There are certain sights we’ve become used to in the ‘90s that weren’t possible before. Chuck Berry duckwalking at 70. Cadaverous Keith Richards, still the best rock ‘n’ roll guitarist in the world. Even Jerry Garcia, before he died, with his big, old gray head. Yes, musicians of the rock generation get old, just as jazz, classical and blues musicians always did before them. The thing is, when you think about up-and-coming bands, you picture flannel and long, flailing hair in any color but gray. This is where Beyond Reason breaks the mold.

Okay, they’re not exactly creaking at the joints, but the five members of Beyond Reason—guitarist Greg Kidd, vocalist Steve Leighton, drummer Roland Krueger, bassist Steve Mead and keyboardist Tom Coolidge—also aren’t fresh-faced college kids. They have day jobs and families. And although they may laugh and joke that they’re too old to strive for mega-stardom, they don’t want you to believe that you’re only hearing them now because they haven’t taken their music seriously to this point.

"In the back of my mind I always think that it would be really great to be part of something really big that was moving around and influencing the industry," says Mead. "But at this point in my life I’m not willing to starve to get to that point. At the same time, I almost take it to the point of resenting people considering my music as a hobby, because I have put a significant portion of my life into getting to whatever proficiency that I have. I think it’s more than a hobby, because there is such an emotional aspect to it that I think it’s not a diversion. It’s a need. If everything fell apart, I would probably go full bore into music, because I don’t really care about myself in terms of I can live on very little. But I have other people and responsibilities, so that keeps me grounded in reality. But, if at any time anybody gave me the ultimatum that I had to stop playing music while I was still capable, while I still had ears, while I still had hands to play, then that would not go over very well at all. When I’m playing and the band is clicking, that’s something that you can’t get by collecting stamps."

Even though responsibilities and obligations to family play a strong part in deciding how far Beyond Reason is willing to try to climb, Leighton, the group’s focal point onstage and the only member who resembles anything like the prototypical rock star, insists that he would be willing to try and make it all work if the chance arose.

"I’d go," he says. "If somebody came and said, ‘We want you guys]…’ I would go. I have a really good job [building pipe organs], but I wouldn’t hesitate. I would give it up to do music full time."

Whether or not to go if the opportunity presents itself is a matter that the members of Beyond Reason have considered, but that’s a long-term question. Rather, the members choose to focus on the more immediate goals that they agree would make them happy to achieve.

"I want to keep making records and keep being able to sell enough to recoup so that we can keep making a few more anyway," says Kidd, whose intense, often bluesy leads reflect the years of work he’s put into his playing almost as surely as the silvery tint of his hair. But making records even on a local basis requires cash, and there’s only one way for a band to generate an income stream: "…get some kind of steady circuit, like the college circuit, and to just get some really steady work," in the words of Coolidge.

Beyond Reason has found some success getting such gigs, and more are on the way, due to the efforts of a woman named Carol Ansheles, who has been helping the band with the day-to-day, business end of things. (Previously the group had booked itself.) Of course, a band’s booking depends in large part upon how they define their sound, and there are a couple of characteristics that have made it difficult for Beyond Reason to find its niche. First, the band plays original music, which makes weddings, corporate parties and other lucrative functions hard to land. The second, and somewhat unusual, characteristic is that the band performs in configurations ranging from a duo to a quartet. Though that arrangement fits the band members’ schedules quite well it tends to confuse people who might otherwise book them.

"I have to agree with Tom about finding steady work," says Mead, "but I think that will come, perhaps when we can finally define the niche that we belong in and find the clubs that we play in successfully. Some clubs, I think, work out pretty well, and others not so well. I think that the crowds expect different types of shows than what we put on. They’re a younger crowd, and they want to hear more of the radio songs and things like that, where we do mostly originals, and the songs are more than the usual baby type of material. That might put some off a little bit. It’s a little bit challenging for people who are just out looking for dates and things like that."

"It would be nice to find a club that just goes into a circuit," agrees Kidd. "Some clubs we work really good in, and some clubs we don’t work at all in. Sometimes they book us as a full band when it should really be an acoustic act, because I don’t like playing full-band rock when I really have to worry about playing loud or with any intensity. If I’m going to do that, I would just as soon play acoustic, because it fits."

Although Beyond Reason doesn’t mind playing in any of their various forms if the setting is right, the members admit that they get the most enjoyment out of playing the larger, louder, full-band gigs.

"I like the magic moment when you’re putting something out and you look and there’s somebody really entrenched in what you’re doing," says Leighton. "That’s just a great feeling to know that you’re giving out all this energy to somebody and they’re really watching. It doesn’t really feel naked. It feels like they’re just really looking in. I love that feeling. That’s why it’s hard to do the little quiet thing when you’re competing with everybody’s conversation. You’re just starving for a set of eyes. That could be the theater ham in me, too [He was a theater performer for many years, at one point portraying Christ in Jesus Christ Superstar in a Portland performance], this need to be watched, but it’s just a nice connection to have somebody really digging what you’re doing."

That connection with the audience is important to all the members of Beyond Reason, because they’ve worked hard to reach the level of musicianship that they have achieved. They also know that that personal link between performer and listener is what creates loyalty.

"I’d like to think that the audience would go away thinking that there’s a certain level of craftsmanship involved in what we do and that we care about the music enough to play the best that we can," says Mead. "I’m actually embarrassed when I don’t do well. I prefer to have it that I played well and that I satisfied myself and hopefully that was able to come out in what I played and somebody out there appreciated it."

"My hope," adds Coolidge, "is always that they will see the creativity of what they’re seeing on stage and be right there for the moment and to realize that it’s not a canned, rote, turn-on-the-radio kind of thing, because a lot of stuff that you hear, anyone could [be playing]. The faces may change, but you get the same thing. Who wants that? If I want to do that, I’ll go home and turn on the radio and be comfortable. When I go out, I want to hear something different. I want to see interaction, interplay going on. That’s what I think that we really have an awful lot of going on."

As much as Beyond Reason enjoys playing a really good gig, it’s fair to say that they enjoy working the studio even more. This is especially true for songwriters Leighton and Kidd.

"That’s a blast," says Kidd. "It’s fun getting it going, and then taking it home and working on extra guitar parts and putting them down."

So it is that Beyond Reason has returned to the studio just as their stage act is picking up stearm. The band is completing its third CD. The album will be independently released on Laughing Cat Records, as were the previous albums, A World For You in 1993 and Beyond Reason in 1995. lt also will mark the first recorded works with Beyond Reason for Mead and Krueger, who only recently became full-time members of the band. The rough mix of the album has seven, somewhat bluesy, rock-oriented tracks that were done live, except for additional guitar and keyboard tracks. As is customary for Beyond Reason, Kidd utilizes a variety of guitars, including a 10-string Argentinian tiple on the instrumental track tentatively entitled "Slidin’ Home." The music was recorded and mixed at Studio Dual and engineered by John Etnier. It is scheduled to be mastered at Northeastern Digital Recorders by Dr. Toby Mountain in July and released in early to mid-fall. Now, though, it’s hard to say just what the final product will be.

"Greg has the recording bug real bad, so I’m sure that there’ll be at least two or three more songs on there," says Leighton. "But we have decided what to put on the album cover. It’s a character that I drew for the last record that didn’t make it. He’s a little happy, beasty looking guy with some funky arms and legs and hair shooting up out of his head. We’ll put blue socks on him and call it [the CD] Stompin’ in Blue, I think, but that’s subject to change."

There’s an evolution to Beyond Reason’s material if you begin listening to A World for You and work up to the songs that will appear on Stompin’. In general, though, Beyond Reason creates songs that are rooted in rock with a strong pop feel, topped off by Leighton’s melodic, high tenor.

"It would be untrue to say that we’re not a pop band, because we pretty much are," says Leighton. "We’re not a heavy metal band. We’re not a country band. So, you have to consider us a pop band, I guess, as much as we try and stay away from the word."

"We do write three-minute songs," agrees Kidd. "We do write choruses, verses, bridges, intros, outs."

"But it’s not bubblegum pop," insists Krueger.

On the contrary, Beyond Reason does almost nothing you could call throwaway. Their music has a certain depth, and their audience is comprised of intelligent people who can appreciate their lyrics as well as their catchy melodies.

"Sometimes I’m not too impressed with John Q. Public," says Coolidge. "It’s the McDonald’s mentality, ‘Give me a ham burger and some ketchup. I don’t want to think.’ Different people who want to hear music and want to hear words and want to think about words that might mean something; I think that’s our audience."

Beyond Reason’s lyrics are written to reflect their personal concerns as well as things happening in the world around us. ‘Desperate Means,’ from the second release, is an example of the latter.

"‘Desperate Means’ came from the Boston Globe," says Kidd. "I gave Steve the idea. I said, "Steve, you’ve got to write a song about this."

"Greg read about this doctor in Boston who was going around and visiting AIDS patients," says Leighton.

"He’s an AIDS researcher," continues Kidd, "but he actually goes and visits the patients. A big quote of the patients was that they were just so happy that a doctor would come in and touch them and shake their hand. Then, at the same time, Autumn Aquino, the little girl with AIDS, came back here. When she came back here, the people were lined up at the airport greeting them, which I thought was great versus the reception in Florida where they put her in that glass cage in that school. So, that’s where that one came from."

A social conscience in rock mode; older men in a kid’s business; multiple-choice band configurations; Beyond Reason really isn’t easy to draw a bead on. And yet none of that is so extraordinary. The members of Beyond Reason really do seem like average joes. They just happen to be on a career track that rewards extreme degrees of exhibitionism.

‘We’re just regular guys, and we do have fun,’ says Kidd. ‘We enjoy playing with each other, and I think, on a good night, that comes across.’

"We’re not a standoffish bunch of guys," Leighton adds. "I like people to think that they can actually approach us. I like people to come up, and then you can go back into that bar a month later and have people come up and go, ‘Hey!’ Then, to throw that back at somebody and actually hug somebody that you’ve seen a month ago. That’s my only goal, other than to have somebody listen."

"[I’d ask people to] buy the CD, and if they don’t like it, they can mail it back to our P.O. box, and I’ll refund their money," says Kidd. "How’s that for a deal? I would like to have people listen, come and listen and take a chance."

They’re good writers and fast learning how to use both the studio and the stage to maximum effect. If the guys in Beyond Reason don’t exactly fit the stereotype of what a rock star is supposed to look like in the ‘90s and that bothers you, close your eyes and listen. n