It only took a year or two, but the pinnacle of Running Blue’s career was captured in a couple videos by my friend Rachel, and I finally got them!
These are from Relay for Life 2011 on the University of Michigan campus. Running Blue was a band with me and a couple of my housemates in college. It started with me and my friend Jim Brunner, a singer, guitarist, and harmonica player (also, he was no slouch of a songwriter). We would jam through songs around our house and then go to open mics. Eventually, we wanted a percussionist and Shawn Wetherhold joined us. He played tambo and egg shaker at our smaller acoustic gigs, and drums at our bigger ones, and really brought our sound up a notch. For one show, Pat Kochyan even joined on percussion and vocals, helping us win an open mic competition! Senior year, we started getting more serious and recruited a bassist, Adam Berkovec. He was a really talented bassist, so much so that we had to make sure he got a bass solo in one of the songs we played at Relay for Life.
Now, I don’t remember exactly what our setlist was that day, but I remember a few things vividly. The band that was supposed to play after us was two guys from the football team that did an acoustic rap kind thing. I’d seen them before and they were pretty good, and also really nice guys. The show was running really behind schedule, so half the football team showed up just in time to watch us play! Early on, we played one of our staples, a rock version of “Dynamite” by Taio Cruz, with a sweet guitar riff that Jim put together. Guess who was standing in the front row? None other than Denard Robinson, throwing his hands up! Its not every day you have one of college football’s greats dancing to your song!
The other part I remember the most was when we started playing our version of “Wagon Wheel.” I was strumming through the chords, then Jim sang the opening lines. I was looking out across the huge field in front of us, and a big crowd of people ran up screaming “Oh my god!! Wagon Wheel!! I love that song!” Note that it was loud enough for me to here over all of the instruments. I couldn’t believe other people even knew the song, I didn’t know it before Jim introduced me to it. Jim was so into the song at that point, he didn’t notice the surge in crowd size.
Playing at Relay for Life was one of those unforgettable experiences that has continued to inspire me. I’m excited I finally got my hands on these videos!
Eric