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For the better part of 10 years, Emily Burns and Aaron Markovitz have been performing all sorts of music. Whether it was in a blues jazz band as teenagers, or performing covers of top 40 hits on cruise ships, their music career has been wide ranging and unique to say the least.
It wasn’t until four years ago that the duo decided to take all of their experience and create a sound of their own. They wanted to go back to their roots and strip down their sound for a more acoustic experience, and that’s when Escaping Pavement was born. Americana-folk inspired with flares of bluegrass and country, the Detroit based band is making noise by going back to the basics.
Escaping Pavement use numerous acoustic instruments to achieve their grassroots sound. From baritone guitar, to fretless banjo, to even the mandolin, their sound is meant to invoke a simpler time, which is how the band’s name originated.
Burns and Markovitz came up with the name Escaping Pavement as a way to symbolize the idea of getting away from it all. Burns said with the overabundance of technology at everyone’s fingertips, when it comes to music or otherwise, it is important to unplug for a little bit.
“Music has become accessible to everyone because of the software, and that makes it makes it easy for everyone to record, which is great. But there is something about grabbing an acoustic instrument and recording something that gets back to the basics,” Burns said.
This mentality is also how they approach their live performances. Making a personal connection with the audience and making them get away from their life for a little while is one of their main goals.
Photo Credit: Aram Zarikian
Escaping Pavement will be looking to make personal connections throughout the summer as they are currently in the middle of an extensive nationwide tour. The tour has taken them to many cities throughout Michigan, but the band will head to Wisconsin, Illinois, South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Washington, California, and Colorado all before September 1. The duo will perform at many house concerts and intimate venues, creating a stripped down performance without many distractions, which is when they think the audience can connect with them the most.
The tour is going to be very exciting for Escaping Pavement, but that’s not all the excitement the band has planned for 2018. The duo is currently hard at work to record a follow-up album to 2016’s “The Night Owl,” and while the album will include an audience favorite track “White Pines,” Burns said to expect something unique from this album.
“It’s definitely going to be very different and by far our most bluegrass influenced album,” Burns said. “It’s pretty live, which we have done before, but not as much as this one. We set up as much as we could to record at the same time making it come pretty close to a live performance.”
For more information on Escaping Pavement, including tour dates and the latest updates on their forthcoming album, be sure to follow them on Facebook.
