MUSIC

Brick Fields adds Chosen Ones

Brick Fields and The Chosen Ones includes (from left, top row): Rachel Fields, Larry Brick, Lee Christienson and Jennifer Parker; (bottom row) Be Nito and Matt Jenkins
Brick Fields and The Chosen Ones includes (from left, top row): Rachel Fields, Larry Brick, Lee Christienson and Jennifer Parker; (bottom row) Be Nito and Matt Jenkins

The Brick Fields band has expanded its holdings from its new base in Fayetteville, and is now known as Brick Fields and The Chosen Ones.

Led by Rachel Fields and her husband, Larry Brick, the band has a show Friday night in Hot Springs, where Brick once lived and the couple have been hoping to arrange a show for years. Brick and Fields began their musical odyssey in Eureka Springs and moved to Fayetteville in recent months. Now they have taken on new members.

“The new name came to me and Larry one day when I was joking around about Larry coming from Jewish descent and Be Nito being from Israel,” Fields says. “I said we were blessed because we had God’s people in the group. Larry says, ‘Yes, it’s Brick Fields and The Chosen Ones.’ Ha! It’s stuck.”

The Chosen Ones include Nito on harmonica, Jennifer Parker on bass and backing vocals, Matt Jenkins on keyboards and Lee Christienson on drums. Fields sings lead vocals and plays flute and guitar, and Brick plays lead guitar.

With two albums so far, Fields and Brick have taken the new lineup into the recording studio, she says, and a new CD is coming right along. Guest artists on the album include Earl Cate on electric guitar; John Davies, who plays in Cate’s band, Earl & Them, on bass; RJ Mischo on harmonica; and Barbara Raney on backing vocals.

“Barbara sang on the song,‘Cindy’s Cryin’,’ which was a 1960s hit by the Deepwater Reunion group,” Fields says. “And we’ve lined up vocal contributions from Carrie Roberts, Rain Equine, Jody Andrews, Amanda Rey Leah Spears and Jennifer Parker. We’ll be doing a song by the godmother of rock ’n’ roll, Sister Rosetta Tharp, who was from Arkansas, and we’re covering a Lightnin’ Hopkins song to which I’ve added two verses.

“The best news is that I’m including a tune, ‘Lottie Day,’ by my late uncle, Mike ‘Burger’ Scoggins, who originally recorded it with Barbara Raney singing with him.”

Fields says the group will travel from Hot Springs to Ponca to perform at the Buffalo River Acoustic Music Summit Festival on Saturday, followed by a gospel/blues show in Eufaula, Okla., Sunday at First United Methodist Church. The group will then play that night at D.C. Minner’s Dusk Till Dawn Blues Festival in Rentiesville, Okla.

Brick and Fields last performed in central Arkansas on Feb. 1 at The Afterthought in Little Rock and at the “Let It Rip” tribute to Burger on April 9 at the White Water Tavern.

Headlining act Interstate Buffalo, based in Little Rock, consists of West Memphis native Jack Poff on lead vocals and rhythm guitar, Vilonia native Nick Reeves on drums, Chris “Scooter” Chandler on bass and Stephen Compton, a local guitar instructor and native of Abilene, Texas, on lead guitar. The group, originally an acoustic blues cover band that formed in 2006, recorded its first full-length album in 2012.

The band cites as its major musical influences The Allman Brothers Band, Widespread Panic, The Drive-By Truckers, Albert King and R.L. Burnside.

Interstate Buffalo

Opening act: Brick Fields and The Chosen Ones 9 p.m. Friday, Maxine’s, 700 Central Ave., Hot Springs Admission: $5 (501) 321-0909 maxineslive.com

Weekend, Pages 34 on 08/29/2013

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