They're musicians, not aliens, but the band "Project Blue Book" promises to shake up Bowdoin's nightlife nonetheless.
The group, which identifies itself as "Unidentified funky orchestras" on its MySpace page, is bringing its music and sense of humor to Bowdoin tonight at MacMillan House.
The band took its name from the government-sponsored UFO research conducted in the 1960s known as "Project Blue Book."
"Back when we were in high school our bass player wrote all his songs in a big blue book so we decided to tie the name of the government records to the book," guitarist Rob O'Block said. "Plus, when you Google Project Blue Book a bunch of alien stuff shows up which is pretty cool."
Project Blue Book consists of O'Block, guitarist and vocalist Cam Goodrich, bassist and vocalist Greg Croak, drummer Matt Cambria, keyboardist and vocalist Dan Perkens, and occasional pedal steel guitarist Tony Susen.
Although certain members of the band have been playing together since high school, the current group has been playing together since 2006 in venues across the Boston area. They also frequent college campuses, but this will be their first appearance at Bowdoin.
The band is versatile and does not shy way from playing music from any genre.
"We started out as the house band for the Broken Crab in Boston. We played a lot of classic rock covers, and it evolved from there," O'Block said. "We started jamming out to covers more and it became a kind of funk, jazz, jam band, blues type of thing. We do a little bit of everything."
"We just have fun with it," Max Hendren, band manager, said
"It's jam, punk, all over the place at this point," he added.
The band also plays traditional blues songs as well as Grateful Dead and Phish covers. They perform country on occasion, too.
"We've changed some of the covers so much that they're almost like our songs," O'Block noted.
Project Blue Book plays most of its shows during the summer and succeeds at packing venues with its eclectic numbers.
"We blow people away," Hendren said. "We've never had a disappointed audience. People come one time, and then they just keep coming to other shows."
While most of the band members are not music majors at their respective colleges, technical virtuoisity binds the group together.
"The core of the band is the guitar, drummer, and bassist. They hold the band together, and it sounds great," Hendren added.
Although most of its members are still in college, the band averages 40 shows each summer and looks forward to them all.
"I really like to play music, it's my favorite thing to do. It's great to have people watch, but I think ultimately you have to really like to play and play with each other to keep it going," O'Block said.
In addition to performing at MacMillan House, before the show the band will host a workshop at the college house.
"We'll tell people about the music and open it up for questions," O'Block said. "I'll talk about some of the stuff that I think about in an improvisational section. A lot of the band is improvisational so I'll try to explain what to listen for in the music."
The band looks forward to discussing music with Bowdoin students.
"People can ask whatever they want and hopefully we can give them some good answers," O'Block said.
The workshop will begin tonight at 6 p.m. Project Blue Book will perform at 10 p.m.
For more information about Project Blue Book, visit www.myspace.com/theprojectbluebook.