The members of Steep Ravine, who met at UCSC, have moved to the East Bay to pursue their career. They’ll return for a show at the Kuumbwa on Friday.
It’s become clear to Steep Ravine that being an acoustic band has its advantages.
The band formed in Santa Cruz in December 2012, and after deciding they wanted to give a legitimate shot to doing music full-time, they all moved into a small house in the East Bay late last fall. This way, their thinking went, they’d be more centrally located in the Bay Area music scene.
Of course, their biggest concern was how they would pay rent while still building up a fan base. Someone got the idea to start busking at the Montgomery BART Station, which thanks to their completely acoustic, highly mobile set-up, they can do on any given weekday. Steep Ravine—which consists of Jan Purat on violin, Simon Linsteadt on acoustic guitar/lead vocals, Alex Bice on upright bass and Andy O’Brien on the mandolin—can comfortably pluck away at their instruments at the BART station. But it beats working 9 to 5.
“We call it our 5 to 9. There’s a lot of people going to work in the morning, and people are so refreshed to see a rad band playing. We’ve gotten so much positive feedback. People will email us, like, ‘I just got fired from my job and seeing you guys just made my day much better,’” says Purat.
They entertain commuters during rush hour with a combination of old-timey country tunes, gypsy jazz standards and some Steep Ravine originals, which are modernized, lush, bluegrass-inspired folk tunes with a dash of jazz influence. They usually head over once or twice a week, and on those days they have to wake up at 4:30 in the morning in order to secure the sweet spot before anyone else does. The pay isn’t bad, either. It’s enough to keep the lights on at their house.
Meanwhile, the band did an extensive 40-day tour last summer. Plus, they released their debut full length, Trampin’ On, last October. They are having their Santa Cruz album release show this Friday at the Kuumbwa Jazz Center.
They’ve been working with a promoter to push the album, and have sent it to over a hundred stations in the country, with a couple focus tracks. They’ve been in the top 50 for independent Americana airplay, so far peaking at number 35. “Prairie Road,” an old timey country jam, and “Waiting Blues” a bluegrass-ballad, so far have gotten the strongest reaction from stations and fans across the nation.
“We’re really trying to establish ourselves and get a name for ourselves. If we’re going to do it, now’s the time to do it, and see what we can make happen. So far it’s been a really positive experience,” Purat says.
The songwriting style on Trampin’ On is very much in line with Neil Young and James Taylor, two of Linsteadt’s biggest influences, but the instrumentation is more like a traditional bluegrass group. Their sound is warm and more nuanced in a way not typical to bluegrass, which was achieved in part by their choice of recording studio: Tiny Telephone, John Vanderslice’s San Francisco studio popular with indie-rock and experimental post-rock bands.
“We liked the idea of using a studio that’s had a lot of experience with other types of music as well, because we feel like our sound isn’t really limited to that specific genre,” says Purat.
It makes sense, too, because the quartet only recently discovered bluegrass. The members grew up listening to jazz, classical music, jam bands and folksy singer-songwriters. Other than Purat and Linsteadt, who were friends in high school, the group met at UCSC where they all were studying music. One of the attractions they had to bluegrass was the sheer technicality of it, particularly compared to a lot of the newer Americana folk artists they were familiar with.
“After a while we delved into the roots of where that music came from,” says Purat. “Learning to play bluegrass was just an awesome challenge. We already had pretty awesome chops on our instruments, but not in that specific style. It’s so different than anything else, than jazz, new folk. It’s kind of its own style.”
The group is really looking forward to their Kuumbwa album release show. Even though Richmond is where they lay their heads at night, Santa Cruz is still their hometown.
“We would probably still live there, but we found ourselves driving up here so much for gigs, it wasn’t really worthwhile for us to stay in Santa Cruz, although we love it down there so much,” Purat says.
Steep Ravine plays Friday, Jan. 24 at the Kuumbwa in Santa Cruz.
