How did Picadilly Pub’s Steve O’Brien get tapped to start booking live music for the popular West Springfield eatery? Well, technically, his boss just asked him to do it. But speak to O’Brien in greater detail and it certainly seems like he was buffaloed into it.
“My family and I discovered the roots band Donna The Buffalo back in 2001 and attend their Grassroots Festival of Music and Dance every year,” he explains. “I ended up making a lot of friends and contacts in the music scene because of this passion for music, so bringing acts into where I work was just a natural fit.”
O’Brien recently kicked things off with a Thursday night music series that has offered acts ranging from Wildcat O’Halloran‘s blues to the original pop-rock of John Brandoli and even the six-string stylings of his son, Aiden O’Brien—a 13-year-old fretboard wizard also inspired by the Buffalo he “herd” as a kid. Beginning July 29, however, the series goes into battle mode, with three bands each week vying for a grand prize of $250 cash and a future gig. For more information on how to get your band into the mix, email: sobrien@piccadillypub.com.
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Meanwhile, Connecticut’s Mile Marker Zero (milemarkerzero.com) recently obtained what has become an industry milestone of the times by having its music featured in the popular RockBand video game.
“It’s something every kid always dreams of,” MMZ keyboardist Mark Focarile notes of the animated audio experience. “Since its release, we’ve seen several Youtube videos of kids playing the song, and it’s given us a very valuable promotional tool to put our music in front of people who may not otherwise hear it.”
According to Focarile, the leap into living rooms the world over was made possible in large part due to the band’s publicists, Big Machine Media—a New York-based organization whose credits include working with Down and Dillinger Escape Plan. At present, only the lead single from the band’s self-titled debut, “A Thousand Nights,” is available for gamers to download (from rockband.com) and rock out to, but future plans call for three more—the hard-rocking “Laceration,” the frentic “Kiss to Fix” and prog-rocker “Crimson Read”—to be online by year’s end as well.
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Speaking of the Nutmeg State, veteran fiddler/Daisy Mayhem founder Rani Arbo ushers in the first of three summer picnic concerts slated for the Enfield, Conn. town green this Friday, June 25, at 6 p.m. The series continues July 23 with Zoe Darrow and the Fiddleheads and rounds out with a yet-to-be-named headliner Aug. 20.
Tickets for all performances are $10 for adults (children under 12 free) and may be obtained at Falcetti Music in Enfield, the Department of Social Services on High Street, the Enfield Child Development Center or the Alcorn Family Resource Center, and all proceeds will directly benefit a variety of programs that support at-risk families in the community. Attendees are invited to bring blankets, chairs and (in your best Yogi Bear) “pic-a-nic” baskets, of course. Call (860) 253-6395 for more information on that one.
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In other news, just how current is the technology King Crimson frontman Adrian Belew utilizes on his Painting With Guitar tour?
“[I’ve been] writing material that would have been impossible to create only last year,” the six string/synth wizard reports of his latest collection of soundscapes and loop improvisations.
The audio artisan is slated to perform at Noho’s Iron Horse Sunday, June 27, then head in to the studio proper this fall to record and release music culled and/or created during the solo trek.
In contrast, veteran producer/songwriter Greg Laswell has completed his latest labor of love, a 12-tune effort called Take A Bow, and that’s an accomplishment he looks to celebrate this Thursday, June 24 in the form of an official CD release party at the Iron Horse (iheg.com) as well.
Catch the Nightcrawler every Wednesday at 8:50 a.m. on the Steve Cantara Radio Show, WRNX 100.9 FM. Send correspondence to Nightcrawler, PO Box 427, Somers, CT 0071; fax to (860) 698-9373 or email garycarra@aol.com.
