As you'd expect by now, the New England Patriots will be the center of attention Sunday in the Coppertop, so no band will have to compete with the drubbing the team delivers to the New York Giants during the Super Bowl.
But there's plenty of music leading up to the Big Game, starting Thursday with Rainy Day Activities. The young North County band has a good ear for classic rock, which comes across in some interesting covers (the Rolling Stones' "Angie"....nice!) and solid originals.
On Friday night, Brian & Captain return to the Coppertop with their acoustic show.
And Fred Ellsworth is back in the room with his House Shakers on Saturday. Ellsworth, pictured above with bassist Mike Sisto, definitely keeps his band rooted in the blues, but the guitarist can throw a few curves too. He delivered a pretty infectious "Last Train to Clarksville" last time he brought the band to the Coppertop.
All three shows start at 8 p.m.
So getting back to the Bowl, in honor of the Pats' QB Tom Brady, Sunday afternoon lift tix are $12 for those arriving in a Patriots jersey. And if the Patriots' defense crushes the Giants, we all benefit Monday. Day time lift tickets on Monday will cost whatever the Giants score _ which should be zero, right? Those Monday day tickets will not exceed their normal costs should the Giants somehow score that many points _ but really, what are the odds of that happening?
Getting back into the music scene after a few years away, Josh Briggs learned a couple of things. First, a repertoire of indie-rock tunes drawn from his personal tastes was not enough to entertain most audiences at the places he was playing.
"After getting so many requests to play Jimmy Buffett and Zac Brown songs, I decided I better learn some. Thing is, after all the years I spent scoffing at that stuff, I realized there was more to those songs than I was giving them credit for," says Briggs.
The storytelling and simple, catchy chord progressions were not far afield from the punk rock that Briggs grew up on. And as he worked on a batch of original songs, that country and roots-music influence started showing up in his own work.
"I didn't plan it that way," says Briggs of his recently released "Back to Bliss." "I wrote a bunch of songs over the past couple of years and when I pulled together the ones I liked best for the CD, a lot of them had that country twang thing going on."
Briggs will air some of those tunes with the band Five on Friday when it plays Sunday in the Coppertop starting at 4 p.m. Guitarist Dave Rotondo and percussionist "Bongo" Mike Sheehan join Briggs in Five on Friday, and the trio covers a swath of classic to contemporary tunes alongside the original material. Briggs, who was a member of the popular alt-rock bands Popgun Picnic and Flat Stanley, returns to the Coppertop with a solo gig on Feb. 26.
Briggs used a Kickstarter campaign to finance his CD. He raised enough money to also produce a nice video for the single "What I'm Drinking," above, which has drawn more than 14,000 views on YouTube.
"The Kickstarter worked really well. It was like having a bunch of pre-sales," says Briggs of the funding mechanism that lets fans support musicians, filmmakers and the like with donations and then reap a CD or some other incentive.
"Things are a lot different from the old days," says Briggs. "I don't know 14,000 people, and to have that many people see the video and to get emails from all over the place about my music is great."
What hasn't changed from the old days is knowing how to make a connection with an audience from the stage. Briggs says that Five on Friday typically plays smaller rooms, so it doesn't want to blow away its listeners with anything overly loud. Though "Bongo" has been building his battery.
"When we started, he had a conga and bongos. Now we're up to a kick drum, a snare and other percussion," says Briggs. "His kit looks like it's from the island of misfit toys."
But Briggs knows as well as anyone that you learn what you need to do as you go along.
Hoodoo Revelator singer Kevin Haney wasn't all that surprised when a fan in his 20s approached him to point out how the new Black Keys album sounds like old Howlin' Wolf records.
"It always comes full circle," Haney says of today's hit makers echoing a blues legend who rose to fame in the 1950s.
Haney practically lived the circle, developing a taste for the blues after becoming a fan of classic rock. An older brother and sister had Haney listening to Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath before he ever thought about being a musician himself.
Haney first backtracked from classic rock singing with a funky horn-driven 10-piece band. From there he pared down, moving toward a more traditional classic blues sound. It was four years ago that the current incarnation of Hoodoo Revelator formed with Haney on vocals, Willie Moss on bass, Robert Palumbo on drums, Dan "Moe" Moriarty on guitar, and Glen Assaro on harmonica.
Hoodoo Revelator brings the blues to the Coppertop Saturday night starting at 8.
Hoodoo Revelator can dig into a bit of Muddy Waters then hop over to a Rolling Stones song. The format is similar to what the early J. Geils Band did, so it's no surprise that Hoodoo Revelator does a little Geils in its show as well.
Haney says it's a pretty good time for the blues right now, no doubt as a younger audience is finding its way into the music through some currently popular bands.
"We're getting 21-year-olds to 60-year-olds at the shows. It's a style of music that will never go away," Haney says.
It helps too that Hoodoo Revelator is hitting its stride now that it has a few years together.
"We're tearing it up when we're on," Haney says. "And lately we've been on a lot."
Greg Byrne is pretty well known for playing songs _ on the radio, as host of the WSRS-FM morning show, where he spins Top 40 and pop tracks and provides running commentary in between.
But Byrne, pictured at right, is a musician in his own right. Last year he joined the band Shaky Ground as one of its guitarists. Then he and Shaky Ground's other ax slinger, Ron Stacy, put together the acoustic duo Second Base, which they will bring to the Coppertop Friday for an 8 p.m. show.
"With the blues stuff of Shaky Ground, we're playing to one audience, and with the acoustic shows more people are listening for songs they know, so we'll make sure to get in, say, something by Jimmy Buffett, but we can also stretch out a bit and maybe do Simon and Garfunkel too," Byrne says. "The blue-collar rock thing is aimed at getting people to dance and sweat. The duo is aimed at people who want to sit back and listen. I mean, they can dance and sweat if they want."
Those who've heard Byrne on the radio won't be surprised to know he sings in the bass register, which makes him a different vocal partner for Stacy, who typically teams with fellow tenors in his other acoustic settings.
"We can bring in some interesting material, like Johnny Cash songs. Or we have fun with some things. We'll do a Beatles song and where you expect that nice Paul McCartney vocal, I'll come booming in instead," Byrne says.
Byrne's work at WSRS keeps him plugged into the latest popular songs, so Second Base is as apt to tackle a new Coldplay song as a classic cut.
"Oh yeah we cycle in new songs as I notice them," Byrne says. "You gotta hear me sing Adele."
We'll hold off on requesting the basso profondo arrangement of "Someone Like You," but we did have to ask how Byrne manages to play in bands by night when his regular job requires him to be up by 3:30 a.m. and on air by 5.
OK, so at first I was bummed that the Patriots' march to the Super Bowl kept derailing music in the Coppertop; I mean, I was looking forward to hearing Glenn Stewart on Sunday. But I have to admit, it was pretty cool being in the company of ski-bum Pats fans surrounded by TV screens as Baltimore Ravens kicker Billy Cundiff turned an easy field goal into a ticket to the Big Game for New England.
So now we have a couple of weeks before the big New England-New York rematch AND full snow coverage on the mountain. So, yeah, it's a good week to check out things, starting Thursday with Grand National Championships playing at 8 p.m. in the Coppertop.
On Friday night, the acoustic duo Second Base is at the mountain. WSRS-FM morning host Greg Byrne and Ron Stacy formed Second Base alongside their duties as guitarists in the band Shaky Ground . Byrne and Stacy cover tunes that feature their vocal harmonies and guitar fretwork, hitting classic and contemporary material alike.
It's a blue Saturday in the Coppertop with Hoodoo Revelator, the band featured in the video above. These North County guys also like to pull from different eras. Their sets draw on the blues' foundations and move into the rock 'n' roll era, though putting a traditional spin on things.
Five on Friday helms the Coppertop's afternoon show at 4 Sunday. The band features Josh Briggs and Dave Rotondo on guitars and "Bongo" Mike Sheehan on percussion. While Five on Friday can cover artists as diverse as Cee Lo and Stephen Stills, it's nice to see that Briggs recently released a CD of his own material.
Andy Cummings is so good at what he does that fans tell the singer and guitarist that he needs to broaden his horizons _ "Go to New York," "Go to Los Angeles," they say.
"I take it as a compliment," says Cummings, who won Best Solo Artist honors in last year's Worcester Music Awards. "But I like being here. I like being the guy that people tell visitors, 'You gotta see this guy play before you go.' I'm a booster for Worcester."
A fleet-fingered guitar player and supple-voiced singer, Cummings performs from 3 to 5 p.m. Saturday in the Coppertop.
Though he has been in and out of various bands over the years_ most recently playing in a ''50s-leaning rockabilly trio_ Cummings is at home as a solo performer. He enjoys a wide array of music and is as natural an entertainer as he is musician.
"I've seen a lot of guys end up playing songs for themselves. If I tailored the set list for me, it would be full of lesser-known songs. But I'm not ashamed to say I tailor a set list for the audience. It's still a challenge to find material that I like, will be known in a crowd, and suits my voice," he says.
Since hitting the coffeehouse circuit 15 years ago, Cummings has amassed a thick catalog of tunes, some of which are still staples in his show.
"'Pinball Wizard,' " Cummings says without hesitation when asked to mention a song he's been playing forever. "I wouldn't call it my favorite Who song, but I love playing it. It's got a great guitar part and lends itself to showmanship."
Cummings also teaches guitar, which he believes has stepped up his game as a performer.
"Joe Satriani said that teaching guitar teaches you how to get your own (act) together," Cummings says. "You have to be ready when the students arrive and know what you're talking about."
Cummings says he was the class clown in school and the one to unabashedly perform at family events as a kid. Yet, he never thought he'd actually be able to turn his talents and passions into a sustainable career.
"I'm teaching and playing, and all along kind of laughing on the inside thinking, "I can't believe I get to do this for a living,'" he says.
Brian Chaffe is probably best known around these parts as frontman for the Franks, a funky rock troupe that puts a hard edge on its jams. But Chaffee is also at work on his first solo CD and not opposed to the occasional scaled-down gig, such as the one he has Friday at the Coppertop with drummer Adam Sausville.
Performing as Brian & AJ, the pair will dip into Chaffees originals and covers spanning Beatles to Radiohead. Show time is 8 p.m.
Sausville and Chaffee were both in the band Krakow, which drew a good following among the Central Mass jam-band scene in the '90s. After Krakow disbanded, Chaffee helped launch the Franks and Sausville took his drumming skills into a variety of projects ranging from rock to country (he also is part of the crew that makes sure the lifts are running properly at Wachusett).
The two only team a couple of times in a year, and each sees it as a chance to craft a loose, freewheeling set.
"He can send me a songlist the night before and we know each other well enough that we'll know how to work through the songs in the show," Sausville says. "It's fun to let it unfold as it happens."
Chaffee likewise sees this kind of show as a chance to stretch out, and he'll come armed with keys, guitars, and probably a ukulele.
"I don't care if it's a song by T.I. or the Foo Fighters, I like playing in a jazz setting, improvising," he says. "I like going by the seat of my pants."
Work is under way on a new Franks CD, and Chaffee says he also started his solo project, which will contain some songs that are brand new and some that just didn't fit into the band.
"It's a blessing and curse," Chaffee says of working on his own. "I do get to do everything exactly my way. But with the band, you do get that benefit some times of extra sets of ears."
