Buffalo Roam

At its most powerful, music transcends barriers, uniting people who on the surface may seem to have little in common. Such is the case with Buffalo Roam, a Los Angeles based band whose partners, despite being from very different backgrounds, have a musical and spiritual bond beyond measure. On their new album, The Gerry Record, one can hear the power of their friendship and dedication to one another in the music, a lush, emotionally intense and darkly beautiful rock record that goes much further than skin deep in exploring timeless and universal themes of love, friendship, strife, loss and determination in the face of all life delivers.Consisting of Greg Evanski on guitars and James Stein on vocals (with Mike Kujawa on bass and Fernando Sanchez on drums), the two primary members of Buffalo Roam come from opposite sides of the tracks. James grew up well off in Wilmington, Delaware, a product of a stable family and the good things in life. Greg’s turbulent childhood and adolescence were spent in Scranton, Pennsylvania. He recalls, “I come from a poor family and have 6 brothers, one of whom was murdered at 22, the others were in and out of jail. My father died when I was 7 and I was raised with basically no parental figures. My aunts and uncles were all drug dealers and I ended up moving in with my grandfather who lived above a bar, which ended up condemned and torn down by the city. I was in a lot of trouble as a kid.”Music provided both inspiration and salvation for both Greg and James. For Greg, his older brother Will was the catalyst. “He played Bee Gees, Led Zeppelin and Kiss records,” he recalls, “I was seven, and it just seemed like the coolest thing in the world. Then when I was thirteen, he joined a band. So Will definitely inspired me to start playing. By the time I was fifteen, I could play many instruments and I put together a band to play original material, which is very rare in Scranton.” James took in various styles and influences: “I started playing because of the Wu-Tang Clan, and somehow from there I got into the Grateful Dead, Phish and Dave Matthews, and then I started getting into the rock; Led Zeppelin, Oasis and Radiohead.”Both Greg and James’s journeys took them to Los Angeles, where they met four years ago, introduced to each other via Greg’s girlfriend and James’s brother. The bond was instant, immediately powerful and lasting. Greg explains, “Everything that one of us is missing the other has and for that there is an abundance of gratitude. “We’re like brothers – we spend every day together, we write, fight, and make up every day.”Greg and James’s first four years together produced their share of ups and downs. But they also produced about seventy songs, and an increasing confidence in themselves. “We worked under the name ‘Roam’ for quite a while,” says Greg, “But we pulled the plug on that and then recorded The Gerry Record.” It’s titled The Gerry Record because of Greg’s brother Gerry Evanski, who writes lyrics along with James and Greg, and is the spiritual third member of Buffalo Roam. Gerry is currently in the Los Angeles area in a drug and alcohol treatment center, and is “looking forward to getting back and working with the band”.The Gerry Record is infused with a strong sense of darkness. Greg explains, “Our music is about internal conflict and the feelings within everyone; love, happiness, loss and sadness. We do run on the darker side of emotional living; our thoughts go to longing, pain and sadness. But there’s always room for a way out and for celebration, even in the darkness.” That may seem contradictory, but it’s undeniably human, and you can hear it in songs like “Yup Yes Yeah,” a brooding, loping and hooky tale of a man who loses his confidence but sets to win it back by believing in himself and fighting his own self-doubt. It’s also present in “A Day At The Beach,” where a man finally away from the office wishes he was back there while he’s at the beach. Musically, James’s vocals convey the subtle balance between deep melancholy and exaltation at the miracle of being alive. Greg’s guitar modernizes classic forms; the echo laden sound of The Edge, the simple but melodic riffs of great alt rock bands like the Pixies and the acoustic based classic sounds of Tom Petty. It has roots in the past but is set firmly in the present and it’s that combination that gives The Gerry Record it’s sense of timelessness and being beyond the fickle whims of fashion and trends.Buffalo Roam is finding their audience in the best way possible; through heartfelt, intensely personal music that can strike a chord with anyone and through a steady stream of playing throughout Southern California and Nevada. The foundation of Buffalo Roam’s music is set in the friendship between its two founding members – in 2007, that bond will bring in more and more fans who want to be enveloped in the warmth and realness of the band’s music. The Gerry Record is musical testament to the trials and triumphs of life – theirs and everyone’s.