New England Americana 2014 Featured Artist: Ethan Robbins (Cold Chocolate)
Cold Ch
ocolate blends together a fusion of funk, soul, rock ala the Dead and of course, bluegrass. Not quite as traditional as the traditional bluegrass quintet, the band adds percussion to their flavor and its quite an addition adding the steady back beat to the songs and arrangements. With banjo, upright bass, and acoustic guitar rounding out the instruments-and these folks can play!-, the band’s vocal harmonies are also where they shine. I caught up with guitar player, singer, and songwriter for the band Ethan Robbins to ask him all about the band and their involvement in this year’s New England Americana Festival.
1) “Americana” has become the go to term for arguably every genre under the sun. How you do feel you as an artist falls under that umbrella? Where do you pull your inspiration from? What is the style of music that you most closely relate to?
Ethan: CC definitely draws most heavily from bluegrass. However, because we have a less-than-traditional instrumentation, it’s hard to call our music bluegrass and have anyone who hasn’t heard us before have a real sense of what we’ve got going on. Bluegrass implies something pretty specific in this town, along the lines of Bill Monroe’s band, or even newergrass, like Tony Rice’s Bluegrass Album Band, but not really what Cold Chocolate is up to. We like to take the idea of bluegrass and make it our own. We draw our song-stylings from a wide variety of artists—Hank Williams, Chuck Berry, Jim Croce, the Grateful Dead, John Hartford, The Band—and combine it with the technical prowess of Tony Rice, Ricky Skaggs—all them Nashville cats. We’re hoping that some day, we’ll be able to call ourselves “bluegrass” and have it really fit.
2) New England Americana and the Fest firmly plant their roots and morals in “community” and attempting to bring that community together in this big once a year event. The event is a culmination of a community of musicians and artists that is going on all year in other forums and gigs and so forth. What does that community mean to you and how does it effect you as an artist?
Ethan: The music community in this town is something truly special. The bluegrass scene here is very rich, full of talent and good people who are genuinely interested in lending a listening ear, picking some tunes, and sharing their music/business knowledge. The musicians in Boston are the other musicians’ biggest fans, which builds up this incredible musical community full or supportive friends and colleagues.
In the bluegrass world in particular, because of the many great festivals, up-and-coming musicians are able to hob-knob with their heroes. We shared a bill with Del McCoury, Nickel Creek, and many of the other bluegrass greats this summer at the Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival. Truly an awe-inspiring experience.
3) Music festivals, in general, are fairly well known for surprise sit ins, improvisational jams and collaborations. If you could see any two local acts collaborate on stage at this year’s NEA Festival, who would you like to see?
Ethan: I think it’d be really cool to see The Blue Ribbons mix it up with Tigerman, Woah! to create a super-bearded-New-Orleans funky folk group. You could call it “Tigerblue Roah-bbins!”
4) What local releases are you listening to right now that you think folks should be listening to as well? Any independent acts that really make you say “wow”? Friends that you want a broader audience to dig into?
Ethan: Again and again I am just blown away by The Stray Birds. Although they are from Pennsylvania, they have deep roots in the Boston area, and have just been signed to Yep Roc Records. It’s so inspiring to watch a band like that really make it. Great people, amazing harmonies. Hop on the bird-train!
5) So, what do you have coming up either before or after the festival? Any shameless plugs you want to make whether it be shows, recordings, or anything at all?
Ethan: We have been working on our new record for the better part of two years, and will be releasing it on Sunday October 19th at Club Passim! It’s an afternoon show, 3:30pm, and we’d love to see all of our friends there! This show will also be James McIver’s last gig with the band.
For those of you who have been to a recent show, you may have heard that our banjo player, James, is going to be graduating with a PhD in Physics from Harvard in about a week. He spent most of our summer tour in the backseat writing his thesis and is set to defend it this week. For the past four years, James has been splitting his time between Physics and Cold Chocolate, and, as he becomes Dr. James McIver in September, he’ll be leaving the band to start a new career at the Max Planck Institute in Hamburg, Germany. We are sorry to see him go, as he has been such a positive driving force for the band, and a great friend, but are very excited for what lies ahead for him. James will be with us through the end of October, at which point, the lovely and talented BB Bowness will be joining us on the road.
Some come check out our CD Release Show, and party with us! October 19th, 3:30pm! Club Passim!
