The Steamboat Pilot & Today

Steamboat Springs — “In general, I’m trying not to kill these guys, which promotes the message of the band, which is tolerance,” says E.O.E. percussionist Gabriel Velasco, nursing a cup of coffee and reflecting on the marathon session of jovial insults that has just transpired between his bandmates.

On Tuesday morning, the guys in E.O.E. are feeling the effects of a marathon session of jamming the night before at Old Town Pub, pushing through the wear and tear of a tour by keeping comedy a high priority in their everyday interactions.

Singer/guitarist Billy Franklin mentions the band is trying to compact their tours with more dates and less driving, that they’re trying to “go green.” It takes about one beat for bassist David Hyman to quip, “I’m going yellow, actually. I’m trying to get jaundice.”

This could go on for hours. And in a way, it does. But this is how E.O.E. functions — each of the band’s four members comes from a vastly different cultural and musical background, and each brings something wildly different to the table. E.O.E. is hip-hop and Latin jazz, reggae and jam rock. The only way to make those disparities work, the band members insist, is to heckle one another mercilessly and constantly.

“On a lighter but serious note, I think the key is to have an open sense of humor. We don’t really have any boundaries,” Velasco says. That dynamic translates on stage, where a conscious back-and-forth is crucial to keep a groove from falling apart, Hyman said.

“It’s a similar thing. On stage musically, any one of us can do anything, and everyone can choose to go along with it or not,” Hyman says. Not everything goes over, and sometimes — as in life — the things one member or another in E.O.E. says get ignored, Velasco says.

That is why Hyman can jokingly say he has “added the awesome” since joining the band in fall 2007, and seconds later legitimately add that his playing brings “more of an aggressive aspect to the band that wasn’t there before, and that causes more rocking.” And that is why the guys in E.O.E. get to make jokes about anything and everything, and why they make no attempt to keep those jokes politically correct or even socially acceptable.

“The conversation as a musician is the same through the instrument, ideally,” Velasco says. “I think we try to imitate that level of communication. And sometimes you choose not to listen.”

‘Unity in diversity’

Getting past the inner-organizational jabs, E.O.E. does have a serious side. The band, now back in New Orleans permanently for the first time since Hurricane Katrina, sports a hefty humanitarian mission, working with Sweet Home New Orleans to rebuild and reinvigorate the city, and giving to Drop in the Bucket to make a difference on a global level.

“The whole big thing is trying to focus on the humanitarian aspect of it, and have it be reflected at every level of the band,” Franklin said, in Steamboat Springs in early July for a short organizational run with Atman Roots Productions, a company he’s getting off the ground with sometime-band-mate Holden Young.

“The new sort of motivation is ‘Unity in Diversity.’ We figured if we can travel around and get along and actually make music together, then we can put that out to the world,” Franklin said. Working with Young, Franklin plans to start promoting and organizing events, and build a musical connection between New Orleans and Colorado. He’s thought about festivals that bring together winter sports and live music, and of booking and promoting projects Atman Roots believes in.

“All the proceeds end up going to other causes, because there’s just not any other point for everyone involved,” Franklin said.

The production company and E.O.E. plan to stay independent, moving from gig to gig and promoting their music, their cause and their ability to keep touring, Franklin said.

“It’s a bunch of little stuff going on, but it all relates to the bigger idea of creating a community for musicians around the country so they can still do it, and so they can do it right.”