Zollo, David

Equipped with a 'rode hard and put away wet,' whiskey-soaked rasp and a deep bag of keyboard chops that echoes some of the greats of country, rhythm & blues and gut-bucket rock, David Zollo brings to his music the kind of savvy, trans-genre synthesis you might expect from a grizzled road warrior twenty or more years his senior.

Precocious from jump street, Zollo has always been ahead of the curve. He began playing the piano at the age of four and, steeped in his writer/journalist daddy's eclectic record collection (jump blues, whorehouse jazz, folk, vintage rock, soul and Golden Era country—you name it), the kid with an "old soul" was regaling family house parties with knockout Ray Charles and Huey "Piano" Smith covers by his early teens.

Zollo founded High and Lonesome—a hell-raising quintet that fused the Stones, Southern rock and alt-rock'n'country—in the early '90s. Over the next five years, the band careened across the Midwest, playing over 200 gigs per annum and releasing three discs (plus David's first solo effort) on his own Iowa City-based Trailer Records label along the way.

The ravages of time, travel arid, well, just too much of 'too much' took their toll on "Hi & Lo," particularly on the band's hard-charging leader. A career-threatening throat condition was remedied by surgery, extensive therapy and no small amount of luck, but as Zollo & Co. readied for more studio time, it was clear that they had reached an impasse.

The band dissolved, and what began as the fourth High & Lonesome recording became Zollo's second solo disc—the earthy, rustic and decidedly more stylistically diverse Uneasy Street.

Throughout these formative years, complex, give-and-take relationships were developed between Zollo and the previous generation of Eastern Iowa's roots-music heavyweights.

The flexible keyboardist was mentored by (and picked up regular gigs/session work with) celebrated singer/songwriter Greg Brown and guitarist/producer Bo Ramsey (Brown, Lucinda Williams, Dave Moore, Kevin Gordon, Teddy Morgan, Joan Baez, etc.).

Meanwhile, David's Trailer imprint has issued acclaimed discs by Ramsey, Brown and extraordinary, ghost-channeling bluesman Joe Price, as well other stellar Iowa roots musicians.

You can learn more at this site: www.davidzollo.com