Fiction Plane
Bluebird Nightclub, 216 N. Walnut St., Bloomington
Sunday, Aug. 10, 8 p.m., $10, 21+

NUVO: Can you tell me about that initial audition for Fiction Plane? What led up to it?

Pete Wilhoit: What led up to it was, I grew up in Bloomington, taking lessons from Kenny Aronoff. Then one of his students, Shawn Pelton, who is the “Saturday Night Live” drummer for the last 15 years, taught me in high school. So I had a lot of really good teachers and guys that were kind of high up in the industry.

So Shawn moved to New York and got the gig with “Saturday Night Live,” started working with a lot of different producers, and one of them was David Kahne, and David Kahne did Fiction Plane’s first album, “Everything Will Never Be OK.” So at the end of that recording … they had used a studio drummer for that, because they didn’t have a drummer in the band, and were planning on touring in the U.S. So, the idea was, they were planning on getting a drummer slash member of the band, so they started putting out the word. And David Kahne started calling all the drummers that he knew, and he called Shawn, and Shawn knew that I wanted to move to New York, because I had been in a band called the Cutters for 10 or 11 years in Bloomington, and it was great, but that was starting to kind of come to an end.

I loved being in a band and having artistic input into something, instead of just being a hired gun. So Shawn called me and said there’s this band looking for a drummer and I think you’d like the music. So I listened to it online and really really liked it and called their management and said I’d love to set up an audition. So we set it up in New York and I drove 13 hours and spent the night at a friend’s house, actually my first teacher that I ever had, who’s actually from New York, and he was also an IU guy who went through the jazz program there.

So the first time I met them, they were nice guys, but auditions are always strange. For me, the way I approached was I just wanted to play the music the way it was on the album and just try to nail it. But also, I had extra things, and throw in a few fills. I think the interaction between us, and if we hit it off as people, was just as important as if we hit it off as musicians.

The first song, everybody’s eyes kind of lit up when we started playing up. Seton and Dan looked at me and started getting into it more and more and more. So we went through all four songs that I had been sent for the audition and then they threw a new one; they said, here, we’ve got this riff, what would you do with this? So we played that, and it was fun, and we stopped and everybody started chatting, just talking about my availability and what I’m looking for. And they said, well, why don’t you come and learn the rest of the album? We’ve got a gig here Tuesday at CBGB, which was like three days later. It all happened pretty fast but, when you feel like it’s right, it’s right. And I think we all knew pretty quick that it felt like it could work. It was cool.

NUVO: Knowing each other so well now, why do you think you meshed so well immediately?

Wilhoit: I think we all come from similar musical background and we were looking for a drummer that could really lead the band, in a sense. Not a timid player; they wanted to somebody that really laid it down and was a solid figure from the percussion/rhythm section standpoint. I don’t know; I think we all have the same sense of humor too. We all made the similar jokes and had similar outlook on the music industry and different political views of presidencies and stuff like that. We touched on all sorts of stuff and it wasn’t like I was in the band instantly … I’m definitely the kind of guy that, what you see is what you get, and I definitely don’t hold back. I’ve played so long, I enjoy it so much, you can see it right away, I think. And I guess that was obvious to them too, and they really liked that.

NUVO: So going back into your youth, when’d you realize that you really liked playing drums and that you were any good at it?

Wilhoit: I think the time that I realized I enjoyed it, I was in fourth grade and me and one of my best friends decided to start a band, and it was just the two of us. And we both played drums and piano a little bit, just barely, but he actually had a drum set, and I didn’t have a drum set. I was always intrigued with the drums, so I started learning beats from the drums and he started playing piano, and then we’d switch off.

NUVO: What kind of stuff were you playing?

Wilhoit: It was very Beatles sounding. You know, major-minor triads, all eighth notes on the beat, with simple vocal melodies over the top in our high child-like voices; it was quite funny. The thing that really sparked was when we started playing them in school during recess if it was raining. People would come into the band room and start playing instruments, and we started playing our songs, and people started to learn the songs, and they would sing along. And that was the moment that I was like, “Wow, this is such a powerful thing to be able to perform and entertain people.” And that was the first time that it clicked in my head that I think this is something I could do, or at least that I have an aptitude or a talent for it.

I would say, the years went on and I was playing in school band, and Bill always had a thing on the side going on. I think it was when I met Rob Calder and Tommy Barry, we started a band, at the time called The Nixon Tapes, and that was the first time that we really started taking things seriously and thinking about from a music business standpoint where we started doing our own recording and wanted to get a record deal and go on the road and tour. That’s when I started really practicing the drums as something.

NUVO: So this was in high school?

Wilhoit: Yeah it’s in high school. I was 16, 17 maybe. And yeah, started getting serious about the drums, practicing three or four hours a day, and doing the necessary discipline to learn the craft. And cut my teeth in that band and we became the Cutters. It was a great experience because we were all friends. And we actually took out a loan ourselves and made an album in Memphis, Tenn., and pitched it to labels and actually got signed. It was quite a success for four guys from Bloomington, which isn’t necessarily the mecca of a giant city music scene. It was four determined guys who really liked what we did, and were determined to make it. We did two albums and a couple EPs.

NUVO: What did you guys sound like?

Wilhoit: It was pop-rock with kind of a Genesis progressive feel to it. Me and Bill, when we had our own band, we called ourselves Sound Gallery; it was just keyboards and Bill would do a lot of programming, so that was a very Genesis-type feel. And then, when we got together with Tommy and Rob, it definitely took more of a pop sensibility; Tommy wrote all the lyrics. It sort of sounded like maybe a little U2, a little bit of REM, a little bit of Stone Temple Pilots. It had all sorts of those things in them. It was really a college rock band but we were writing our own music.

NUVO: Were you playing with any bands that are still around? Maybe throw off some names of bands you’re still playing gigs with.

Wilhoit: I actually played a gig with Michael McDonald just as a hired drummer, from the Doobie Brothers. I also played with a bunch of singer-songwriters around the Bloomington area: Krista Detor, Janice Jaffe was a jazz singer that I played with a lot. I had a jazz trio that I really loved called Third Man. It’s hard to branch out too much from the Indianapolis area: Chicago’s the closest biggest town, but I never really broke into that scene, but I did do a lot of recording from the Bloomington scene.

NUVO: What did you get musically and socially out of playing with so many different groups in so many different styles?

Wilhoit: One of the most important things Shawn ever told me is a gig is a gig is a motherfucking gig, which means, practice your ass off, don’t take any gig for granted because they all have something to offer, musically and monetarily. I played everything from Broadway stuff, I even did a couple country gigs. At IU, I had to do symphony, concert band, all that stuff, so there’s a wide range of things that you’re exposed to, and you realize very quickly that each one has something to offer musically. I did a small playhouse thing in Brown County. It was very simple stuff, but you had to do it at very low volume, and it had to be almost perfect every time. The repetition was the hardest thing. You’re having to do these small mezzo-piano pieces at 220 and it has to be absolutely perfect every time. You have to watch the conductor and there’s that relationship there. But you learn a lot about being a percussionist and a musician from doing these things, and you also learn about how to interact with people, and how that relationship is just as important when you’re trying to get a gig, keep a gig.

Shawn and Kenny taught me all that, and I learned a lot from hearing Kenny talk about situations that he was in in the industry, as far as bands and producers, and how he had to adapt to make the situation work, if it was a dicey one and difficult. So that inspired me, to hear those stories.

So I was hungry and my appetite to achieve was definitely there because of Kenny and Shawn and all these other gigs that he was doing. I’d hear Kenny’s schedule and it was mind-blowing; he was playing a gig every day, and he was all around the world. So I took that to heart, and did every gig I could do in Bloomington, and it really made me a well-rounded musician, and made me approach the Fiction Plane stuff as such too: Every song has a place for the drums and whether it’s laying out and playing one high-hat part or playing a Vinnie Colaiuta solo. You have to find out what works for the music, and so all those gigs helped.

NUVO: Do you do as much session work these days?

Wilhoit: I did a lot of session work when I was in Bloomington and in the Cutters. I did, probably, 25 or 30 albums for different singer-songwriters and bands. But moving to New York, I’ve done not as much because being in Fiction Plane, I’m out on the road so much that I’m hardly ever in New York. That’s the one downside: When you move to New York, there’s the expectation of getting into that network of musicians that can provide amazing gigs, and they’re amazing players, but also there’s the draw of going out on tour, because that’s a way to see the world and play music; it’s great but it also takes you out of the network so you’re not playing in New York anymore, you’re just living out of your hotel.

I also play with G. E. Smith from “Saturday Night Live.” Ari Hest, a singer-songwriter from New York; I play with him, and I’ve played on one of his albums. And overseas, I’ve played with a girl called Kate Aumonier — she’s on Sanctuary Records — and Veronica Antico, she’s a French artist. And getting to go on tour with Sting and all of his musicians, and subsequently The Police, actually, which was quite funny, to be playing a Police song on stage with the Police.

NUVO: What was that like? Did you get nervous?

Wilhoit: You know, growing up, doing so many gigs in so many different environments, whether it’s a recital or an acoustic performance at a bookstore or playing in front of 70,000 people, it all has to do with whether you’re comfortable on your instrument. Repetition makes it all easier, of course. And yeah, there are nerves at all those things. Sometimes it’s just as hard to play in front of five people at a bookstore because every little thing you do is noticed. Sometimes that’s harder than playing in front of 70,000 people because you’re so removed from those people that it’s larger than you. You don’t feel like you’re under a microscope. You feel like you’re surfing a giant wave with four other people. So it’s a different feel but I get excited. The most nervous I’ve ever been in my life has got to be doing my senior recital at IU. I had taken off a year because I had tendonitis in my wrist, and then I was just coming back and just trying to finish it. And having to do tympani and marimba and all these other things that I wasn’t super-proficient at, and having to cram it all in just so I could finish my degree, that was the most nervous I’d ever been.

NUVO: What was that like to have to take a year off?

Wilhoit: Well, I’m a pretty positive guy, and even though it was mentally quite stressful, I tried to turn a negative into a positive. I couldn’t play with my right hand, so I took that year to concentrate on my left hand. So I even played a few gigs just left-handed, even played some jazz concerts. At IU, you have to be in an ensemble, so we had jazz concerts every Monday night in different ensembles, so I did a couple with just my left hand. So it gave me a chance to try to turn my left hand proficiency into a plus. It was hard. In some ways it made me appreciate having your health even more. So I readdressed how I play and relaxed more at the drums. It wasn’t something I’d like to do again but I’m glad I went through it and came through OK.

NUVO: Is that a conditioning issue? Are you attentive, at this point, to wrist health, as Stephen Colbert would say?

Wilhoit: There are an amazing amount of injuries as a musician. It’s a repetitive thing, and your muscles and tendons are reacting hundreds of times when you’re doing these things, depending on the temperature outside or inside, and how much you’ve warmed up and how your posture is. There are a lot of variables that go into it. For me, it was a combination of mental stress from trying to finish school, and also physical tension: not playing loosely, not stretching, not trying to warm up. So what I do now, is I take time to try to stretch and warm up as long as I can before I play. Once in a while, if it gets bad, I will ice after a show. It’s been pretty good. Once I made a conscious effort to relax my body, it’s been good. Stretching, warming up, even icing sometimes, have made it so it’s not really a problem, which is huge.

When I went through that whole thing, I went to a neurologist, because I was having trouble with my pinky and my ring finger on my right hand, and he said, well you’ve got nerve damage and you’ve got repetitive motion injury and you really should just giv