The first Local Spins on WYCE episode of October also featured a chat with Sam Porter and new tracks by Romance for Ransom, Max Lockwood and The Muteflutes. Listen to the podcast, watch the video.
In Studio X: Fauxgrass performing during Local Spins on WYCE. (Photo/Local Spins)
Musician or musicians wanted.
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And it’s a terrific gig.
The core of popular Grand Rapids progressive bluegrass band Fauxgrass — mandolinist Jason Wheeler, upright bassist Tim McKay and acoustic guitarist Adam Balcer — are on the hunt for another band member or two to fill out the group as it continues to record a new album and make inroads regionally and nationally.
With fiddler Jeffrey Niemeier recently leaving to take a high-profile touring slot with contemporary Christian artist Shawn McDonald, Fauxgrass plans to start auditioning new musicians whether they play violin, banjo, Dobro, percussion or whatever.
“If you want to play and the fit’s right, we’re actually pretty open,” McKay said during this week’s edition of Local Spins on WYCE, where Fauxgrass performed a cover of Allen Reynolds’ “Ready for the Times to Get Better” and its own “Riot in the Ranger,” the band’s 2015 ArtPrize submission. (Listen to the entire podcast here, with a video below.)
McKay said the group is interested in any and “all influences” that might boost creativity and broaden the musical scope of Fauxgrass.
The band — formed more than four years ago — has been performing as of late with original band members Joey Schultz on banjo and Mark Lavengood on Dobro, and will do so again on Sunday night at Grand Rapids’ St. Cecilia Music Center, opening for headliner Joshua Davis, with folk-rock’s Troll for Trout also on the bill. Tickets for the St. Cecilia fundraiser are $25 and $30 and available online here or at the door.
Members of Fauxgrass also will perform at Grill One Eleven in downtown Rockford at 6:30 p.m. Friday, along with Clint and Luke Gitchel. On Oct. 10, the band plays the first-ever Hastings Roots Music Festival and returns to Rockford Brewing on Oct. 16.
It also recently released a new video for an original song, “The Worrying Kind,” performed live at La Luna Recording in Kalamazoo, and hopes to get back into the studio later this year.
“We’re letting it take a little bit of a life of its own,” Wheeler said of the band. “It’s been really fun. … It’s a lot of just doing what we’re doing right now and getting to see the world and getting to meet great musicians.”
A host of great local and regional musicians were part of the Oct. 2 edition of Local Spins on WYCE (a show that featured several tracks that are 2015 ArtPrize entries) with the debut of new music by Kari Lynch, Chris DuPont, Romance for Ransom, Troll for Trout, Flint Eastwood, Bennett, Max Lockwood and The Muteflutes.
The show also featured an interview with Traverse City promoter Sam Porter, who’s spearheading The Eddy music festival starting Friday in downtown Grand Rapids. Get more details and a full schedule in this Local Spins story.
VIDEO: Fauxgrass, “Ready for the Times to Get Better”
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