Untitled Document
Michael Davis was bitten by the music bug in middle
school, but he was nearing his college graduation before he actually put
his music out for the world to hear.
The Petersburg native self-produced a CD of original
songs, then sent it to music-business types around the country. A call came
in from producer Todd Joos at Cellar Records, an independent record label
based in Dixon, Ill. After a weekend visit to the studio facility and a
visit with Joos of an hour or so, Davis was ready.
“You know how it is when things just fit and
you know it?” he asks. “I called Todd on Monday and said,
‘Let’s do it.’ ”
Using musicians affiliated with Joos and Cellar
Studios (and juggling coursework as he made his way through his final year
at Peoria’s Bradley University), Davis spent several months
recording; One Down, the finished product, came out on April 15, and it’s a
fine representation of the young artist’s take on the world. “In my head I heard a piano song or drums and
guitar and with the studio guys we shot ideas off of each other without
egos,” he says. “They liked that I had the songs already
written before coming to the studio. We had so much fun recording the
album.”
Davis, who majored in Web design and graphic arts,
recently graduated from Bradley and has started full-time work in Peoria.
Through college connections and networking at IllinoisMusicians.com
he’s found a working band, and he now spends a couple of weekends a
month out playing and promoting the CD. No
Cover magazine picked him for a spot on a
compilation CD, Boom Boom Records tapped him for a world-hunger-relief
benefit disk, and Davis just got word that one of his songs, “Bob
Dylan,” will get airplay on St. Louis community radio station KDHX-FM
(www.kdhx.org). “It’s weird to say my career is the best
it’s been,” he says, “but there’s all kinds of
stuff happening right now. It’s great.”
In the good-things-keep-happening category, not long
ago Davis, driving in Chicago, passed a Borders bookstore and noticed that
Matt Nathanson, a nationally known San Francisco-based singer/songwriter
and Davis’ personal musical hero, was scheduled for a meet-and-greet
there. He immediately headed into the store and got in as one of 30
fortunate souls allowed to visit with Nathanson. The ambitious novice took
the golden opportunity to question the successful, established
professional. “I asked him for one piece of advice, and he
told me to make my music the way I want to now,” Davis says.
“Everything he’s done, getting where he is, was on his own. I
aspire to that kind of career.”
Michael Davis performs with his band 8 p.m.-midnight
Friday, June 8, at City Nights, in the Capital City Bar & Grill, 3149
S. Dirksen Pkwy. (217-529-8580).
Contact Tom Irwin at tirwin@illinoistimes.com.
This article appears in May 31 – Jun 6, 2007.
