Former Refreshments bassist pens first novel

Curtis Grippe
Special for The Republic
October 18, 2003

Arthur Edwards, former bassist and founding member of the Refreshments, returns to the Valley this weekend to promote the release of his first novel, Stuck Outside of Phoenix. Edwards will read excerpts and sign copies of his book Sunday at Changing Hands in Tempe.

Stuck Outside of Phoenix humorously chronicles the travails of 21-year-old Phoenix native Josh Hotle. Hotle, a rock and roll bass player in a lower tier local band, wants desperately to leave the Valley for the fertile musical pastures of the Pacific Northwest. Before he can make it out of town, he is asked to play what amounts to his dream gig at the best club in town, has his car stolen, and has a romantic interlude with his dream girl, a clerk from the local convenience store.

Although there are a few similarities between Hotle and Edwards, he insists that his book is not an autobiography. "I started the book as an escape during the waning years of the band," he said. "I didn't want there to be anything to do with music or my life at all. The protagonist was a paperboy, not a musician."

After discussing his first draft with one of his professors, Edwards decided that the story would benefit from there being some similarities between Hotle and Edwards. "I couldn't write about a 21-year-old who didn't love music and want to be in a rock band. That was me, that was who I was," he said. "That is where the book really took off. At that point I began pulling more and more from myself and from people that I've known.

"The beauty of fiction is that you have your experiences, the experiences of others and stuff that you've made up," Edwards said. "I found that the closer I came to writing about people and circumstances I was familiar with, the more it worked."

Edwards, 34, moved to the Valley to attend Arizona State University from his hometown of Moline, Ill., in 1990. While attending ASU, Edwards played in several local bands including the Solemines and the Hanson Brothers.

After earning his bachelor's degree in English in 1993, Edwards teamed up with drummer Dustin Denham, guitarist Brian Blush and singer/guitarist Roger Clyne to form the Refreshments.

The band's lighthearted tales of life on both sides of the Mexican border earned them an almost immediate following that grew with each performance. Within two years, the Refreshments were signed to Mercury Records where the group made two full-length recordings, Fizzy, Fuzzy, Big and Buzzy in 1996 and The Bottle and Fresh Horses in 1997. The band also wrote the theme to Fox TV's King of the Hill.

The Refreshments appeared twice on Conan O'Brien and had two videos that received regular play on MTV, and all appeared to be going well. Then in true VH-1 Behind the Music fashion, things began to unravel. Despite sales of its two releases totaling nearly 500,000, the band was released by Mercury. Substance abuse problems and outside interests complicated matters further.

The band was forced to replace Denham and was on the verge of firing Blush when Edwards decided to call it quits.

"I didn't like that someone had helped us build this thing and we were throwing him out," he said. "We had already done that once before and I never felt right about it."

Edwards said there were other contributing factors.

"The Refreshments was an all-or-nothing type of thing," Edwards said. "I had creative interests outside of the band that became more important as time went on. I couldn't stay in the band and yet distance myself from it enough.

"When I think of Rog, Brian and myself, I think of three very different people who had this narrow way of communicating, which was the Refreshments. Outside of the band our lives were very un-Refreshment-like and over time that crept its way in. It was easy to overlook early on because things were so exciting."

Edwards married fellow ASU English major Raquel Berry in July 1995. Six months after the breakup of the band, Edwards and his wife relocated to San Francisco where he earned his master's in creative writing from the University of San Francisco in 2002.

When asked to compare making music with writing, Edwards has a clear favorite.

"Writing suits me the most because of the solitude," he said. "Writing is also something you do every day. With music it's more about waiting for inspiration and when it comes you write it and you don't mess with it too much beyond that." Edwards said he hasn't played with a band since the Refreshments and that he rarely even picks up a guitar.

Stuck Outside of Phoenix should be particularly appealing to any who have had even a peripheral association with the local music scene over the past decade. Many of the bands, individual musicians and venues are based on real people and places.

Edwards also stays geographically correct when describing streets and landmarks. "At times it was like taking a drive through Tempe," said Sandra Quijas, 37, assistant manager of Long Wong's on Mill Avenue. "It's a fun story and I really liked the attention to detail."

For Lawrence Zubia, 39, lead singer of the Pistoleros, reading the book brought back good memories.

"He really captured what it was like when we were young and hungry and how badly we wanted to play the cool venues," Zubia said. "I really liked it because it's a local thing, but he also has a real nice delivery as a storyteller."

Over the telephone from one of his stops on his current promotional tour, Edwards sounded at ease with and in control of his new career.

"I am approaching it as independently as possible right now," he said. "I am using a print-on-demand company, which makes it possible to walk into any book store and order this book, and I spend every free moment promoting."

Edwards is nearly 100 pages into a sequel tentatively titled The Jitters due out in late 2004, and is hoping to expand his marketing capabilities.

"This first novel was all about reaching all the people that I can reach," he said. "This next one I'm going to need some kind of support, like a publicist, a conventional publishing company or an agent."

Edwards reads from the book at 2 p.m. Sunday at Changing Hands, 6428 S. McClintock Drive, Tempe. Information: (480) 730-0205. The book may be ordered through www.defunctpress.com.