Interview

Pete & Pete's House Band Polaris Kick Off First Ever Tour in Providence

Check out our exclusive interview with a 90s tv-music-theme icon

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Mark Mulcahy was the frontman for New Haven’s Miracle Legion before providing music for Nickelodeon’s The Adventures of Pete & Pete. Along with Miracle Legion bandmates Scott Boutier and Dave McCaffrey, Mulcahy wrote and performed twelve songs over three seasons as the series’ house band, Polaris. Before setting out on their first-ever tour--starting at The Met in Pawtucket on 10/4-- Mark took some time to chat with us about how he became involved with Pete & Pete, the band’s role in the show and its legacy, and his surprise at the continued interest in a band that wasn’t ever really a band.

The creators of Pete and Pete (Will McRobb and Chris Viscardi) were Miracle Legion fans, but how were you approached about doing the music for Pete & Pete?
At that particular time we were in kind of a weird state. We were tied to a label and we couldn’t get out of it, we just had a record we finished that we couldn’t play out, it was sort of a very classic industry disaster really. So [they] asked me if we would do it, and I asked the band if they wanted to do it and nobody wanted to. And so I thought about it and asked Will if he would want to just have me try it by myself. I had never really done anything by myself up to that point. He said yes, so I started writing the songs by myself. When they asked us to open up the show and for a name, to have as a character really it wasn’t something anyone had thought of, we just kind of invented this band, Polaris, which was really not a band.

You all had pseudonyms as Polaris--Muggy, Jersey, Harris. Was the idea that this band existed within the fictional world of the show? Did that have anything to do with why you never played live until now?
Yeah, well we wanted to be characters. We’re not actors, but we wanted to be considered to be part of the cast. But the reason we never did anything was that we didn’t think anyone cared. We were just this thing on a TV show. It’s been a pretty eye opening surprise to realize that so many people know who this band is. We’re in the opening of the show, so that helps, but when we played the one gig we played everybody knew every song. That’s not something you get just from watching the show. They don’t really use the [whole] song, they just use parts of them. So that means a lot of people have the record. The scope of how big Polaris is, and I’m not saying we’re The Who or anything, is much bigger than we thought.

When you say that nobody cared did you mean that people at the time weren’t interested in seeing Polaris or did you mean that you guys weren’t interested in playing as Polaris?
The way the songs got written were in blocks of four. At the end of the three seasons I had these twelve songs which to me is a record. I asked Nickelodeon and a few different labels if they wanted to put this record out and there really was no interest at all. Right around that time I started my own record label and that was one of the first records I put out. Because we didn’t do all of the normal things that I’d ever done with being a band, which is get a band together, practice, write some songs, and have this organic growth--it was just we got together, recorded four songs, and that was that--there was never any kind of foundation for anything. Somebody would have had to invent the idea that we were a band that played. I’ve only realized now how unusual it is to have been in a box for however many years. It’s like somebody found you in the attic and said “Oh look, this band is here!” I’m really looking forward to seeing what it’s like to play this music in front of people who have never heard it played.

How was your experience working with the show? Was there any back and forth or did they just let you do your thing because that’s what they brought you in for?
There was back and forth, mainly with Will. I wrote the songs on my own, but I didn’t record anything until he said, “Yes, that’s a good song to record.” Once they were written they would ask for certain things, like a steel guitar or a trumpet or an accordion, just so they had these different things. What they would get from me would be a version of the song as it is, a version without any of the singing, and then just tons and tons of pieces of the song. They might just use three seconds of the trumpet playing or the guitar part. So they had this pretty big library. It was just four songs [per season], but there were 90 different mixes.

Do you ever get people telling you that through Pete & Pete they were exposed to Miracle Legion and other kinds of music they wouldn’t have heard otherwise?
Yeah, it’s been surprising and amazing in a way. People that liked the TV show took the steps to find out who this band is and then get the record. And then from that to finding out that I was in Miracle Legion, or that I had solo records, or that Scott and Dave are in Frank Black’s band. It’s a funny thing because in America I have a different audience than I have in say England. In England the show was never on, or certainly wasn’t as much as it was here, so I have a different audience. Here I see this audience of people that crosses a lot of different age groups. It’s been a great thing.


What do you think it is about Pete & Pete that people are so passionately nostalgic about?
I think there’s a group of people that discovered this thing that wasn’t really on the radar. It’s like you found something that’s really cool and a lot of people don’t know about it, which is sort of the surface part of it, but then the thing you found is this great thing. It’s not like you found Saved By The Bell or something and nobody knew about it. It’s this amazing show and it’s a great thing to find. I really think that Will and Chris, and as I’ve been reflecting on the whole thing all of the people, even the suits and head guys at Nickelodeon, were all making something that was built to last.

Polaris plays at The Met on October 4th
Purchase tickets HERE

Get a dose of '90s nostalgia and check out Polaris' opening theme to The Adventures of Pete & Pete...

the adventures of pete and pete, pete and pete, nickelodeon, tv show, tv theme, music, polaris, house band, the met, providence, pawtucket, Mark Mulcahy, miracle legion, pacitti

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