Love of The Beatles brings together Moondogs
June 22, 2009
ECO Staff – Laure Cioffi, senior journalist
 ELLWOOD CITY – Growing up in the early 1970s, Gary Fray, Chuck and Scott Patterson and Stan Pietuch couldn’t escape Beatlemania.
So about eight years ago the four friends, who has played music most of their lives, realized they were each without a band and decided to give their love of Beatles music a chance.
And that’s when Gary and the Moondogs was born.
“We figured we would be a niche band and play about once a month,” Chuck Patterson said. “We found it was a much bigger thing than any of us thought it would be.”
Eight years later their “niche” band has turned into a regular gig in area clubs and they will be making a repeat performance at the Ellwood City Arts, Crafts and Foods Festival. Gary and the Moondogs are slated to be the last performers at 9 p.m. Sunday before the fireworks.
“We are having a blast. We love The Beatles and we love their music. As you get older and those dreams of being a rock star go and we just love playing music,” Patterson said.
And, according to Patterson, they can all blame their love of the Fab Four on Fray.
“He was a huge Beatles fan. He got me hooked on The Beatles and I got my brother hooked on The Beatles,” he said.
They were all pre-teens growing up on the south side of Ellwood City near Hillside Avenue playing guitars. Patterson said he met Pietuch, who grew up in a different Ellwood City neighborhood, when he was 14 and they all formed a band.
They eventually went their separate ways, but each kept up their love of music playing in numerous bands.
Patterson said he played in the early 1980s in a band called Dyce with Mercer native Trent Reznor, now famous for Nine Inch Nails, and his brother Scott Patterson was in a group called Stone Mona with North Sewickley Township native Keith Nelson, now lead guitarist of Buckcherry.
“When my last band broke up, the guitar player said `I’ll see you guys when you start your Beatles cover band,’” Patterson said.
Patterson said the comment stuck with him and he called his brother, Pietuch and Fray to see if there was any interest.
“We met at Stan’s house in early 2001,” Patterson said. “We played pretty well together, but we found from a harmony standpoint, it was exceptionally good. There was something there and we knew it.”
Patterson said they found the nostalgia for Beatles music spans across all ages.
“It’s completely timeless,” he said.
Along the way, they also found another niche highlighting the Beatles music from 40 years ago.
This year it’s Abbey Road.
Patterson said they play the wide range of Beatles music, but they will highlight songs from that year and give some interesting facts about that period in Beatlemania.
They even took their name from an early band that John Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison formed in the late 1950s called Johnny and the Moondogs.
They consider themselves a cover band rather than a tribute band.
“We’ve always said this isn’t an imitation, it’s a celebration,” Patterson said.
The four friends all sing, but Pietuch is considered the lead singer nailing most of Paul McCartney’s vocals. They all play guitar, Pietuch plays piano and drums, Scott Patterson also plays the drums, keyboards and some bass and Chuck Patterson plays keyboards and bass guitar.
Patterson says it’s ironic that The Beatles brought most of them together in the beginning and it has brought them together again nearly 40 years later
“We’ve know each other since 1970. We went on to do other things and we’ve all come back to do this,” he said.
To learn more about Gary and the Moondogs go to their web site at www.gary-moondogs.com
(Laure Cioffi can be reached at LaureCioffi@EllwoodCity.org) |