In 1996, the Chapel Hill music scene had a lot of eyes on it. After Seattle had made a splash in the early part of the decade, the music industry at large was looking for the next great music town, and with its large student population and bustling music scene, Chapel Hill had all the important
elements to fit the bill.

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Cover art for the Squirrel Nut Zippers album "Hot."

Indie rock bands like Superchunk, Archers of Loaf, and Polvo were all making a lot of noise both literally and figuratively. Soon to be superstars Ben Folds Five were gaining national attention after their first single "Underground" became a radio hit.

Perhaps most surprisingly, a swing band named after a sweet treat from the 1920's rocketed into the national spotlight, too. Squirrel Nut Zippers released their second full-length LP "Hot" on June 4th of that year. It would go on to sell more than a million copies by the end of 1997.

"I think the secret to our success was that we didn't fit in," founding member Katharine Whalen said. "We were definitely a different sound for the time period. There was just about every type of sound coming out of Chapel Hill, but not a lot of swing bands like us. We really surprised people."

This Summer, Squirrel Nut Zippers co-founder Jimbo Mathus is on tour with his current iteration of the band celebrating 30 years of that landmark record. The tour stops by the Haw River Ballroom in Saxapahaw on June 20.

Like Whalen, Mathus says that having a different sound from everyone else in town was key to the band's initial success.

"We had all grown up in the indie music scene and were about the same age. There wasn't really a swing/jazz/vaudeville scene in town, but there were other bands operating in retro mode."

Mathus points to Flat Duo Jets, Chicken Wire Gang, The Red Clay Ramblers, and Southern Culture On The Skids as a few of the other local bands that were similarly taking American roots music and putting a modern-day spin on it.

"A lot of the bands that were coming out were louder rock and roll bands. It was pretty diverse, but we were definitely the odd man out," he continued.

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An image from the liner notes of the Squirrel Nut Zippers album "Hot."

The band's previous album "The Inevitable" had been recorded locally at WaveCastle Studios in Hillsborough, but for "Hot" they retreated to New Orleans to work at superstar producer Daniel Lanois' Kingsway Studio, a four-story mansion located in the French Quarter, in October of 1995.

Squirrel Nut Zippers co-founder Tom Maxwell remembers exactly when the idea came about.

"Jimbo shows up one day and he says to me and Ken (Mosher, another one of the band's co-founders), 'Let's go to New Orleans,'" he recalled. "For some reason I was possessed by the idea. That was the most important thing that I could ever do. I had never been to New Orleans before."

In the 1990s, Kingsway Studio was one of the most prolific and unusual recording spaces in the world. Bob Dylan, U2, Emmylou Harris, Pearl Jam, and R.E.M. all recorded there.

"It was just a spectacular time," Whalen said. "It was a beautiful mansion with a garden in the back and a plunge pool. It had big dark cool rooms with high ceilings. The sound in there was really great. I was not a big nightlife person in those days, but just to walk around during the day looking at the gardens was magical."

Mathus says that the decision to work at Kingsway had come about because of his lifelong connection to drummer Glen Graham of the band Blind Melon. That band had recorded their sophomore album "Soup" at the studio in late 1994.

Aside from the fact that it's housed inside of a giant mansion, one of the aspects that makes Kingsway unique is its internal design.

Unlike your typical studio, where a sheet of plexiglass separates the musicians from the producer, Kingsway is one room where there is nothing between the two entities. "Hot" co-producer Brian Paulson says that type of layout was unusual for the time.

"It was hard for me to adjust to the setup at first, because there was zero separation between me and the musicians," he said. "In hindsight, I would rather work like that all the time. (Traditional studios) can create a recipe for paranoia. You see people talking in the other room and you wonder what they're saying about you. It creates immediate separation and hierarchy, and that doesn't exist in the Kingsway setup."

Another thing worth noting about Kingsway is that a lot of people say it's haunted. Paulson says the band embraced that energy when they were working on the record.

"That house was alive," Maxwell said. "It was a living space. It was a big old mansion, and you had to invite it in. It actually became the eighth member of the band."

There's perhaps no better example of that energy than on the band's big breakout single "Hell."

Written and sung by Maxwell, "Hell" is a tongue-in-cheek Calypso anthem that was largely inspired by Trinidadian musician Lord Executor's "Seven Skeletons Found In The Yard," a song that Maxwell says he first heard on UNC-Chapel Hill's college radio station WXYC.

"Hell" went on to become a surprise hit on alternative rock radio stations across the country. The video, which was filmed at Cat's Cradle in Carrboro, was added to MTV's Buzz Bin, a home for up and coming artists that the network deemed worthy of keeping an eye on.

"I cut the vocals for 'Hell' on Halloween night and at the end of the take I broke their crystal chandelier, not intentionally," Maxwell recalled. "If you turn the volume all the way up at the end of that song, you can hear me admitting that."

"He was mortified to tell (studio manager) Karen (Brady) because it was a huge crystal chandelier," Paulson said. "She was surprised, but she was also kind of used to it. You've got musicians and alcohol and you're in the French Quarter…things are going to happen."

Though Mathus is the sole remaining member from the "Hot" era of Squirrel Nut Zippers, he's been keeping the spirit and story of the band alive for decades now. On this current tour, he says he and the band will play "Hot" in its entirety, and then some.

"You'll get the great showmanship, the great musicianship, the great costumes, everything that comes along with the Squirrel Nut Zippers show," Mathus said.

Squirrel Nut Zippers hit the Haw River Ballroom on June 20.