A diverse crowd of people gathered to enjoy music at the nontraditional venue surrounded by farm life, the austere weather and haunting passing of the occasional train adding to the atmospheric quality of the music.
Children and adults of all ages stopped by the event, some after doing their shopping at Bell Urban’s grocery store, Farmstand — while others dropped by just to show their support of the band and business.
THISNESS is a local band manned by vocalist and guitarist Jamie Dow, guitarist Jesse Butler, bassist Michael Norton and drummer Nate Chapman.
While the band usually plays in the Little Rock area at venues such as Stickyz, Vino’s, Four Quarter Bar and White Water Tavern, the band’s friendship with Bell Urban Farm owners Zack and Kim McCannon brought them to Bell Tones.
Inspired by bands such as Pink Floyd, Joy Division, The Cure, The Doors, Sonic Youth, Black Angels and Murder Capital, Dow lovingly described the band’s sound as “loud and miserable.”
Despite the band’s membership being comprised of college professors spanning across UCA, Hendrix, University of Arkansas at Little Rock and Arkansas Tech University, Dow said their following is not limited to college-age students.
“I think also because we’re all middle-aged we actually have a wider age demographic in our audience because of that. Something that comes through in the kinds of songs that we put together is that we grew up in the 80s and 90s, so that’s something that we’re drawing from and that’s something that our more adult fans can resonate with,” Norton said.
The diversity of Saturday’s audience supported Norton’s assessment.
The show was the second time Bell Urban hosted the event and the 30 members in attendance more than tripled the attendance of the first, held Dec. 17.
Sophia Stolkey and Drew Skelton, both students at Hendrix, said they knew about the event because the lead singer and guitarist for THISNESS, Jamie Dow, is their philosophy professor.
Stolkey was delighted that the event made her more aware of Bell Urban farm and the Farmstand.
“I’m glad I’ve been in here now and I probably wouldn’t have if they didn’t have the show. It’s locally sourced products which are good for the community and the environment. It feels more warm, cozy and personal,” said Stolkey.
Skelton added that they didn’t know why they didn’t come to Bell Urban more often since it was so close. “It’s always good to have a grocery place that isn’t a chain,” Skelton said.
Zack McCannon, who owns Bell Urban Farm with his wife Kim, said they started Bell Tones after they had developed a habit of playing music with friends on Saturdays and decided they wanted to give the gathering a name.
“I mean there’s a lot probably philosophically and psychologically about music and farming that I feel is pretty similar. Sound in general, there’s a lot of sounds on the farm, so I think that there’s a lot of connection there,” McCannon said.
“With the music, we’re probably taking the same approach as the farms. There’s a lot of small-scale farms, small bands that need access to a local venue that’s not super stressful like trying to get your product into Walmart,” McCannon said.
McCannon said his goal in hosting events such as this is to provide a cool place for families to spend their time during the weekend afternoons. In the future, he hopes to get more people involved in the open jam session that starts the event.
“Over time we wanna foster people that are even up and coming or just need an opportunity to work on a few songs. That’s kind of my thing too. I write songs and it’s nice to work out the kinks in front of a live audience without too much pressure,” McCannon said.
Bell Tones will continue to be hosted regularly, McCannon said, so their business can help foster the music community alongside the food community.
THISNESS is set to release their EP “Underneath” on Bandcamp Feb. 3 followed by a release on platforms by Feb. 17, all of which can all be found on their linktree: https://linktr.ee/thisness.