Everlast Calilhanna Marketing Everlast

Erik Schrody was as surprised as anyone
when he first heard the sounds on Everlast's
new record, Whitey Ford Sings The Blues.
Schrody, a.k.a. Everlast, had broken away
from his five-year ride with L.A.-based House
Of Pain and was in New York with Dante
Ross and John Gamble recording
a solo
album when things took a left turn.
"We were just making a straight hip~hop
record. and I was literally sitting in Dante's
living room one night strumming my guitar
singing 'What It's Like,'"
says Schrody,
drinking a coke on the second floor of The
Pontiac Grille in Philadelphia. "He came out
like. 'What the hell is that?' He was like,
'Dude, tomorrow I want to cut that.'''
What Ross was hearing was something
pretty unusual,
a rap artist writing melodic
ditties on an acoustic guitar. Ross heard an
artist breaking out of some of the rap stereo~
types, lyrically and stylistically,
and envi·
sioned music defying classification as solely
rap or acoustic rock.
Schrody resisted recording the song. but
Ross persevered. After the tracks were laid
down, Schrody recalls. "It just came out so
good. I started realizing that all the music I've
ever listened to in my life was starting to
evolve with the hip-hop. My father was into
Neil Young and country. Then I got into
Kiss, Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath before
I ever got into rap. I always kept them sepa~
rate. But now I was like, 'Let's rry to incorpo·
rate a Neil Young kind of vibe into hip-hop.
Let's try to incorporate a country vibe into
hip hop.' Ideas just kept popping up. This
was not planned."
The result is an impressively introspective
and mature acoustic/rap/hip-hop
album. To
Schrody's credit, ir sounds remarkably organ·
ic in a climate where rap/rock is quickly
becoming taboo. Whitey Ford Sings The
Blues. released in September on Tommy Boy
Records, manages to imbue an honest folk
element while delivering
real rap. It's a
strange mixture. and even Schrody is sur·
prised it's been received so warmly right from
the start.
"The reception of this has been great,"
beams Schrody. peering up from under the
brim of his worn black and brown leather
hat. "I thought 1 was going to get a lot more
resistance on this. We thought the record
would have to prove itself. But I can feel the
buzz. You know, right before the water boils.
It's a good thing. I'm very happy right now."
Schrody has many reasons to be happy.
First of all. he's alive. With one day left for
recording, a congenital heart condition sent
Schrody to the hospital for emergency open·
heart surgery, during which a faulty heart
valve was replaced by a mechanical one. The
seriousness of all this is thrown into greater
perspective
when listening to the album.
While it certainly isn't uncommon to find
numerous references to violence and death in
rap music, there is an eerieness
to the
"We thought the
record would have
to prove Itself. But I
can feel the buzz"
redemptive tone on tracks like "What It's
Like" and "Today (Watch Me Shine)." The
personal references to death on "Painkillers"
and "Death Comes Callin'" are also a little
bit unsettling.
Many things distinguish
Whitey Ford
Sings The Blues as atypical, from the hiphop, acoustic·framed
arrangements
to the
revealing lyrics on "The Letter" and the
swing feel and live horns on "7 Years." In
conjunction with the release of the album,
Schrody embarked on a mini~tour of small
venues spanning a few weeks. covering terri~
tory from Tulsa, Ok., to New York. The live
arrangement
includes Schrody on guitar,
Bran "Mr. White Folks" Tieman on lap steel
and electric guitar, Kelly "Rusty" Logsdon
on bass, Paul "Pablo" Legaspi on drums,
Keith "Keefus" Ciancia on keyboards and
Pat "Truly Odd" Freitas spinning as d.j. The
pre~tour has given the band a chance to
develop a personality around the material,
and there are confirmed dates upcoming with
The Urge.
"The band is so tight now it's not even
funny," brags Schrody. "The band wasn't
part of the record, but I plan on keeping
these guys with me for a long time.
They're beautiful people. They're virtuosos
at what they do, and I can say that with
the utmost confidence.
"They're from different schools of music,
but when all of us get up there. it just happens. Wirh my knowledge
and the d.j.'s
knowledge
of hip-hop. and my lap steel
guy's knowledge of the blues, and the key·
board and drummer's
knowledge of jazz,
and the bass player's all over the place just
swinging, we get this vibe that really, well...
it's unique."
With a new band, a new sound and a new
heart. it isn't cliche to say Schrody has a new
lease on life. Schrody's been through plenty
in the past two years. and this album is a
musical chronicle of it, successfully transcending genres and stereotypes.
Schrody seems to have learned something
from all of this. as well. "You know,"
Schrody says as the conversation starts heading for a close. "everybody walks around saying. 'You might step off the curb and get hit
by a bus tomorrow.'
But for most people
that's not tangible. It's just something they
say, like 'knock on wood.' But for me it's a
little more tangible. When I go to sleep at
night, you know, there's a slight chance that I
really might not wake up tomorrow.
Supposedly I'm healthier than I was before
because I don't have a heart defect anymore.
But that thought flashes through your mind.
When you go to bed one night and wake up
five days later in the hospital, it makes it a littie more real."
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