EAT A PEACH
Good Ol' Boys Makin' Sweet Southern Noise
by Tom Lounges
In the five years that have passed since guitarists Curt Sanders and John
Voyak first discovered a mutual love of blues-inspired rock, they have gone
from jamming in a garage surrounded by cornfields and coyotes, to headlining
the Levi's Stage at the World Music Theatre.
Now armed with a new full-length album of original material and some heady
industry contacts, Eat A Peach has become a tightly knit ensemble with a very
bright future.
But getting to here from there wasn't a cake walk for the band. It took
working through some membership changes, which included the departure and
eventual return of original drummer Mike Severence, and shifting their focus
from being an Allman Brothers Band tribute act to forging their own creative
path.
Now traveling with Sanders, Severence, and Voyak down the road to their
collective rock 'n' roll destiny, are bassist Glen "Tumbleweed" Schultz and
keyboardist/vocalist Greg Scheiltwiler.
"Sure, doing the tribute thing might mean getting a lot more gigs right
now and putting some extra cash in our pockets, but that's not what's
important to us at this point in our lives," said Sanders, who shares the
group's lead vocals with Scheiltwiler. "We all sat down and agreed that it
was time to concentrate on our own music."
"We all want to do more with our musical talent than just play in local
night clubs for the rest of our lives," added Severence, "and we know that
nothing will ever happen for this band if we don't take the necessary steps
right now to get our own music heard by people."
Eat A Peach began establishing their musical identity by creating a four
song demo CD to test the waters and to see if their original songs could
ignite any interest.
Chicago's Jam Productions was impressed enough to book the band this past
summer at the World Music Theatre in Tinley Park, where they played the
Levi's Stage, opening for the Grammy-nominated Carlos Santana.
"That was so damn awesome," recalled Scheiltwiler. "Even though we played a
lot earlier than Santana, a lot of people were there to see us and the
response was really strong. Plus, before his show, we got to go up on
Carlos' stage and check out their gear.
"Playing the Levi's stage was one of the coolest things I've ever done as
a musician," continued Scheiltwiler, "but when I was up on that main stage
and I looked out at those thousands of seats, I knew that was where I wanted
to be one day. I think that doing the show at The World really put a fire
under all of us to work even harder than ever to make this band happen.
While they may not make to the main stage at the World anytime soon, Eat A
Peach is very optimistic that they will get the chance to do an encore
performance on the Levi's Stage this coming summer.
"We really don't know anything for sure, but the people there were talking
(to our management) about having us come back," said Sanders. "I don't know
for sure, but some of the people (at the venue) said that we had more people
up rocking and dancing than any other band that has played the Levi's stage."
It took them a lot longer than they had originally expected because of the
high costs and their determination to "do the job right", but Eat a Peach
wrapped up a year long recording project in October.
The results of that time and expense, "Turbulence & Thunder", was made
available to the public in late October.
The CD, recorded at Star Trax in Crestwood and mixed by studio wiz Jeff
Luif (Janet Jackson, Enuff Z'Nuff).
The ten track set is a widely varied collection of southern-fried blues,
upbeat rock and mellow ballads that was picked by this writer as being one of
1999's Top 10 locally-produced CDs.
Their sound is admittedly very steeped in Southern rock tradition, not the
kind of pompous guitar army schlock of a Molly Hatchet, but rather more blues
based with just a little hint of Memphis in the mix.
These well-written and superbly recorded tunes are tastefully textured and
emotive, showing that quite a bit of ol' Duane and Dickey rubbed off on the
boys during their years of doing Allman covers.
"We set out to make a CD that we could be proud of and that would be
representative of us musically," said Scheiltwiler, "and I think that we
pretty well succeeded in doing that with Turbulence & Thunder.
"As to where it takes us all from here only time will tell," he continued.
"But my dream is to get myself back up on that stage at The World Theatre,
only this time when I look out, I want to see all those seats filled up with
people who are waiting to see us."
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