Ithaca Blog

Thursday, August 28, 2008

Evil City String Band, With Richie Stearns, Plays Ithaca This Weekend

After a surprise and semi-furtive gig there last night with his longtime band, the Horseflies, Richie Stearns returns to Felicia's Friday night with his up-and-coming group, Evil City String Band.

Evil City will also appear at the Chapter House on Saturday. The band is promoting their first CD.

Evil City is an old-timey band with Richie on banjo, Steve Selin on fiddle, Pat Burke on guitar, and Ben Gould on stand-up bass.

The band is making formal appearances after a number of loosely-organized gigs around town, most notably at Simply Red's restaurant at Sheldrake Point winery. That gig lead to the production of a CD that is included in a new cookbook from Simply Red's. (The CD is also available independently.)

Evil City played a couple of well-regarded sets at this year's GrassRoots Festival, including one with Willie Watson, of Old Crow Medicine Show, of which Ben Gould is an alumnus.

Evil City's music straddles the territory between accomplished playing and creative fun. Their material includes some originals, and many traditional standards with the distinctive sound that four great players who are also old friends can create.

The band has several songs in live performance posted on its MySpace site.

Evil City's CD, and Simply Red's cookbook, are available at Small World Music in Ithaca.

Stephen Burke
for Ithaca Blog and Small World Music

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