Album release party is homecoming for The Everyday Parade

Photo by Photo by Larry Rutledge

The Everyday Parade: (From left) Leh Sammons, Rick Camp, Jeff Golightly, Tom Wilson.

Sitting in a Midtown beer bar, musician Jeff Golightly points to his friend and songwriting partner Rick Camp, and begins razzing him.

“You know, it wasn’t until I met this guy that I got into playing in bands. That’s when it all went to hell in a handbasket,” jokes Golightly.

Photo by Photo by Larry Rutledge

The Everyday Parade: (From left) Leh Sammons, Rick Camp, Jeff Golightly, Tom Wilson.

Three decades after gaining acclaim in Memphis pop outfit The Crime, Golightly and Camp are back with a new project, The Everyday Parade. The group will celebrate the release of its self-titled debut album with a release show at Nocturnal on Saturday.

When they first met nearly 30 years ago, the musical rapport between Camp and Golightly — two left-handed guitar players with genetic harmonies — was instantaneous and undeniable.

“It was like finding a brother you didn’t even know existed,” says Camp.

“I don’t want to be corny, but he’s my musical mentor, even though I’m older than him,” says Golightly. “When we put The Crime together in 1980 that was my first band ever, but Rick had been playing professionally since he was 9 years old.”

Camp, a Memphis native, began playing in grade school with the kid garage rock outfit The Sands of Time (which featured future Nashville session ace drummer Greg Morrow). He continued performing professionally into the ’70s gigging with a variety of dance and cover bands.

Meanwhile, Golightly got his start playing music after seeing the Beatles on Ed Sullivan. “Then I became a John Prine folk guy until I saw the Sex Pistols at the Taliesyn Ballroom,” says Golightly of the British punk band’s famed local concert appearance in 1978. “That’s when got rid of my acoustic and got my electric.”

In the spring of 1980 Golightly put an ad on the board at music store Strings and Things seeking musicians to form a band (influences included Elvis Cotello, Tom Petty, and the Beatles). Camp eventually called Golightly and after a rehearsal where they harmonized on some Beatles and Petty songs, the Crime — with drummer Carlton Rash and eventually bassist Rick Nethery — was born.

Within months of forming, the Crime and their new wave sound became a Memphis sensation. “We came along at the right time,” says Camp. “The scene sort of developed around a bar called the Well, which later became the Antenna Club. We got pretty popular, pretty quickly.”

The group put out its debut single “Do the Pogo” in 1981. The release helped put them on the map and for the next few years the group would tour heavily, opening show from Dave Edmunds, Rick Springfield, and the B-52s, among others.

“We were road dogs. And after a while I didn’t want to be on the road anymore,” says Golightly, who quit the band suddenly, but amicably, in 1984. “I had missed my daughter’s graduation from kindergarten and when I got in the van that day I told Rick, ‘I’m not missing anything else’.”

After Golightly’s departure, Camp soldiered on with the band for another five years — releasing the Crash City U.S.A. EP — before bringing the curtain down on the group in 1989.

Over the next two decades, while Golightly and Camp remained friends, they never worked together musically. “With 9 to 5 jobs, raising kids and families, we both had our hands full,” says Golightly.

Finally, in the spring of 2005, Golightly decided to engage his old partner Camp, and bring him into a songwriting circle with local producer Greg Roberson.

“I wanted to get Rick back writing again. I knew if we could crack that (collaboration) back open again it’d be great. So we started meeting almost like a job; every Wednesday night for three or four hours. The first night, we got a couple songs, and it started getting to where we were banging out four or five songs a night. After a while we had 50-plus songs.”

After culling that number down to about two dozen, Golightly and Camp began cutting some eight-track demos at home. “The original idea, at least in my mind, was to try and find a kid band and have them play the songs,” says Golightly, with a chuckle. “I figured, let them do the heavy lifting: We’ll be the songwriter/managers.”

That idea was ditched after Golightly was asked to play an in-store at Goner Records in early 2007. Camp came up during the set, and the alchemical magic between the pair was too obvious to ignore. “We sang one of the old Crime things, and it felt so good, “says Camp. “That was the day we looked at each other and said, you know, we really ought to think about putting a band together.”

When it came time to round out the new group, Golightly didn’t need to look further than his family, enlisting his son-in-law Leh Sammons of local instrumental band Noise Choir to play drums. Adding fellow Noise Choir member, bassist J.B. Horell, the Everyday Parade made its proper debut at the inaugural Memphis Pops Festival at the Hi-Tone in 2007.

With Roberson producing, the band headed into Midtown’s Rocket Science studio that summer to record its debut, enlisting a crew of notable locals including organist Adam Woodard and pianist Jim Dickinson to spice up the 12 tracks. The finished disc plays like classic era Crime, with Golightly and Camp mixing Mersey melancholia with bright folk-pop jangle and the bursts of high-velocity power-pop.

With the Everyday Parade album getting released earlier this month (it’s available at Spin Street, Goner and Shangri-La Records as well as online outlets like I-Tunes and CD Baby) the band — which now features Tom Wilson on bass — has been busy working toward the impending CD release show at Nocturnal

The performance will be a homecoming of sorts, as Nocturnal is the site of the old Well and Antenna Club. “When we were in The Crime we’d play coliseums and big clubs, but when we’d come back and play the Antenna, it always felt like home,” says Golightly. “I don’t know what it looks like these days — I haven’t stepped foot in there in years. But playing the show there seems really fitting. This whole thing has brought us full circle in a way.”

— Bob Mehr: 529-2517

The Everyday Parade

CD release show with Kitchens and Bathrooms and David Brookings. 9 p.m. Saturday at Nocturnal, 1588 Madison Ave. Cover: $5. For more information, call 726-1548

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