John E.K. and the Memphis Storm

The John E.K. & The Memphis Storm band has been playing in the New Jersey and New York area for approximately six years. Their style of music is R & B and they have twenty-seven originals that they play at their gigs each weekend in addition to various cover tunes. John E.K. writes and arranges all the originals that the band performs. His major influences in song writing style are Stevie Ray Vaughan, Eric Clapton, George Thorogood, Chuck Berry and Buddy Guy.
John E.K. is the lead guitar player and also lead vocals. He began his musical life at age ten by taking guitar and piano lessons, but as with most kids he put it down for a while. John picked up a guitar again almost thirteen years later at age twenty-three.
While working in the construction field he was injured and decided to take guitar lessons again. This is when his ambitions of putting together a band and having a career in music started. As the lead vocalist John is compared (by his fans) to Clapton and Thorogood because of his deep voice and the way he loves to growl the blues.
The Memphis Storm includes Kurt Colon on bass & backup vocals and Mike Bochniak on drums and Jay Lesley on saxophone and keyboards.
Mike has been playing drums for 20 years and has played in several different bands that covered classic rock and blues. Kurt has been playing bass for 25 years. Jay has been playing saxophone for some forty years and has been touring with the Tokens since the late sixties. Jay plays with the Memphis Storm when he's not with the Tokens.
There are two things that the name John E.K. & The Memphis Storm are created from. First, John E.K. is simply John's initials. Second, Memphis Storm is the first song John wrote, which is about a friend being stuck in Kansas City overnight because of a tornado. He did not like the title "Kansas City Storm" so he chose a city's name that would sound better which happened to be "Memphis."
John produced his first CD called Meet the Storm that was released in June, 1996. Currently, the band is averaging seven gigs per month at clubs and also doing private parties. In 1995, before the release of his CD, John's original song "Back Door Man" was featured on the Homegrown spotlight on WDHA, a New Jersey Radio Station. WNTI in Hackettstown, NJ is playing the CD on various shows such as the Jethro Blues Show that airs on Friday mornings. In June 1996 the band played a Benefit for Karon Brandt, host of a cable TV show called "The Blues" and shared the stage with several regional and national blues acts. All proceeds were to help offset Karon's medical expenses with cancer.
In February 1997, John organized and hosted a benefit for a local family who lost everything in an early morning fire the day after Christmas. The benefit included several bands from the area and delicious food donated by the club. The true success of the day was the generosity of the people, who were there for support and donations. In March 1997, the band was invited to appear on the Carl Richard's Show live on Channel Access 8 out of Port Jervis, NY. The show started with an interview and then the band played a 45 minute set for the local viewers that reached approximately 85,000 homes.
In late 1997, John and the boys headed back into the studio for their second CD release called Down the Road, which has nine new originals and one cover tune. Spring of 2001 the band started working on their third CD project, called Swang Thang, their most involved project to date. It has taken them seven months to complete this album and it is due out in March 2002. This disc has nine new originals, two reworked originals from their CD, Meet the Storm and two cover songs, "Midnight Rambler" by the Rolling Stones and "Hello MaryAnn" by Ray Charles. At the beginning of the Swang Thang project this spring the Memphis Storm was able to work with Silk City Records, out of Hackensack, NJ. On January 11th, 2002 John began the promotion of the 3rd album, Swang Thang, in conjunction with Silk City Records; and was featured on WGHT, 1500 AM. In December of 2002 the Storm received there first review in a national magazine "Blues Revue" in the article the disc Swang Thang was described as spirited with rootsy originals in various styles. In January 2003 the band heads to Memphis for the first tine to compete in the IBC blues challenge. The Memphis Storm will be one of seventy bands to compete for a slot in six of the biggest blues festivals in the country. As well as cash and other prizes. Over the next several months Silk City and The Memphis Storm have several radio interviews and CD release parties scheduled to promote the release of their new album Swang Thang.
John's goals are heading in one direction, which is to make music his full time career and work hard at gaining exposure and experience in the music industry. The band is currently looking to sign with a larger label, to expand their distribution and to increase the venue size they are currently playing.
For more information, please contact the John E.K. at johnek_16@netzero.com

Š2002-04 John E.K. & The Memphis Storm