Still Pending

Local pre-teen band is one of five performing in Java Jam’s 2007 Battle of the Bands

By Cori Bolger

The Lake Oswego Review, May 10, 2007, Updated Oct 30, 2009 (6 Reader comments)

Vern Uyetake / The Lake Oswego Review

Grant Ellman, Ian Rogers and Reed Gulick-Stutz make up the alternative pop-rock trio, Still Pending. Gulick-Stutz and Ellman, who live in Lake Oswego, formed the band in 2005. Rogers, a Tigard resident, joined up later. The band is one of 15 acts in The Cartoon Network’s new “Props” talent search contest.

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When they get onstage, Reed Gulick-Stutz, Grant Ellman and Ian Rogers happily crank out covers of Led Zeppelin’s “Rock and Roll” and The Who’s “Pinball Wizard.”

In between, the trio – all members of the local band Still Pending – plays a song or two from the 1994 Green Day album, “Dookie.”

Never mind that Jimmy Page and Pete Townshend are old enough to be their grandfathers, or that, at age 35, Billie Joe Armstrong is old enough to be their pop-punk dad.

To the boys, the leading men are musical geniuses and the songs, well, they’re all classics – “Dookie” came out two years before they were born.

Don’t remind them, please.

“We just want to be good, not good for our age,” Gulick-Stutz explained.

Still, they know their ages – 11, 11 and 12, respectively – work to their advantage. By dabbling in music since before kindergarten, the boys quickly sharpened their skills as both players and performers to rival older musicians.

They’ll be the youngest band showcasing their talents at the city of Lake Oswego’s 2007 Java Jam Battle of the Bands May 19.

“It was kind of an honor to be selected,” said Ellman’s dad, David, who’s also the band’s manager.

Gulick-Stutz, of Lake Oswego, plays guitar and sings; Rogers, of Tigard, plays bass; and Ellman, of Lake Oswego, plays drums and sings.

Their sound – alternative pop-rock (Green Day meets Red Hot Chili Peppers), complete with shaggy hair, face-melting guitar solos, thumping bass lines and blistering beats – pleases adults as much as kids.

“These guys are the real deal,” David Ellman. “We’re not making them get onstage. They’re controlling everything and they’re all about the music.”

Still Pending was formed in 2005 by Gulick-Stutz and Ellman, who both attend the Arbor School for Arts & Sciences. Rogers, a student at Twality Middle School, joined the band after the original bassist left to “pursue other interests.”

Like any other band, the members of Still Pending work through creative differences and decide which songs are put on the set list at each gig.

The band was the closing act at last year’s Baby Woodstock Festival in Portland. Members also performed at Art in the Plaza in Lake Oswego’s Millennium Park Plaza in August.

Even more notably, they provided the live soundtrack for the Oregon Children’s Theatre 42-show production of “Alexander, Who’s Not, Not, Not, Not, Not, Not Going to Move!”

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