LITTLE ROCK — Big Bad Voodoo Daddy didn’t earn a reputation as a cover band. Instead, the group was labeled, and rightly so, as one of the top draws during the swing revival of the mid-1990s.
On the strength of its own material, Big Bad Voodoo Daddy sold several million copies of titles such as “American Deluxe” and “This Beautiful Life.”
The band’s music was also included in a scene in the 1996 movie “Swingers,” which helped catapult the group to success.
But, like so many other bands, Big Bad Voodoo Daddy would sprinkle in a cover song or two every night. And among those, one cover stood out: “Minnie the Moocher,” originally performed by Cab Calloway.
It was a song the band included in its sets in the earliest days, says trumpet player Glen Marhevka, and it’s one that always got a good reaction from the crowd.
When the band decided to work up a new Calloway song to include in a live performance, it got the musicians thinking, Marhevka says. What if they recorded an entire album as a tribute to Calloway, the legendary bandleader and jazz vocalist who passed away in 1994?
The result was “How Big Can You Get,” which was released in April 2009. Big Bad Voodoo Daddy launched a tour to support the album - and honor Calloway - and will stop at the Walton Arts Center on Saturday.
“He’s one of the heroes to Big Bad Voodoo Daddy,”Marhevka says by phone from his home in Los Angeles.
Marhevka credits Calloway with pushing him toward a career in music. Marhevka had just started to play trumpet, and his parents took him to see Calloway perform live.
“I was blown away,” Marhevka says. “I was completely enthralled by what I saw onstage. It set the tone for me as far as getting into jazz music.”
Marhevka expects he and his bandmates will perform nearly all of the songs on the Calloway tribute album, from “Minnie the Moocher,” “The Jumpin’ Jive” and “Tarzan of Harlem” to “The Call of the Jitterbug” and the title track.
The recording was made live at the Capitol Records building in Los Angeles.
Even with the help of some additional horns to try to capture the big band feel that Calloway’s group had, Marhevka says the record sounds remarkably similar to the Big Bad Voodoo Daddy that will take the stage on Saturday.
“I think it captures our energy. It’s a great representation of what we can do live,” Marhevka says.
In addition to the Calloway cuts, the band will alsoperform some of its own hits, such as “You & Me & the Bottle Makes 3 Tonight (Baby)” and “Go Daddy-O.”
Marhevka says Big Bad Voodoo Daddy is currently at work on a new album and that several of the tracks will berecorded in the next few weeks.
The band may play one of those unrecorded songs on Saturday, he says.
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FAQ
BIG BAD VOODOO DADDY
WHEN - 8 p.m. Saturday
WHERE - Walton Arts Center in Fayetteville
COST - $32-$68
INFO - 443-5600 or www.waltonartscenter.org.
Whats Up, Pages 18 on 02/18/2011