Eymarel invades Richmond…
Last week saw two very special performances in Richmond with Wilmington, NC based duo Eymarel. Monday evening, I had the pleasure of performing with Lee Allen at Cafe Diem. Lee is an exceptional drummer, and incorporates a wide variety of electronic effects into his playing via a sampler and V-Drum pad. Mary Francis, the other half of the Eymarel duo added vocals to our rendition of the Bill Withers tune “Use Me”. The first set included several of my original tunes, some Robert Walter and MMW tracks and some open-ended improv. Mary took to the keys for the opening of the second set, performing three Eymarel originals with Lee and really blowing away everyone in the crowd. The evening wrapped up with me back on the Rhodes and organ belting out Radiohead’s “Paranoid Android”, an original track that melted into MMW’s “Bubblehouse” and closed off with a speedy turn through Eric Clapton’s “Layla”.
Wednesday evening, Dave Decker and myself performed an opening set for Eymarel at Emilio’s, running through our own material and several covers that closed off with Led Zeppelin’s “What is and what ever should be”. Eymarel then put together a dazzling performance, thoroughly impressing everyone present.
The band, with the help of their tour manager/booking partner Travis MacDaniel pulled off over 180 concerts in 2006, and is looking to keep pace with that for 2007. They are quite accomplished and bring an incredible set-up to each concert, including a Hammond organ, Rhodes, Motif piano, several synthesizers, the afformentioned samplers and a first-class drum kit. The amount of sound they generate is pretty wild, layering bass and rhythm, background synth effects and Mary’s chording and lead lines with some in-your-face drumming, they are really something worth checking out.
Last year saw the release of Eymarel’s debut CD “Groovin’ a Little Each Day”. I was fortunate to draw and design the artwork for the cd, the cover of which is seen here:
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