What Would Johnny Do?
Kind of funny how I started and ended the month at the Island Merchant in Hyannis. I celebrated New Year’s Eve (and the first hour of Jan. 1) with some friends, watching my favorite local band, the Greenheads. Last night I couldn’t get there until 11:30, but I was there until closing time (the first hour of Jan. 31), watching my favorite new local band,What Would Johnny Do?
WWJD is a pretty good reggae band, but they’re a great cover band. I’ve seen way too many bands that take songs we’ve heard a zillion times and play them just the way we’re used to hearing them.
WWJD does not do that. The quartet takes classic songs by Johnny Cash, Bob Dylan, Kris Kristofferson and other, and gives them a reggae arrangement. That’s clever.
It wouldn’t work if the band didn’t have the skill to pull it off. Carl Hedin on bass and Lucas Ferreira on drums are a tight rhythm section, an essential for any reggae band. Josh Ayala can play mellow grooves on guitar and he can rock out when it’s needed. And then there’s the sultry Melissa Barbosa on vocals. She’s known as a soul belter from her previous bands, but she also can deliver a smooth ballad.
Last night the band played a bunch of Bob Marley songs, in honor of the upcoming anniversary of his birth (Feb. 6, 1945). Randy Frost of the Somers Frost Band was sitting in. It’s easy to take this guy for granted, because he doesn’t try to call attention to himself. He’s like a receiver who makes an incredible touchdown catch, tosses the ball to the ref and jogs off the field without a dance or a trademarked gesture. But while he may be low-key in his style, Frost is one of the best players on the Cape. Any band is better with him in it.
I got there in time to see a Marley tribute (”No Woman, No Cry,” “Wait in Vain,” “Exodus”). They followed that with “Me and Bobby McGee,” starting it slow and soft and building to a ska frenzy. Next up was Johnny Cash’s “Orange Blossom Special,” with some Chuck Berry-style guitar riffs thrown in.
Next up was my favorite song by the band, a cover of Dylan’s “It Ain’t Me, Babe.” In the hands of WWJD, it’s dark and stormy, a bad storm on the horizon. After that came Marley’s “Hammer” and Willie Nelson’s “Whiskey River.”
Check out the band’s MySpace page for a list of upcoming shows.