Dylan Black Project at Funky Friday

Funky Fridays frontman lost everything in fires; will debut new Sonoma Shines song|

Funky Friday 411

Funky Fridays is weekly at Hood Mansion, funkyfridays.info, 389 Casa Manana Road, Santa Rosa.

Doors open at 5:30 p.m., tickets are $10, kids under 18 are free.

The Dylan Black Project plays the Funky Fridays event at Hood Mansion Friday, June 20, with a 7 p.m. showtime. They have played the event several times and, band leader Terry Sanders says, “Bill and Linda are why we love playing Funky Fridays!”

Bill Myers and Linda Pavlak are the people who created and produce the Funky Fridays event, and run it with their enthusiastic and personable style.

Sanders and his band had been successfully playing the Bay Area for many years when a real sour chord hit them hard: Sanders lost all his musical equipment in the fires.

Sanders, ironically enough, is an Oakland firefighter/paramedic. While driving home that fateful Sunday back in October, he saw his local counterparts doing something he first thought to be foolhardy. “I made fun of the firefighters outside the house because they were blowing the leaves on a super windy day.”

Little did anybody know that those winds would lead to a series of major fires in the area.

Sanders woke up during the night and moved his sleeping family into the front of their house, fearing that the wind might topple a nearby tree. By 1 a.m., his wife Debra was grabbing their important papers, and he was grabbing their son. They bolted, as the orange sky was just too close by.

They moved from parking lot to parking lot, trying to stay ahead of the flames. They ended up in a stranger’s home in the Santa Rosa Junior College neighborhood, watching TV and seeing their own neighborhood burn down.

Sanders also spent hours helping others to safety. He and a friend went up the hill to Varenna at Fountaingrove and assisted with their evacuation efforts. He and his friend Lou Ratto delivered a water tanker to Calistoga to protect five rural homes. He also looked for stray cats.

Months later, his band is back at it, using a bunch of new gear. His favorite guitars were lost but they have been replaced by donated models. Loud and Clear Music in Cotati gave him a guitar.

“A retired cop in L.A. made a guitar and gave it to me,” says Sanders. Two Rock Amplifiers of Rohnert Park gave him a new amp.

The Funky Friday show by the Dylan Black Project will showcase some excellent band work. Not one to exaggerate, Sanders did say, “Our musicianship in incredible.” The band features Sanders on guitar and vocals, Greg Saunders on drums, bass player Elmar Kurgpold and Steve Seydler on keys.

The band plays mostly original songs, and Sanders will sing a new composition called “Sonoma Shine,” written after the fires. They play some familiar covers, as well. He teases with the promise of them performing a “Deep Purple to Beatles mashup.”

Of the band, Sanders says, “We are a big stage band, that’s where we shine. But we also like to maintain intimacy with the crowd, communicate with the crowd and entertain.”

The name of the band comes from Jimi Hendrix and his early days in the “Jimmy James and the Blue Flames” band. While touring in England, witnesses to Hendrix’s fiery playing style referred to him as “the black Dylan” because of their shared unkempt hair style.

Sanders and his Dylan Black Project will undoubtedly tear up the Funky Fridays stage. Just don’t count of any Hendrix inspired on-stage guitar burning. Sanders has had enough of that.

Funky Friday 411

Funky Fridays is weekly at Hood Mansion, funkyfridays.info, 389 Casa Manana Road, Santa Rosa.

Doors open at 5:30 p.m., tickets are $10, kids under 18 are free.

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