Local band Colflesh signs with record label

MARION – Crowded into a semi-circle in bass player John Burris' basement, the members of Colflesh ripped into the song that recently won the rock band a contract with a record label.

"Long, Hard Road" was the only tune Teresa Cope, CEO of EPOC Recordings, had to hear to know she wanted the Marion-based band to sign with her company, said Brian Delauder, who wrote its lyrics; the band collectively wrote the music.

"This is everything I've ever worked 27 years for in music," said the man who co-founded the band a year ago with lead guitarist and the source of the band's name, Billy Colflesh. Describing a life that's included fighting drug addiction, he said, "To get this now is incredible. It still hasn't set in, really."

Burris, who described himself as the band's "mouthpiece," said he and Delauder have both been playing music professionally for more than 20 years and have met a "degree of success with different projects throughout the years. We're really proud of the work we've put into this and to have the ability to advocate for a number of causes; drug awareness and cancer awareness are the two big things."

Seeing the success at a much earlier stage of his career, youngest member of the band, Billy Colflesh, a Mount Gilead High School graduate, said, "I guess this is what dreams are really made of."

The band formally signed with EPOC Recordings on Thursday night at Musicians 1 Stop, a local music store owned by Chuck Gregory.

"We grew up with him," Burris said, adding that Billy Colflesh purchased a new guitar during the signing.

"We all love him and appreciate him. ... I'm not from Ohio originally, but I've lived here long enough that I know everyone. We want to be those people sharing our success with our hometown, because a lot of people don't do that. It's little towns like this, this is where people come from. There's not a factory in L.A. spitting out musicians."

Cope said she wanted Colflesh to join her label because of its "unique sound. One of them's voice, I could hear a little bit of Axl Rose, a little bit. I thought, 'Wow.'"

Instead of sending recordings of the band's music and photos to EPOC, Burris "built ours into a video. I just wanted to try something a little different. I sent it out to a bunch of record labels, and a handful started responding to it, thought it was creative. We went with the one that was the better fit for us."

EPOC's soft-sell approach convinced Colflesh to sign, he said.

"The best way to describe it is they didn't promise anything," Burris said. "She said, and I'm paraphrasing, I'm not going to make you promises. I'm just going to give you results, and in the music business there's a lot more promises than results. I guess that goes in a lot of different professions, but in the music business you get a lot more. She offered us a really good, exclusive deal that gives us a mass market and puts us out on the road. That's how you develop a fan base, by going on tour and getting around more people."

Based in Jonesboro, Arkansas, EPOC Recordings bills itself as an independent record label and booking agency, which features inspirational music, along with a variety of country, adult contemporary, pop, bluegrass, classic rock, and other genres "with the exception of evil. We do not promote or record anything that is evil, promotes evil or explicit language."

Burris said Colflesh's music is "more toward the uplifting stuff. Our music is written about real life and weathering its struggles. I'm celebrating almost four years of sobriety, and so I talk about the struggles of how life has been."

He said he and Delauder try to demonstrate to the band's young members, Colflesh, drummer Josh Gould and keyboardist/vocalist Ben Virden, that dedicating a career to rock music doesn't require illicit drug use.

"A lot of people associate rock bands with being out of control," he said, adding Colflesh has made a goal of achieving success as a sober band. "Being able to do this in less than a year is great. Being a person in the music business for over 20 years, I know a lot of times it takes over a year for anybody to know who you are."

"The two of us are the older ones in the band, and we have the two younger guys; the two older of us have been down those back roads and dark alleys. We're able to keep the younger guys from going down those roads. We're letting them know you can do this and be positive about it."

Cope said the band will go on tour in Florida in early March, and she's lining up a national tour for later this year.

jjarvis@marionstar.com

740-375-5154

Twitter: @jmwjarvis