Kenny Welch Band Goodbye Eastside...
Hello Nationwide.

All Apologies Eastsider’s... we dropped the ball on this one. The Kenny Welch Band’s faces should have graced our pages long before now. Not to mention last month we told you he was leaving in October to go on a national tour. Well we were half right. He is leaving to go on tour but not until January. You still have time to see the show at several area pubs, after that bye bye KWB.
For those of you who don’t know who the Kenny Welch Band even is don’t feel too bad... we didn’t either (and it’s our job to know these things). No
reason to panic, you still have time to go see KWB up close and damn personal but time is the key word.

We caught our first KWB show at K.C.s Pub. Kenny and the band made the pub feel more like a national act’s after party than a local pub band on a Friday night. You know the kind of after parties I’m talking about, like when Aerosmith plays Annies after their concert or Jimmy Buffett shows up at the Waterfront and jams with the Menus after his last Riverbend gig. KWB’s show has just that same feeling. It’s not hard to figure out why the shows are packed. KWB’s sound is “cutting edge country” at least that’s how I describe it, Kenny calls it rockabilly. Either way it’s fresh as grandma’s pie.
Just imagine if Toby Keith or Garth Brooks started singing and song writing for Lynyrd Skynyrd... and then brought in Angus Young to play lead guitar, you get the picture. Obviously the lead singer and frontman of the band is Kenny Welch. Kenny is pure chicken & biscuits. I bet he was “country when country wasn’t cool.” His Southern sound is soaked to the bone in sausage gravy. He’d feel right at home at the Grand Ole Opry and I’m sure they’d welcome him in as if he were kin.
The lead guitar player Ryan Hale is quite different. Even though he is dedicated to playing the awesome country cover hits and the just as awesome original country tunes on the KWB CD (Crank it Up) you can still hear the ghosts from years of loud rowdy rock-n-roll shining through Ryan’s strings.
Ryan would be just as at home on a Metallica stage as he would the KWB’s.
Kenny and Ryan aren’t the only talented members of the band. Marty Cummins soothes the bass, sings and wrote three of the six songs on the new CD. Rob Fancher also plays guitar, sings and keeps the country sound authentic with his laid back down home style not to mention his country smile. Sitting in the back keeping the beat is Peter Otmar. Pete just can’t be beat. He’s been playing in Australia but he sounds more Austin than Aussie to me.
The mix of Kenny’s country twang and Ryans six string stang is what gives The Kenny Welch Band their cutting edge country sound. They play country for the new era of country fans. Kenny explains, “You see a lot of 80’s big hair guitar players in the country music scene today... all those guys who were rockin in the Motley Crue and Metallica type bands have now moved into country.” In fact, Bret Michaels, Kid Rock, David Lee Roth, Bon Jovi, Sheryl Crow and even Hootie & the Blowfish are putting out country records now and the fans have never been happier.
The record labels were plenty happy themselves when they got an earful of KWB’s new CD. The band passed on the the Hank Williams lonely draw and took on more of Hank Jr.’s “lets party ya’ll” attitude towards song writing. Tracks off the cd like “Crank It Up” and “Country Girls” are far more party hearty than the older poor me country sound. Party hard is the name of the game but the ballad is still the staple single. KWB has a hell of one with “Angel of my Life.” It will have all the ladies’s mascara running and will surely be released to radio right away.
If you don’t have the CD get it. It’s great music and it might turn out to be one of those really cool collectibles later when KWB is really big. If you get it at the show the band will happily autograph it and even pose for a photo with you and your friends to slip inside the cover. You still have time to see the live show in all it’s glory at several Eastside locations. You had better get to the shows because KWB has no less than 3 major record deal offers from RCA, Epic and Atlantic. Depending on which deal the band chooses they’ll be paired up with Toby Keith, Keith Little, Rascal Flatts and more. Good job guys... damn good job. I can’t wait for the real after party show when ya’ll play Riverbend. I’m certain it will be here on the Eastside where it all got started!

October dates.
Oct. 5th McNamara’s
Irish Pub.
Oct. 12th KC’s Pub.
Oct. 13th Uncle Sams Tavern
Oct. 27th Hammersville Dance
Nov. 10th
KC’s Pub
Don’t miss it!