Sunday Music: Jam Econo (A Minutemen Riff)

Even when The Minutemen were making a dent on the nascent American Cali-punk scene in the early 1980s, they kept their day jobs.

They weren’t just working class. They weren’t just uncomfortable with extravagance. They’d never really known anybody who’d made a living making art, so they carved out time and space for it in the ways they knew how.

Besides being in an extra artsy (and what would later be an extremely influential) band, bassist Mike Watt was a paralegal, drummer George Hurley was a machinist, and guitarist/singer D. Boon was a teacher.

Watt said, “it’s bizarre to think that people live like that, so you’re always thinking about what if everything goes to s***. You have to be econo so maybe when the hard times hit, you can weather them.”

Econo deserves explaining.

Watt also said, “Econo is an old concept. The punk rockers picked up on that, the idea of scarcity and just using what you got. And maybe more of you comes through because there’s less outside stuff you’re sticking on — all you got is you, so you have to make something out of it.”

Econo is the root of the Professional Slash Artist ethos.

It comes together in community too, especially in small cohorts or bands like theirs.

Showing, as Watt would say, “We don’t have a leader in our band — no leader, no laggards.”

Showing, as Watt would say, “That’s what we try to do with our songs. It’s not to show them [others] ‘the way’ but to say, ‘ look at us, we’re working guys and we write songs and play in a band.’ It’s not like that’s the only thing to do in life, but at least we’re doing something — confidence. You can hear some song that the guy next to you at the plant wrote.”

Showing, how if you still don’t get it, if you think maybe it sounds a touch cult-ish in the ideals and aspirations of any man, then you’re actually onto something.

Maybe put best by D. Boon when he said, “I’m not religious about God, I’m religious about Man.”

Econo means anybody can do it.

You just need the confidence.

Not bad for a couple of corndogs from Pedro, right?

“Punk rock changed our lives.”

It’s still changing lives.

One more thing about them - “Minute” was a play on words. Not just a play on their short and often fast songs, but “minute” like “min-ewt” meaning very small, of little importance, or marked by close attention to details.

Confidence.

Jam econo.