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Band officially formed: January 1988 Members: Alan Feldman - Guitar Ted Overall - Drums Pat Loehr - Keyboards Big R - Bass History: Alan and I started forming Free Beer in 1987 at the University of Northern Colorado. It basically resulted by Alan walking by my room and seeing tons of amps and guitars against the wall. We started working on song and set ideas during the Christmas break of 1987. When school started again, I contacted my old roomate and drummer, Ted Overall, and a keyboard player I jammed and recorded with the year before, Pat Loehr. We jammed in Ted's apartment to see if it would work. We could see that we had something good going on. I left the dorms and moved into a house. The band followed along. My bedroom turned into the practice room. We basically put together a Classic Rock, Blues, Dead, Funk band. It actually was a real good run once we got the band off the ground. We were a great cover and party band, and Alan wrote some pretty cool originals as well.  |
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I'd have to say the highlight of this group was when we played at the TKE Spring Blowout. There were 3,200 crazed drunk college students cheering us on at a small outdoor arena at UNC. Was a real KILLER time. The fans drank 110 kegs of beer. Our payment for the gig? A keg of Lowenbrau.
We hired a singer/songwriter/guitarist Andrew in June of 1988. We gigged quite a bit throughout the summer and had a great time. Lots of parties and bar shows. The usual fare for a struggling college band.  |
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The police got to know our name real well. We were the loudest band around, and popular too. It got to be so bad that the police would find our flyers, and shut the party down as soon as we started playing. One time, a cop started hitting Ted through a fence with a billy club to get him to stop (he didn't). That is when we decided to start playing the bars. At the time, I was the only one who was old enough to legally drink. That really didn't matter though.
After sticking it out over the summer, I was fired from the band in November of 1988. I guess it was a result of me losing interest and not practicing enough. I also really wanted to graduate from college as well. The band gigs and practicing really cut into my priorities. Uh, and to be honest, motorcycles too.  |
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For as many gigs as we played, I hardly have any photos. These are a few of what is left. All demo tapes I had were stolen when I moved from Germany back to the States in 1993, unfortunately. I have one real bad copy of half a gig, before the cops showed up.
JUST FOUND! Free Beer artwork and flyers. Our flyers were drawn for us by Paul Tinney (commonly known to everyone as "Tiny"). An aspiring artist, classic rock fan and all-around good guy. Last I heard, he was doing computer animation in Denver. Anyway, click on the smaller photos below to see a larger print.  Where are they now? Alan and Andrew carried Free Beer on through the early 90's. They toured the country and released a CD. Alan now works as a lawyer in Aspen, CO, and Ted is a financial consultant in the St. Louis area. Last I heard, Pat is in the Denver area as well. |