Heavy-metal axe strapped over his shoulder, Alex Brown-Whalen sure knows how to shred. It’s his first time practicing with all the members of Boston-based art-rock-instrumental trio Devil Music Ensemble — multi-instrumentalist Brendon Wood, electric violinist/synth/bassist Jonah Rapino, and drummer Tim Nylander — and they’re working through Alex’s original songs. Cramped together among amps and random equipment in a JP-basement rehearsal space, they try a wordless progression he’s named “Electric Storm.” A couple times, Alex forgets parts he’s written, but with Wood’s instructive prodding (“Are you sure you only want to play that chord once?”), he refines his works to Nylander’s improvised beat, with Rapino thumping along on bass. Once or twice, Alex even rips into a few face-melting bars of metal-chord rock he’s just added.
“Sweet,” compliments Wood.
Alex Brown-Whalen (“I have two last names”) is nine, somewhat mumbly and shy, with porcelain-doll eyes and a light spray of freckles across his pale cheeks. He is a fourth-grader at the Joseph P. Manning School in Jamaica Plain, where his favorite subject is recess. He wears black sneakers, dark pants that bunch around his ankles, and adult-size rock T-shirts that fall just above the knees on his child-size frame. His favorite bands are the Misfits, Green Day, Slayer, Black Sabbath, and Iron Maiden. Sometimes Alex squiggles their monikers on his arms in ballpoint-pen tribute — like pretend tattoos. Asked about his limb-scribblings, he shrugs, “It’s just something I do.”
Alex owns a Gibson Dean Flying V, a gift from his family that stands nearly as tall as he does. For almost two years, he’s taken one-on-one lessons from Wood, the thickly bearded founder of Devil Music Ensemble who can play everything from analog synths and banjo to bass clarinet and guitar. In the last four years, DME has toured the country performing movie-house scores for silent films like F.W. Murnau’s Nosferatu, Robert Wiene’s The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, and the 1922 Western Big Stakes. Together, they’ve also participated in Glenn Branca’s 100-guitar composition Symphony #13 and separately enlisted 40- and 20-piece orchestras to execute their individual contemporary-classical works before live audiences. And so DME is just the sort of arty assembly that welcomes experimental configurations, like rocking out with a V-slinging fourth-grader.
When the band had a Wednesday show booked at Great Scott in Allston this past September, Wood invited his star pupil to join he and Rapino for a guitar-heavy live adaptation of DME. It was Alex’s world debut. Beforehand, Rapino crammed in a last-minute practice session in the men’s room. On-stage, Alex was decked out in a Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon T-shirt circa 1973. On his little knuckles was what appeared to be the word ozzy inked upside-down. His parents were there — his dad actually videotaped the show — and so was his fourth-grade teacher, Ms. Amica. (“She was dancing,” Rapino remembers, grinning.)
Four months later, Alex smiles bashfully and says, “I did pretty good.”
Wood beams, “He was awesome!”
