With numerous blogs and coverage throughout the city, Baton Rouge’s varied music scene is continuously brought into the light. Bands made up of students are quickly sprouting up in apartment buildings, practicing and grooming their musical prowess.
These tight-knit groups often collaborate and form additional bands and side projects, helping to add to Baton Rouge’s supply of local entertainment.
Usually, these offshoots result in shared members. One example is Levee Daze, a band that shares drummer Scott Graves from popular jazz-rock band Burris.
Graves and his band mates Dom DeJulilio, John Trufant and Andrew Borniak come together to bring a blues and funk sound that exhibits the members’ influences.
After devoting months to schoolwork and practice, Levee Daze is ready to release its full-length eponymous debut March 21. The release will be celebrated with a much-anticipated party at Chelsea’s Cafe.
The Daily Reveille sat down with Levee Daze to chat about the new EP.
The Daily Reveille: What do you guys think makes you sound like what you sound like?
John Trufant: Well, we’re all inspired by a lot of different music, a lot of different genres, and it’s pretty hard to specify.
TDR: What music do you all like?
Andrew Borniak: Funk, rock, reggae, blues, jazz, bluegrass, classical…
Scott Graves: There really isn’t a genre we haven’t touched. As an over-arching genre when people have asked, I tend to call it a funky psychedelic rock. But, I mean, of course, that leaves out a large amount of elements that we’re very influenced by. If you come to a show, you will hear a grab bag of genres. Latin breaks, even. It’s very hard to pin down, which is, you know, what everybody says about their own music.
TDR: Friday is a big night for you.
Graves: We’re releasing our debut record.
Trufant: All of us recorded it in Austin.
Borniak: Two days.
Graves: Two eight-hour days. Seven songs.
Trufant: It’s our debut release. It’s definitely meant to be listened to all in a row, like some songs bleed into others. It’s got a couple of instrumentals and a lot of singers, a reggae awesome surprise in the middle.
TDR: How long had you been working on the album?
Trufant: There are songs from the years before [the members met] and some as close as the last year.
Borniak: We have like 20 or 30 songs we could have chosen, but we chose these because we felt like they go together.
Graves: They fit very well together. They flow really well together and the record definitely is meant to be listened to from top to bottom. It sounds very cohesive that way, almost like it tells a tale. It’s a logical progression the way the music moves. The record makes sense.
TDR: Do you see this as a big progression for the band?
Borniak: It’s been a long process. I don’t want to jinx anything and say this is our skyrocket, but we’ve been waiting for this for a while so we can give it to people. There’s definitely going to be more people.
Graves: It’s well produced. We had some really brilliant engineers that we worked with for this. It’s exciting. We’ve never heard music of our own sound as good as this. In a way, it’s good that we played so hard and so much and for so long before we went into cut an official debut record because we went in there and sounded really tight and good. Like we’re seasoned at playing together.
Trufant: We want this [Friday] to be our biggest show. We’ve got lots of merchandise for people. The first 250 people get a free copy of the album with their cover.
Levee Daze’s debut was recorded in Austin, Texas at Eastern Suns Studios. Prior to the release of “Levee Daze,” the band’s biggest event was a performance at last year’s Groovin’ on the Grounds alongside acts like Yelawolf, Lupe Fiasco and Grace Potter. The band’s show at Chelsea’s Cafe will have a $7 cover. Music will begin at 10 p.m. with local act Machete. Levee Daze’s performance will feature accompaniment by other local musicians, including Ben Herrington from Minos the Saint, Captain Green and Chris Polk of Speakeasy.

Gallery • 5 Photos

Charles Champagne

Levee Daze pianist Dominic DeJulio practices Tuesday, March 19, 2014 in preparation for their show Friday, March 21, 2014 at Chelseas Cafe on Perkins Road.