Makers return for festival

Don’t call it a comeback.

The Makers never actually left.

But they are back together for the first time in years for a show on Saturday night at nYne.

Although it’s not technically a reunion show, because The Makers never broke up.

They just play a lot less frequently.

Saturday’s headlining performance at the weekendlong Volume Music Festival isn’t a 20th anniversary show celebrating The Makers’ 1993 full-length debut. It just so happens the stars aligned so that the internationally known Makers are playing a rare show in their native Spokane almost exactly two decades after the release of “Howl” on Bellingham-based Estrus Records.

The Makers’ retro-punk and glam stylings, along with an infamous reputation for a raucous live show, drew sell-out crowds in San Francisco and New York, and fans paid to fly the band to Japan to tour, and yet The Makers were banned from numerous venues in Spokane during the 1990s.

The Makers released nine albums on three different labels, including Sub Pop and Kill Rock Stars, but after touring 2005’s “Everybody Rise,” they went dormant.

They still play shows, almost annually – either really big shows or really small private gigs.

There hasn’t been any talk of making a new album any more than there is talk of breaking up. All of the Makers – singer Michael Maker, his bassist brother Donny Virgo, guitarist Jamie Frost and drummer Aaron Saye – have remained close friends. They’re all active in music, some of them playing music together.

Things fall into place from time to time, and The Makers form like Voltron. But there is no big plan, said Frost.

In fact, that’s how it goes for a lot of his band projects. He and Saye played another quasi-reunion show with Rough Congress a few months back.

“I’m constantly reacting to what’s going on around me. The phone just keeps ringing and I can’t complain,” said Frost, who also plays pedal steel with Silver Treason and Marshall McLean. “Most of these projects are full of old friends and seems to happen all at once. It seems like I don’t have an identity, but when you think about it, it’s like that is my identity. I just have fun with it, but I don’t know what’s gonna come next.”

Michael Maker, who now lives in Portland, said he has solicited Frost to track guitar on his newest project, Mister Scarlet.

“We’re all brothers in this band,” said Maker during a telephone interview. “Sometimes the key to longevity is separation for a bit. We’ve lived in small houses and toured in small vehicles, and that can destroy you if you let it. We’ve decided not to let it destroy us. There’s no getting rid of each other at this point. When there’s a call to arms we’re all gonna be there, and that’s the bottom line.”