Rounding out the field

Jah Roots and A Day Away complete our Best Bands lineup.

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Last issue you met three of the five finalists from the GO Music Awards. (You can check them out here.) Now say hello to Jah Roots and A Day Away.

Courtesy Jah Roots The members of Jah Roots always seem to be smiling.

Jah Roots

Who they are: Aaron “I-Ron” Berger, vocals; Eric Groves, drums; Josh Heinrichs, vocals/guitar; Mike Hulsey, guitar; Josh Nail, percussion; Stephen Washburn, bass; Phil Cosby, saxophone

What they play: Reggae, dancehall

Influenced by: Bob Marley, Burning Spear, Souljah, Morgan Heritage

It’s not easy being Springfield’s hardest-working (okay, and only) reggae band. It’s not easy being their touring van, either. Singer Josh Heinrichs says the band has gone through two vans now, but a new 15-passenger van is on its way to try and keep up with the group’s schedule.

Good luck, van. Jah Roots is one of Springfield’s most traveled music acts. In the last year alone they’ve been to Colorado, California, Florida, Georgia and Ohio, mostly weekend trips due to jobs and (in Heinrichs’s case) kids. The band still plays shows in Springfield regularly, but it’s on the road, where a reggae sound is more likely to be heard at another bar down the street, that the welcome mat is largest. Some people dismiss them on account of “the white reggae thing,” but generally there are crowds waiting for them at every stop they make. “I think a lot of people like it that wouldn’t listen to reggae,” guitarist Mike Hulsey says.

Jah Roots’s style of reggae embraces a modern dancehall sound that has recently taken acts such as Matisyahu onto the pop music charts. It took Jah Roots to the Wakarusa music festival last year, and this year has seen them take the stage at the High Times Reggae Festival and at South By Southwest in Austin, Texas. Before the year is out, it will even see the group record at Lion Fox Studio in Washington, D.C. It’s a long drive to D.C., but at least they’ll have a brand-new van to get them there.

Read about A Day Away on the next page.