New CD collects vintage Peabody Band tunes
New CD collects vintage Peabody Band tunes
In the mid-to late Seventies, the Ithaca music scene featured two high-spirited, freewheeling original music ensembles: the Zobo Funn Band and the Peabody Band. The groups had dedicated—and overlapping—followings who attended their gigs at Cornell and in local clubs like the Haunt and the Rongovian Embassy, where "Zobo dancing" and other hippie hijinks prevailed.
In 2004, Zobo Funn keyboardist David Arnay revisited some of the group's recordings from that era and released a CD called Live at the Haunt. This year, Arnay did the same for the Peabody Band, culling fourteen songs from 1975 and 1977 tapes to release a CD called Archives on his N Studio Records label. Arnay, who is married to Peabody Band vocalist Jill Ganon, says both collections are reminders of the "wacky, crazy, fun" music that was heard on and around campus during that era, noting that many of the Peabody Band's most memorable gigs were in the Straight's Memorial Room.
The Peabody Band had eight members, most of whom still live in the Ithaca area, including principal songwriters Danny Speer and Chris Broadwell (now the proprietor of Ithaca Guitar Works), drummer Mark Sammo (who operates Matrix Studio), and the three Aceto brothers: Harry, Eric, and Robby, all of whom have numerous musical projects. Their Peabody Band music is quirky, fluid folk-rock with often ingenious arrangements, many of them featuring multi-part vocals and melodic violin solos by Eric Aceto. If some of the songs go on for too long or have too many solos, they still constitute "a rousing late hurrah for the counterculture," as Arnay writes in the liner notes.
To celebrate the release of Archives, six members of the Peabody Band got together to play at the Rongo in December. It was, says Arnay, a "rousing success," and future reunions are possible—as are more CD releases of material from the Zobo Funn Band and Peabody Band tapes. Both CDs are available from CD Baby (www.cdbaby.com); all proceeds are being donated to diabetes research in memory of Zobo Funn Band guitarist-vocalist Jeremy Werbin, who died from complications of the disease.
{mp3}Brand_New_Good_Time_Music{/mp3}
Brand New Good Time Music (4:32)