1. What was the first instrument you learned to play, and do you still play it?
2. You've been a part of the Evansville music scene for quite some time; please tell us the bands you've been in and about your role in Rachel & The Jimmies currently.
3. If your pre-gig routine had a theme song, what would it be?
4. What are your three essential albums from three distinct genres?
5. What's the strangest thing you've seen from stage?
1. My first instrument was guitar and I started playing it when I was about 13. My cousin, who was a priest who played bluegrass banjo, would come by our house every so often with some of his other priest friends (a couple of guitar players and an upright bass player) and jam. They would encourage me to jump right in and play along. I would watch their fingers and try to learn the chord progressions as fast as I could. That’s when I realized that music was going to be a major influence in my life.
When I entered 8th grade, I began playing a sousaphone and my freshman year at Memorial I joined the high school band. It did not take me long to realize that guitar players got more attention from the girls and so the sousaphone rapidly became a thing of the past and the guitar became my best friend.
2. I started playing professionally when I was 16. A couple of classmates and I played every weekend at the Village Inn Pizza Parlor. After a few years of acoustic music, I was introduced to the electric guitar and began playing country rock at Gloria’s. I can never thank Gloria enough for teaching me the business end of playing music.
After Gloria’s the band broke up and reformed as a rock and roll band. We played the local scene for about a year and then signed with Variety Artist Talent Agency and hit the road. Boy was that an experience. The road teaches hard lessons – like the show MUST go on no matter what and if some girl thinks you are the one, she probably said that to the band that played the club last week. Anybody who has ever played the road circuit knows what I mean.
When I came off the road I reverted back to my roots, acoustic music. That lasted for a couple of years before the rock and roll bug bit me again. That’s when 5.11 Jimmy got its start. We were playing every weekend and we were packing the house. Some key members left 5.11 (Jeff and Rachel Ennis along with Bill Doty), so the bass player, Rob Hoffman, and I recruited Rod Bennett on lead guitar and vocals and began our search for a drummer. After going through quite a few drummers (over ten) and a variety of other musicians, we finally arrived at the Jimmies’ present day lineup (Rob Hoffman, Rod Bennett and Cayce Fredrick on drums and vocals). We decided to ask Rachel Ennis if she would like to join the fun and much to our delight, she said yes. Today, Rachel usually plays one weekend a month with us and the rest of the time it’s the four guys kicking butt and having a blast.
3. Bob Dylan’s “One More Cup of Coffee.”
4. The first album that changed my world was Meet the Beatles, for obvious reasons. David Bowie’s The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust showed me that an acoustic guitar could be incorporated into cutting edge music. And finally, Jesus Christ Superstar made me proud to be a believer.
5. The coolest thing was during a break. We were playing at a hotel in Terre Haute and Elvis, along with his entire entourage, was staying at the same hotel. During our first break, we were hanging out in the lobby (talking to the good-looking desk clerk) and I heard the elevator doors open. When I turned around – BAM – there he was: Elvis Presley in all his glory – a white leather jumpsuit, big sunglasses, and a rather large belly. It was awesome!
With regard to the strangest thing, any musician that has ever played in front of an audience will tell you the strangest thing they ever saw probably had to do with a girl. You can use your imagination from there…
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YOU THERE! YEAH, YOU!
In a band? Are you a solo artist, singer/songwriter, DJ, beat-maker, MC, etc.? SEND US A NOTE! Or, and email, rather… we want to do something. Here’s what:
Each month we want to feature a YOU (well not YOU specifically every month, but, well, you know) as our BAND/ARTIST OF THE MONTH. Here’s what we’ll do:
Do a write-up on you, tell your story, describe your sound, and so on. What you’ll need to do is:
• Reach out to us via email – editor@news-4u.com
• Have some music ready to go. Part of this whole deal is that we’ll post mp3 copies of some of your stuff on our Web site.
• Send us photos so we and our readers know what you look like.
Get on this, pronto guys and gals. I’ll be putting this together as the months go by and soon, we’ll have a nice library of sorts of local and regional artists in the pages of our magazine and – as importantly – on our site so there’ll be yet another place the public can go to check out your stuff.
So hit me up and we’ll get this ball rolling. Rock on.
-- Dylan Gibbs, Editor
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Credit Larry Cohen Photography
