JoBu: Press

who: JoBu
what: rock reggae
where: Sidetracks
when: Friday and Saturday, August 28 and 29

JoBu:
A Jamming Back-to-school Tradition

by Leah Williams Wright

Sick of school already? To usher in the new academic year, a former Southern Illinois band is providing twice the entertainment for those suffering from the end-of-the-summer blues.

JoBu is set to come back to their old stomping grounds to play twice this weekend, performing Friday and Saturday, August 28 and 29 at Sidetracks. The rock-reggae mix and uplifting, catchy lyrics put together the perfect party atmosphere.

"We are a mix of rock and reggae," bassist Andrew Neel said. "We like to throw everything we got at people. If Sublime and 311 had a baby, that would be JoBu."

JoBu-- also featuring Aaron VanVooren on lead vocals and guitar, Matt Hines on lead guitar, Evan Ryan on drums and percussion, and newest member Kevin McHugh on keyboards-- has been on the touring circuit for a number of years now. But JoBu began in October 2005 while VanVooren, Neel, and Hines were all in the same place at the same time-- Carbondale. VanVooren was taking his solo act on the road while Neel and Hines were working on their bachelor degrees in music at Southern Illinois University, from which both later graduated.

JoBu then relocated to central Illinois for easy accessibility to the Saint Louis, Indianapolis and Chicago markets.

Since they left the 'Dale, the band's MySpace page surpassed the two-hundred-thousand hit mark. They broadened their touring, performing at shows stretching the length of the continental United States, from a block party in Minneapolis to welcoming in the New Year in Key West, Florida.

According to the band's website, the opening track from their first studio album, Stop Time, "Voices," was selected as the anthem for the 2009 Great American Barbecue. The annual event, held at the largest venue in the state of Kansas, the Capital Federal Park at Sandstone in Kansas City, is the second-largest barbecue festival in the world. JoBu was asked to play twice during the festivities this last Memorial Day weekend, and the audience totaled more than one-hundred-thousand.

Recently they nabbed a regular gig at the Canopy Club in Champaign, playing every Monday night.

They also share the same living quarters, which has its share of both convenience and hairy situations.

"It consists of being around each other a lot," Neel said. "We work together, play together, live together. It's a lot of each other, but it works somehow."

Neel said the two-night stand at Sidetracks during the opening weekend of the fall semester has become a sort of tradition for the band.

"It's going to be great," he said. "We are really looking forward to coming back and rocking out."

Within the next year, JoBu plans to release their sophomore album, which Neel described as a new direction for the band.

"It's a whole different ballgame," Neel said of the new sound. "It's a bit more radio-friendly, less instrumental than on the first album. It's catchy. We are trying to be more listener-friendly."

For more information, log on to .

"Hang Easy" a track from our new album Stop Time was rated in the Top Ten Albums for the Reggae and Jam Band catagories.

JoBu to jam at Hangar 9 tonight
Audra Ord
Issue date: 9/11/08 Section: Pulse
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Media Credit: Provided photo
JoBu

The lifespan of a local band is generally a short one: a band is formed, it jams at small venues for a while, maybe makes a demo, has some kind of dramatic falling-out and disbands.

Fortunately, this is not the case for JoBu, a four-man jam band formed in Carbondale in 2005 and has since relocated to Champaign with the hopes of making it big. The group returns to its roots tonight with a show at Hangar 9.

JoBu hits the stage at 11 p.m. tonight with acoustic guitarist Ben Grant providing the opening entertainment. There is a cover charge for this performance.

The band debuted in Carbondale three years ago after three of the members - bassist Andrew Neel, guitarist Matt Hines, and guitarist/vocalist Aaron Vanvooren - met through the classical guitar program and began playing together, Vanvooren said. Drummer Evan Ryan joined the band in August 2007.

"We started off playing parties and smaller venues in Carbondale. We weren't really doing it too seriously," Vanvooren said.

He said the name JoBu comes from the movie "Major League," in which one of the players on the team worships a god named JoBu. People still come up to the band during shows and quote the movie, Vanvooren said.

Eventually, though, JoBu's popularity grew, and the band began playing more shows at bigger venues in the region. They now tour the entire Midwest.

In the past year, JoBu has played in six states and performed more than 100 shows, Vanvooren said.

"This is our job. This is what pays the bills. We're fortunate enough to have it be what we love doing," Ryan said.

The four members of the band live together in a house in Champaign, according to Ryan, and having Vanvooren is something that contributes to the success of their music.

Ryan said the band members spend 80 percent of their time together, whether they're eating, watching TV or driving to one of their many shows.

"We're all best friends," Ryan said. "What we strive to do is create music of best friends ... you need to know somebody inside and out before you can really play music with them."

Jobu cannot be placed in any one musical genre, Ryan said. He said they are mostly categorized as a rock/reggae band, but they also play bluegrass, fusion, jazz, punk and R&B.

"Our motto is creating positive music for positive people. We just want people to have fun, get down, enjoy and be with friends," Ryan said.

Most of the songs the group performs live are original tunes, though they do perform two or three covers a night, Vanvooren said.

Ryan said the goal for their shows is to have fun, and they hope everyone in the audience has a great time, too.

"Coming back to our hometown - Carbondale is where it started. The crowds there are insane. We need to bring that atmosphere everywhere," Ryan said.

To learn more about JoBu or to hear their music, visit their Web sites at http://www.jobumusic.com or http://myspace.com/jobujams. Their album, "Stop Time," is available on iTunes and Amazon.com.

Audra Ord can be reached at 536-3311 ext. 275 or at amarie06@siu.edu.


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Jobu to play at Uptowner
Rock/reggae style of choice for 3-year-old group

Carbondale-based band, JoBu, is attempting to accomplish something that is very rare in today's music scene. The boys of JoBu are attempting to get fans of all types of music to listen to their rock/reggae/fusion sound.

"We encourage fans of music ranging from heavy metal to funk to come and have a listen," said Evan Ryan, drummer and percussion player for JoBu. "We try to incorporate all kinds of music into our sound, we really don't like to be held back by any limitations.

"We want to try and write music for the masses."

JoBu has been a band since 2005 and the band's current lineup has been intact since 2007. The band is made up of Aaron VanVooren (lead vocals/guitar), Matt Hines (lead guitar/vocals), Andrew Neel (bass) and Evan Ryan (drums). JoBu can be seen at 10 p.m. Saturday at Mac's Uptowner.

Each member of JoBu knew that at an early age, they wanted to play music. VanVooren and Hines both picked up the guitar at age 12, while Neel began his exploration of the bass in grade school. Evan Ryan took his first interest in the drums at the age of 4.

One thing JoBu tries to do that is different from the typical jam/rock scene is the strong emphasis on structuring their songs.

"We try to use a different setup on stage that focuses on communication between all of us," Ryan said. "We focus a lot on writing transitions and knowing what each other will do during these parts. Not to say that we don't allow for extended jams, but we try to stay on the same page."

JoBu is no stranger to touring either; it has traveled extensively throughout the Midwest. The band acknowledged that the touring puts strain on other relationships, but that " only makes us appreciate the people close to us that much more."

JoBu is fresh off an 11-day, nine-show tour that left the band appreciating crowds of all sizes.

"Even if there are only six people in attendance, as long as they feel it, then our job is done," Ryan said. "Obviously, nothing tops the hometown crowd, but we enjoy the hard touring schedule."

The habit of a constant touring schedule has paid off for the band with an appearance at the 2007 Summer Camp in Chillicothe.

"We really enjoyed the atmosphere of the place and it was a truly inspiring event," Ryan said.

JoBu currently has one album out on the market that can be purchased on I-tunes or at the band's Web site, www.jobumusic.com. The album is titled, "Stop Time," and was recorded in January at the Institute of Production and Recording in Minneapolis. The album took nine days to record and it left the band with an accomplished feeling.

"We believe it to be a great first album; in a way, it's kind of our baby," Ryan said.

who: JoBu
what: jam-rock CD release party
where: Sidetracks
when: Friday and Saturday, May 2 and 3

JoBu's Big Trip
words by T.J. Jones
pictures by Thomas Horan

Since 2005, JoBu has been playing a fusion of rock, reggae, and funk in Southern Illinois and the greater Midwest region. JoBu, which consists of lead guitarist and vocalist Aaron VanVooren, guitarist and vocalist Matt Hines, bassist Andrew Neel, and percussionist Evan Ryan, will play two shows on Friday May 2 and Saturday May 3 at Sidetracks in celebration of the release of their first CD. CDs will be on sale for $10 and T-shirts will be $15. More on JoBu can be found at .
Nightlife recently spoke with percussionist Evan Ryan about their new album, the road, and what it's like to play on TV.

So what's it like releasing your first album?
It was phenomenal. It was the first album for the band. It was a bunch of fun. We went out to Minneapolis for nine days and spent one-hundred-and-eight hours in the studio and got ten tracks done. [It's] some real cool music that we hope people will like- we love it. It was a great opportunity and a great learning experience and it made the band more of a family.

All of the members of your band have studied music, either classical guitar or percussion. How does that knowledge help you play jam rock, or how does that set you apart from other jam bands?
We have a constant effort towards going outside of the box. In a musical standpoint, [we're] playing things in different keys and different modes and experimenting with different sounds and pushing our musicality as far as we can.
I think that's what sets us apart because we have a very structured thing- our songs are very structured. But then we'll go in and have an extended jam session, but in that jam session there are different peaks and valleys and plateaus. It's a very big trip- that's what we like to call it.
It's like taking the audience on a rollercoaster. We want the audience to go on an emotional rollercoaster while they're watching us. We want you to be really excited, then we want you to calm down a little, and we want to throw some things that are really nuts and crazy at you, then we bring it back down. What sets us apart [from other jam bands] is that we design sets based around emotions. I'm a jazz drummer so I bring a lot of jazz influences and feelings towards the music.
We have many different personalities in the band. We mesh really well together, the four of us, musically and personally. We all live together and we're pretty much around each other twenty-four hours a day. If it's not playing music, it's sitting in from of the living room watching TV. If it's not that, it's on the road touring. We all work very well together and that's so important for a band- being able to understand the person sitting next to you or standing next to you playing and knowing subconsciously where he's going with the music and you try to follow that or you try to lead.
It's all about giving and taking and leading and following or sitting in the background or being in the forefront. We really understand that and we write that way. We listen to a lot of music and we think, 'Yeah, I think they should have stopped sixteen bars ago.' We're very critical, of our music more than anything. If we're down in the basement trying to figure something out and if we hear it going too long or doing something we don't like, one of us will stop and say, 'That doesn't sound right. Let's try to fix it.'
We're a very understanding band when it comes to the writing process and the playing process. We just want the music to come out- that's all. We just want to play a great show. None of us want to show off. We're just playing what comes to us. I think that's what makes us different from other bands.

What's it been like being on tour throughout the Midwest in the last eight months?
It's been a phenomenal experience, a hilarious experience, a bad experience. We'll have a good show in the Quad Cities and then drive to Bloomington and have nine people show up to a concert. Then we're in Charleston and playing for two-hundred people. It's very up and down right now. We're a developing band and this is our first CD that is going to be out for the masses. It's going to be on CDBaby.com and Amazon.com. So we're getting into those things- trying to get on the radio stations. We're just trying to get that fan base out and that's how we're going to get a lot more people at shows. [Almost] everyone we see at shows we've seen multiple times, which is good for us because we know that they enjoy what they [previously] saw and they want to see it again. And then they bring a couple people. That's the name of the game.
It's rough. We drive all weekend. We'll leave on a Wednesday or Thursday and not come back until Sunday. We put nine-hundred to sixteen-hundred miles on my truck every weekend, and that's just constantly being in the car with each other. And that makes the band better, too. It gets everybody to know each other so much more on an intimate level. That helps the music so much more because you know everything about each other. It's such a great experience- the people and the bands. You never know who you're going to meet. We could play a show for nine people and one of the people in the audience could be a record executive. We have a motto going into shows- 'Play every show like it's your first show.' That's because no matter how many times we play our songs, it's always somebody's first time hearing us. We want the audience to say, 'Wow, at my first JoBu show it seemed like it was the band's first show,' what with the excitement and energy level. I think it just makes us better musicians. The more we play and the more we learn and the better we get.
Performing is a huge aspect of it. You don't just go up and play your instruments. It's interacting with the crowd and making the crowd feel like their part of the show and giving the show to the crowd. We're out there doing what we love and the crowd wouldn't watch it if it wasn't fun to watch. That's what you have to do.

You've also recently played a show for PBS.
We're the first band that WSIU asked to come and play in their new local-band show. We went in for about three hours and played about five tunes and had an interview and talked about what's happening with the band. That's going to be airing in June and we're looking forward to be seeing it.

Jobu @ Tres 7-24-08
"Stop Time"

The night of reggae music continues at a Mexican bar just across town called Tres Hombres. The band Jobu was playing their style of reggae for the Carbondale crowd. Jobu and I met a few years ago, after a show at Sidetrack's. Since then they have expanded their range as a band and the range of venues they perform. Before the show I asked them if I could do some filming of the show. They said it was fine with them, as long as I got there early since it gets crowded quickly in Tres. Kyle and I used two cameras to capture the genius of Jobu. We made it to the show around 10 p.m, the band had just started their set while we begun filming. They started the set with an original song off the album Stop Time, called "Voices". The recording I got from this show looks amazing and has great sound quality. Jobu has been packing venues in Carbondale since 2006. In order to find new avenues to spread the music upon, they have decided to move their way to Champaign, Illinois. It didn't take long for the bar to fill with beautiful women, party people and other film crews. After they jammed a few original tunes, Jobu would play a few covers including Blind Melons "No Rain". The reggae twist to this song made it easy to dance to, but hard to film the band with a dance floor packed with people. The drummer in the band, Evan shows true expression while we knocking out half of the rhythm section in the band. Bassist Andrew Neel showcases his ability to carry the rhythm section to new heights while holding the two guitarists simultaneously. Aaron and Matt strings together a masterpiece every time playing each show like its a special event. They would play two sets that night, including the title track of their album "Stop Time".