“For clarification, this is real life,” the post promises.
The listing started gaining traction after Roan’s drummer, Lucy Ritter, posted it to her Instagram story. From there, it spread to the feeds of national music publications such as Stereogum, where it garnered thousands of likes and comments.
“Your favorite devil worshiper’s favorite devil worshiper,” read one comment on Stereogum’s post, referring to Roan’s frequent claims of being “your favorite artist’s favorite artist.”
“If this wasn’t in Denton, I would think it was a joke,” another commenter wrote.
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According to Eli Snider, the frontman of North Texas alt-rock band Chimney Dream and mastermind behind the now-viral Craigslist post, that second commenter isn't too far off. The Chappell Roan death metal cover band did, in fact, start off as a joke.
“I’m in a Discord server run by the Denton Live people and someone posted in there looking for a drummer between the ages of 18 and 24,” Snider tells the Observer. “Someone replied saying, ‘The ageism is real.’”
Snider sent what would be the headline for his Craigslist ad back as a snarky response and was encouraged to post it by others in the chat.
“It started off with me just getting a couple email responses saying, ‘Hell yeah,’ and, ‘I’d love to see this,'” he says. “Now I just get a bunch of messages recommending band names and telling me they asked their grandparents, but they said no.”
The joke has grown into a real pursuit for Snider. Denton has a history of posting jokes, going viral and leaning into that momentum for a real musical endeavor. The same thing happened with the yearly festival Dentonpalooza, which started as a meme.
Snider has already started working on cover arrangements and hopes to start playing live shows early next year. That’s contingent on his finding a drummer, of course, but he has yet to uncover anyone who meets his standards.
“The search isn’t going great, but it isn’t awful either,” he says. “I have a couple of prospects, but every time I send a death metal example song, they don’t know if they can do that. Might have to simplify it.”
One concession he’s having to make is the age requirement that inspired this whole endeavor.
“It’s definitely a heavy preference that they are 70, but since there is so much interest, I’d go as young as 60,” Snider says. “I might just need to Sharpie a couple extra wrinkles on their face to sell it.”
He’s not budging any further on the payment, though: it’s tapioca pudding or nothing.
“For every show that the drummer gets through without passing out, he gets one tapioca pudding cup,” Snider says. “If he falls asleep during the show, I’m going to make him give me a tapioca pudding cup and watch me throw it in the trash.”
As for why he picked Roan as his muse, Snider says that it was a little random and that he was just going with what’s popular at the moment. Whether Roan’s music lends itself to death metal arrangements remains to be seen, but she has inspired a wealth of band name ideas.
“I think we’re going to call the band ‘Whitechappell Roan,’” Snider says.
If they can find their drummer and make it to the stage, we’ll be first in line to see them.