{"id":17123,"date":"2017-04-13T02:49:36","date_gmt":"2017-04-13T08:49:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lastbestnews.com\/site\/?p=17123"},"modified":"2017-04-13T02:49:36","modified_gmt":"2017-04-13T08:49:36","slug":"wibaux-band-rocks-the-gem-at-album-release-party","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/2017\/04\/wibaux-band-rocks-the-gem-at-album-release-party\/","title":{"rendered":"Wibaux band rocks the Gem at album-release party"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Gem\"<\/a>

Charlie Denison<\/p>

Might Big Jim (that’s Jim in the middle) and the Tall Boys perform at the Gem Theatre in Wibaux on Feb. 17.<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cShut up, dude, I\u2019m trying to listen to your song,\u201d a friend said as we were taking a seat at the Gem Theatre in Wibaux.<\/p>\n

An extension of the Beaver Creek Brewery, the Gem is host to fine dining and an impressive stage setup. On this particular night, the band belonged to brewery co-owner Jim Devine. At 6-foot-6, his friends have been known to call him \u201cMighty Big,\u201d a nickname he also uses for his band, Mighty Big Jim and the Tall Boys.<\/p>\n

Since we met in 2009, Jim and I have written a number of songs together, and his band put seven of them on their self-titled debut album. They were just getting started, playing the album in its entirety, starting with \u201cDyin\u2019 Town,\u201d when I walked in the door.<\/p>\n

My friends at the table were getting into it, and so was I, losing myself in the dark groove of the song, thinking back to when we wrote on a cold January night in Lewistown three years earlier.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was one of the worst drives I\u2019ve ever done,\u201d Jim said. \u201cThe roads were shit, but, if I had bailed, we wouldn\u2019t have those songs, Chuck.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another song that came out of that weekend was \u201cBeaten Down By Love,\u201d a cryptic, captivating heartbreak ballad that\u2019s also on the MBJ album.<\/p>\n

This one also caught my friend\u2019s attention.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s this one about?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s about my friend getting his heart broken in Memphis,\u201d I said. \u201cI hate Memphis.\u201d<\/p>\n

MBJ and the Tall Boys did the song justice. On the album, it\u2019s Jim\u2019s best vocal performance, and Casey\u2019s solo is ridiculous in all the right ways.<\/p>\n

Good to be home<\/h5>\n

Returning to the brewery for the first time in more than a year, one of the first things that struck me was how much the band had grown. Casey Malkuch, lead guitarist and vocalist, had never sounded better. Same goes for Jim, who also happens to be co-owner of the brewery and theater.<\/p>\n

Drummer Jayson Eslick and bassist Jon Redlin were also outstanding, keeping the beat while also adding personal flair over flavorful fills. They were in the pocket.<\/p>\n

Katelynne Eslick, Jayson\u2019s wife, excelled with her background vocals, stealing the show when it was her time to shine on Dolly Parton\u2019s \u201cJolene\u201d and the band\u2019s newest original, \u201cTake My Pain Away,\u201d which she co-wrote with the guys in Nashville.<\/p>\n

\"CapreAir_Variable\"<\/a><\/div><\/div>Katelynne, known best as \u201cPrincess Kate,\u201d is surrounded by family in the band. In addition to her husband being in the group, her father, Jamie Sharples, plays keys and organ. When they played The Band\u2019s \u201cThe Weight,\u201d he practically brought the house down, building the song up and giving it a \u201cHighway 61 Revisited\u201d edge.<\/p>\n

Versatile, talented and entertaining, Mighty Big Jim and the Tall Boys are exactly what you want for a house band. In a town of 600 just miles out from the North Dakota border, they\u2019re especially rare, and, on Feb. 17, they were very much appreciated.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s awesome to see so many people out,\u201d Jim said. \u201cWe should release a CD every week.\u201d<\/p>\n

The 11-song album (tracked at the Gem and mastered in Los Angeles) is almost all original, with the exception of \u201cJolene.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"CD\"<\/a>

Here\\’s the cover of the band\\’s CD.<\/p><\/div>\n

At the release party, as I said, they played every song on the CD. Playing this many originals in Eastern Montana doesn\u2019t happen very often\u2014unless you\u2019re a national act selling tickets\u2014but MBJ and the Tall Boys had the crowd with them from start to finish as they rocked out to \u201cMemphis,\u201d got down to the Wibaux funk on \u201cGet it Right,\u201d felt the easy groove of \u201cRiverwalk (the album version features Beach Boys session musician Randy Leago on sax),\u201d tripped to a Jerry Garcia-guitar inspired \u201cWrong Side of Town\u201d and shared a moment of reflection and hope with the heartbreaking yet optimistic \u201cWithout You Here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Being there for the show I was met with a sense of overwhelming pride. I was especially touched by the renditions of the songs Jim and I wrote together. Often I was struck with goosebumps, nodding my head and grinning.<\/p>\n

I stopped talking and let the music take me away, or take me back to when the songs were merely ideas. Now they become something more, something greater, and I dug it.<\/p>\n

So did my friend.<\/p>\n

\u201cNice song, dude,\u201d he said, bumping knuckles with me. We were in it together. It\u2019s in these moments we realize why we write songs in the first place, and I\u2019m excited to say there will be many more.<\/p>\n

Charlie Denison is a reporter for the Lewistown News-Argus and a singer-songwriter and guitarist.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cShut up, dude, I\u2019m trying to listen to your song,\u201d a friend said as we were taking a seat at the Gem Theatre in Wibaux. An extension of the Beaver Creek Brewery, the Gem is host to fine dining and an impressive stage setup. On this particular night, the band belonged to brewery co-owner Jim […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":17124,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,16],"tags":[5739,5740,1656,5741,1646],"class_list":["post-17123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","category-montana","tag-beaver-creek-brewery","tag-gem-theatre","tag-jim-devine","tag-mbj-and-the-tall-boys","tag-wibaux","prominence-category-featured"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17123"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17123\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17127,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17123\/revisions\/17127"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17124"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}