Third Man Records chief Jack White’s massive Supply Chain Issues Tour, celebrating his forthcoming LPs Fear of the Dawn and Entering Heaven Alive, gets underway in just a few weeks. Today word comes regarding the opening acts for those dates. Pertinent to folks in our general area, rock ’n’ soul champion JD McPherson, who settled in Music City a few years back, opens the April 27 show at The Tabernacle in Atlanta and the May 1 show at Ascend Amphitheater here in Nashville. The two shows sandwiched between those dates will be opened by a band that will bring an extra dose of hometown pride for Nashville folks. After laying dormant for 14 years, Be Your Own Pet will reunite to open on April 28 at The Tabernacle and April 30 at Ascend Amphitheater.
Back in the mid-Aughts, following Nashville rock and punk didn’t necessarily mean the same thing as following those scenes on a national scale. It was noteworthy if a respected outlet like Rolling Stone or Brooklyn Vegan so much as mentioned a Nashville rock band. Be Your Own Pet was among the cadre of rockers and punks who helped change that in a big way.
The members — singer Jemina Pearl, guitarist Jonas Stein, bassist Nathan Vasquez and drummer Jamin Orrall, who eventually left and was replaced by John Eatherly — met as students at Nashville School of the Arts. The buzz about their catchy, nigh-unhinged yet unforced brand of punk began to rise in 2004, and reached a fever pitch later that year when U.K. DJ Zane Lowe — who’s now at Apple Music but was then at the BBC — played their debut single “Damn Damn Leash” on his show.
All the band members were still minors at the time, which was relevant regarding the need to have their parents involved, but not so much with respect to the intensity and proficiency of their music. They released two LPs — 2006’s Be Your Own Pet and 2008’s Get Awkward — via the Thurston Moore-helmed Ecstatic Peace label in the U.S. (technically an indie but with distribution from major Universal) and XL Recordings internationally. There were a few friction points with the labels, most significantly a conflict with Universal over lyrics the label thought were “too violent” on Get Awkward and pressure from the label to play Warped Tour. In hindsight, the band’s resistance to Warped Tour seems even more well-founded.
Ultimately, the need for a change of pace led the group to disband in 2008. In a release about these new shows, Pearl notes that the formative experience of BYOP is something to celebrate.
“I’ve had a Be Your Own Pet-sized hole in my heart for the past 14 years,” Pearl says. “We shared something life-changing together, so to get to go back and do it again as adults feels like coming home.”
Following the breakup of the band, the members either started or reignited a variety of projects. Pearl has made solo records and performed and recorded with a firebreather of a band called Ultras S/C; currently she fronts Rayon City. Jonas Stein lit a fire under his band Turbo Fruits and took on pursuits running the gamut from the punk-rock Bruise Cruise to the vinyl-centric disco dance party Sparkle City. Vasquez has been part of a huge variety of rock-adjacent bands like Deluxin’, Bad Friend and Road Block. After Orrall left BYOP, his band with brother Jake Orrall — a little group you might know called JEFF the Brotherhood — began to take off on its epic arc. Eatherley took off for NYC, where he’s performed with the band Public Access TV as well as pursued acting and comedy.
No word yet on whether Eatherley or Orrall (or both) will be taking the drum throne for these shows with Jack White. Tickets are on sale now, and you can get all the details via White’s website. Meanwhile, check out some footage of BYOP playing Lollapalooza in 2006. It’ll be hard not to do a little thrashing, so make sure there aren’t too many breakable things nearby.
