The Red Bicycle offers three groups this weekend — the Port Angeles hillbilly jam-grass band Deadwood Revival, country rock’s Scattergun and Vashon’s own 5:01 with its characteristic country rock tunes.
Revival will kick into high gear at 9:30 p.m. Friday, Jan. 30, with a free event open only to those 21 years or older.
This award-winning band with Kim Trenerry, Jason Mogi, Ches Ferguson and Julie Campbell has an undeniable musical connection as they “dish up banjo pickin’, harmony singin’, spirit liftin’ new roots music,” said the show’s organizer Pete Welch.
The show features inventive twists on clawhammer banjo, acoustic guitar, bass and fiddle.
“The magnificent vocal blend between Kim and Jason is so powerful that their voices truly become one,” Welch said.
It’s not unusual to find the group starting a cozy Grateful Dead cover, traveling into an unscripted jam and easing into one of its own original tunes. In fact, the group has been invited to perform at a Dead festival this summer in California.
On Saturday, Scattergun will head up a Vashon CD release party for the group’s new album, “Live from the Lake.”
The band will give out free copies of the CD to the first 50 people who come to the show, which begins at 9:30 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 31.
Continuing to map the territory claimed by the likes of Lynyrd Skynyrd, ZZ Top and Bill Monroe, Scattergun puts the hot burn of a whiskey shot back into country rock, according to Welch.
The music of Scattergun gives a nod to the building blocks of country music’s namesakes and tradition, as well as more modern topics such as low-rise jeans, the need to fight corporate interests to save our small towns and the importance of bipartisan politics.
Scattergun’s style lands towards the rock end of country rock, which they have termed “biker country.”
At times serious, other times tongue-in-cheek, Scattergun makes no apologies.
And at 7 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 1, Vashon’s country-rock Island band 5:01 will perform at the Red Bicycle. The group’s vocally driven, rock-flavored music has an original sound, Welch said.
“Expect anything from true love to political commentary from this all-Island band,” Welch said.
5:01 is composed of Islanders Jack Barbash on piano, Doug Ringer on bass, Luke McQuillin on electric guitar, Mark Wells on acoustic guitar and Geordan Mitchell on percussion.
Designed to showcase Island talent, the Red Bike’s free Sunday night events run earlier — 7 to 9 p.m. — than other shows, which permits Islanders of all ages to attend.