The Cate Brothers Band has eased off the throttle, but you can’t say the same for Earl Cate, the guitarist half of the Cate brothers. (Keyboardist Ernie, the other twin, got weary of life on the road earlier than Earl).
So because Earl could not find another musical Cate, he just assembled some other like-minded musicians and has kept on playing and touring. Some of his cohorts are familiar names; others, not so much. Terry Cagle, who plays the drums, is a nephew of the late Levon Helm, whom he both resembles and sounds like, which no one in the band or any of the fans are complaining about.
“We were playing at the King Biscuit Blues Festival in Helena last October and Bubba Sullivan, who has that great record store there, came up and said, ‘Your drummer sure sounds a lot like Levon!’ and I told him, ‘Well, he’s got a right to, since Levon was his uncle,’” Cate says. “And with that, he likes to sing a lot of songs by The Band, so we put their songs ‘Remedy’ ‘Shape I’m In’ and ‘Ophelia,’ on our first album and are considering several more, such as ‘King Harvest,’ ‘Don’t Do It’ and ‘The W.S. Walcott Medicine Show’ for the next album.
“Our lead singer, Jason Davis, sounds remarkably like my brother, so it was kind of an easy transition for me into this new band. He’s really good at picking songs people really haven’t heard that much. We’re playing mostly covers, but not the ‘classic rock’ stuff, which keeps it kind of fresh. So we’re getting plenty of work.”
Davis first came to the attention of music fans in Northwest Arkansas when he led a Lincoln, Neb., band,Baby Jason & the Spankers, who were frequently booked into the area and at the blues festivals in nearby Eureka Springs. When Davis met his future wife, Donna, while playing at Chelsea’s Corner club in Eureka Springs, it wasn’t long before he became an Arkansan. He now has a “day job” as manager of a Sound Warehouse store in Fayetteville.
Earl says, “When Ernie decided to retire from the road, Jason said, ‘Let’s do something,’ and he was the only one I would have considered putting a group together with. It’s a real plus that Jason has a great stage personality.”
Cate notes that another smooth transition came with the changing of bass players, when Mike Murray, who was in the group when the debut CD, Special Blend, was released, departed when he and his wife moved to Idaho. John Davies, who played bass inThe Cate Brothers for a dozen years, had moved from Little Rock back to Fayetteville, and stepped into his old job.
As for the group’s name, Cate says it happened in a seamless kind of way, when he and his musical pals would get together and play around Northwest Arkansas.
“It started off as get-togethers at George’s [Majestic Lounge] in Fayetteville,” Cate explains. “Jimmy Thackery, a guitarist friend of ours, said we should just call it Earl & Them, since everybody’s always asking, ‘Where are Earl and them playing ?’”
Thackery, who lives in Eureka Springs, sometimes sits in with Earl & Them, as does David Renko, who played saxophone in The Cate Brothers and also lives in Eureka Springs with his wife and two little girls. Renko also has a business building bike trails in several states.
Cate says the group is nearing completion of its second CD, with horns and backing vocals the only things that need to be added. A July release is planned.
Other gigs include Farm-Fest in Wynne on Friday, and three days of the forthcoming Eureka Blues Weekend, June 13-16 in Eureka Springs.
Meanwhile, Earl Cate reports his semiretired brother Ernie likes to do Cate Brothers shows on occasion, although he and his wife do a lot of traveling: “They recently celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary.”Earl & Them
9 p.m. Saturday, Stickyz
Rock ’n’ Roll Chicken
Shack, 107 River Market
Ave., Little Rock
Admission: $8
(501) 372-7707
Weekend, Pages 38 on 06/06/2013