Thursday has the potential to be one of the hottest days of the summer so far.
Downtown Seymour may be just a little hotter thanks to a Columbus band that plans to bring its classic ’70s rock sounds to the Seymour CityJam stage at 6:30 p.m.
Back in the Day has been together since late 2013, when guitarist Jerry Lowman of Scipio and vocalist Charlie Greer of Columbus, who also plays guitar, started to “pick and grin” mostly on acoustic guitars.
“We talked about bands we had been in back in the day, then we started to talk about putting some tunes together to play out a little, maybe just the two of us,” Lowman said. “But after Charlie heard me sing we decided against that.”
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That’s when the conversation between the two shifted to forming a really good group.
“We thought it would be fun to pull together the best musicians we could find to perform the super hits of the ’70s and ’80s,” Lowman said.
The first call went to drummer Kevin Spiker of Brown County.
“Kevin is by far the best drummer I have ever had the pleasure of working with,” Lowman said. “He’s a machine. I called him and he said, ‘Who’s involved?’ I said, ‘Me and Charlie at this point.’ He said, ‘I haven’t played in years, but sure, I’m in.'”
With a little more searching, the band picked up bass guitarist Ron Harrison of Columbus.
“We spent a lot of time searching for a singer and a keyboard player,” Lowman said of the search that led to the addition of vocalist and keyboardist Tom Bartels of Columbus and female vocalist Michal Pennington of Greensburg.
Pennington brought a new dimension to the group and is a perfect fit for the group, which bills itself the Midwest’s best tribute to ’70s and ’80s rock, Lowman said.
Even with the addition of Pennington, the band still needed a male vocalist.
“Little did we realize that our lead singer was already in the group,” Lowman said of Charlie Greer.
“Charlie continued to sing us through our rehearsals while we searched for and auditioned singers. We went through a dozen singers from as far away as 175 miles,” Lowman said. “But we stayed true to our goal and didn’t lower the bar.”
Back in the Day plays authentic classic rock from the ’70s and ’80s including songs made popular by such bands as Kansas, Rush, Styx, Led Zeppelin, Boston and others.
“We do the music others can’t do vocally and we do them like they were originally done,” Lowman said. “That was our goal. We wanted to find all the pieces to do that and people who love that era of music.”
Lowman said too often classic rock groups do their own renditions of the classics instead of the original songs.
“We do it note for note and try to duplicate the tones because we are capable of doing that,” he said.
CityJam will be the group’s first performance in Seymour, Lowman said, although people have had the chance to see them on stage in Columbus, North Vernon and other locations throughout the southern part of the state.
The concert stage is on East Second Street between Indianapolis Avenue and Ewing Street. Food will be available for purchase beginning at 6 p.m. from The Pines Restaurant and alcohol can be purchased from Bartholomew County Beverage. The band will play until 8 p.m.
Other bands scheduled to play Seymour CityJam this year are First Time Caller, a cover band from Indianapolis on Aug. 17 and The Louisville Crashers, a party band from Louisville, Kentucky, on Sept. 21. The Woomblies Rock Orchestra kicked off the fifth annual summer series on June 15.
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What: Seymour CityJam featuring Back in the Day
When: 6:30 to 8 p.m. Thursday
Where: East Second Street between Indianapolis Avenue and North Ewing Street in downtown Seymour (rain site is Knights of Columbus, 118 E. Second St.)
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