ann Arbor heavy music scene, DeWolf mentioned, "Heavy? There is none."

"Its all jazz," Lipscomb said. Montague continued, "The cool thing about Ann Arbor is that at least they will give people places to play. Like, its hard for us to get a gig in Lansing because its all cover bands over there. Even though there's not much of a heavy scene around here, at least we get to play a little bit."

The group also mentioned a lack of venues in the Detroit area. It has been financially stable, playing places such as Kentucky and Pensylvania. A recent Kentucky performance drew a gymnasium-filling crowd. The band attributes its fan base to the Internet.

"It seems like one person will see our webpage from somewhere, they'll order the CD and word just spreads from there," Montague said.

Richards added, "On the mailing list from the site I've got people, at least one, in every state. Just people telling other people about us. Thats how we got that Kentucky show."

02-24-99