'Keep on Rocking in the' Teen World

They're an electric guitar with fuzz, a singer belting on the mic, a drummer keeping the beat and bassist rattling your bones. They're the Bolts, one of Evergreen Park's youngest rock bands.

After nearly five years of jamming in their garage and playing over 100 live performances – at Bourbon Street, during the and outside U.S. Cellular Field – the band of 13-year-old kids has become a rock-steady act in the Southwest Suburbs.

“We all know each other,” said guitarist Luke McGinnis, sitting with his bandmates Kasey Hayes, James Ryan and John Rolence after a concert last month at in Oak Lawn. “We're just friends from the block then we started playing.”

That friendship, which began when all four kids were in the second grade, has allowed them to develop their musical talents as a group.

“It keeps them off the couch,” said Rolence's Father. “[Playing in a band] makes it fun listening to the radio. When they hear a song they like, they'll say, 'I want to learn to play that.'”

McGinnis, a classic rock enthusiast, acknowledged many acts as influences – including Pink Floyd, the Who and Led Zeppelin. As for his band-mates, their favorite acts to listen to and cover include the Beatles, the Black Keys and Lynyrd Skynyrd.

It's not hard to notice that the rock star mentality of many of those band has left its mark on the kids either.

“We want to play bigger and better places,” Ryan said, wide-eyed. “Like the Ellen Degeneres Show, or inside U.S. Cellular Field.”

At one point, the band even tried to catch the attention of WGN news, but too many bands their age were trying the same thing, so the show had to turn them down.

'Want to be a rock and roll singer?'

In the time it took them to learn over 60-well-known covers -- from "Come Together," by the Beatles, to "My Generation," by the Who -- the band has become confident in where and how they play.

On or off stage, McGinnis is seen playing a Fender Stratocaster and keyboards effortlessly; Rolence can likewise feel his way through technical and punk-driven chord arrangements; Hayes doesn't mind jumping off stage and growling when the audience needs to be pumped up; and Ryan already has the chops of drummers twice his age.

“We're kind of shooting from the hip,” said Rolence's father, who along with other band parents, manages the Bolts. “There is no book. Even the adults are learning everything.”

If you want a career in music, whichever genre you enjoy, Rolence's father suggested, be prepared to work for it.

Booking shows, promoting your band, repairing instruments, setting up the stage and traveling across the Midwest, among the handful of things that must happen for the show to go on.

“The kids make it look easy,” he said. “It's about discipline. It's not about how many years you put in, but how many hours.”

Every week during most of the school year, in between sports and extracurricular activities, the band meets--and the guys jam. Before they even play in front of an audience, practicing allows them to work on their chops, whether on covers or original songs.

It's a time in their life, Rolence's father said, when they can really learn the importance of music. And if things change with the band in the future, he added, it will be up to the kids and their parents, not one or the other.

“We've had our ups and downs,” he said optimistically. “We're just going to have to live and learn.”

As for the eyeliner, big hair and leopard-skin leggings many rock acts have donned, “We don't want to get caught up in the image,” he said.

“We're going to worry about the music," he added. "Image will take care of itself.”