the SiBL LIFE Growing from Seed to Shooting Star with JOE FIVEASH
By Frank Etheridge
Saying he was “delirious” from exhaustion, having just finished a 3-hour gig after working the overnight third shift at West Georgia Hospital, Fiveash talks about musical experimentation, the power of trust, and what comes next during an interview in a historic white cabin on the grounds of the Columbus Botanical Garden, where he performed part of their Shine holiday light show.
seem to be polar opposites. To SiBL, it’s just two parts of the same thing. “It’s the same to me because the musicians in Columbus are crazy talented, super creative, and we trust each other,” he says. A vibrant, if a bit manic, energy beams out of him when he speaks about making music, his drained delirium be damned. I’m not answering . . .
House Show Series, Image By Charley Windham
The Shine gig was the last in the 28-yearold’s series of intimate performances, each custom tailored to venue and audience. For this one, SiBL performed in a trio and applied experimental interpretations — both in terms of the tunes’ arrangements and his vocal phrasing — of Christmas classics such as “Christ Is Born” and “12 Days of Christmas.” The crowd, consisting of some friends and curious onlookers, responded with a smattering of applause. This was a far cry from the vibe SiBL cooked up earlier in December at his ‘Till It Kills You’ stop at Blue Canary Records (1250 Broadway). There, the crowd suited the bohemian downtown setting, and was tuned in and turned on for a full-
J
osiah Levon Fiveash likes the game Jackbox. “The game Jackbox is where you try to tell if what someone says is the truth or a lie, so the goal is to be as elusive as possible,” explains Fiveash – who goes by Joe, with Sire as a nickname, and SiBL as his stage name. “So I say, ‘I sing because I’m happy,’ then ‘I sing because I’m sad.’ It’s hard to know. I’ve always used singing as a coping mechanism. It was born out of soothing me. It gets me out of thinking.” LocaL
“When it comes to doing things differently, like tonight,” he continues, “We just lean on what we do best. Everything we did as far as the Christmas music, it was all impromptu. We just followed along with each toehold, because of that trust.” His show at Blue Canary Records? “That turned into a wild writing session,” Fiveash Blue Canary Record Shop
tilt show of surreal sensations. SiBL, backed by a killer quartet featuring Dany Dickerson (keyboard), Emmanuel Black (drums), Darren Johnson (guitar) & Miguel Juarez (electric guitar), the hip audience enraptured by his mesmerizing, mystical approach to both the music and to how they engaged in it. The Blue Canary experience ended on a high note, with SiBL improvising based on words shouted from the audience before leading a soul-stirring call-and-response to being his friend (Yeah Yeah YEEEAAAAYUUUUHHH!) or his foe (No No NNUYOOOOOOOO!). To an outside observer, these two performances 16
explains. “Just trusting each other and having fun. It’s always fun because when you improvise like that you never know how you’re going to create a theme and write a story off what someone gives JANUAR Y 2024
