James Beale's a busy guy these days.

After taking some time off to be with family, he's started a new band, joined Fifth Generation (along with drummer Ken Forrest), and he's resuming duties as host of Blues Night at Dr. Unk's Oasis. And, with a new baby, he's just celebrated his first Father's Day.

Contributed photo (ENLARGE)

James Beale of the Memorial Underground.

The latest project is The Memorial Underground, a rock/psychedelic/fusion band he, Forrest and Carlo Rouse started and have now taken into the recording studio with a little help from Matt Thomas and Barry Knox of Parmalee.

While infusing blues and funk influences, Beale says they're trying to come up with a signature way of tying up sections and do something different.

And after their first "coming out" show at The Corner Aug. 29, they plan on using their music and message to help the community, like raising money for local causes through T-shirt sales.

But we had to get to know them first. So with Beale's compliance to answer any random question we had, we met at Christy's Europub to discuss musicians, politicians and pickles. Here are a few of his answers:

Q If you could play with anyone dead or alive, who would it be?

A I'd really love to jam with Jimmy Herring (lead guitarist of Widespread Panic) more than anyone else. I think that would be a riot. He's phenomenal and I don't even know what I'd do if I was on a stage with someone like that, but I think we'd come up with something pretty bada**. I'd be too scared to play with any of my other heroes ... it'd be cool to jam with Miles Davis, but then again, you don't even know if he'd like it.

Q Do you have any pre-show rituals or superstitions?

A Not so much. I'm the kind of person who likes to be alone right before we play ... Even if it's only five or 10 minutes, if we're rushed, I like to disappear.

Q We have a great pickle debate at the office we need you to weigh in on. Do you think it's fair for some restaurants to give you a pickle when you didn't ask for one?

A I think it's fair. It just depends on how you feel about pickles. The pickle's kind of the something extra, like, "Here, clean your palette with this." ... What you gotta do is you section off the plate.

Q What's funnier: Overweight drunk guy falling at a DUI stop, or kick to the groin?

A I'd have to go with the groin kick. The fat guy with the DUI, I've seen that on "Cops." But the groin kick's always good for some reason.

Q In the spirit of the election year, who would be your dream presidential candidate?

A No one. Who really has a dream presidential candidate? You've got people (politicians) who try to appeal to the most people they can. Like in this election, you have two sides of a coin that stretches the gamete, but nobody's really covering it at all. Say whatever you want for Obama and you can say whatever you want for McCain, but at the end of the day, there's nobody that can step into that job and make everybody happy; that's not going to happen. A lot of people think you're going to give someone that office, and the world's just not going to be hot anymore and gas isn't going to be expensive but that's not true. It's just going to be a new day with a new person.

People would make excellent candidates themselves. If they want change and want things to be different, I think people should just do that. I don't believe they should elect someone who's supposed to fix it all. I don't believe that there's one way to do it and I certainly don't believe government has anything to do with it.

That's kind of what Memorial Underground is trying to do. We want people to ask questions. And not for the sake of asking the question ... what's more important is the answer, and that's what most people don't want to talk about ... When it comes down to it, there's no bottom line. Nobody ever says, "This would work; let's try this; this is something new."

Check out the band www.myspace.com/thememorialunderground and see a video montage at www.reflector.com/mixer.

Contact Kristin Day at 329-9579 or kday@coxnc.com.