Tom Adams, Jesse Brock and Marshall Wilborn, fresh from their falling out with Michael Cleveland, are forming a new band and hope to hit the studio this summer.
The band doesn’t have a name, has no gigs lined up and still needs to hire fiddle and banjo players. “This is still in the very early stages,” Tom Adams told me.
The cursory announcement ends any chance Mike Cleveland had of reuniting the band after an acrimonious split a month ago. People close to both bands say Mike tried to mend fences a few weeks after the breakup, but that an agreement couldn’t be worked out. Plans for the new band started to come together about two weeks ago.
Mike, too, is trying to put together a new band and is touring in the meantime with David Peterson and other musicians he has performed with in the past.
Tom, Jesse and Marshall are all top-flight pickers and past IBMA award winners. But just as Mike Cleveland’s stage show lacks a certain spark without the trio surrounding him, these guys will have a tough time capturing the magic Mike’s fiddle brought to their efforts. That said, another top talent could make the guys the next bluegrass supergroup.
Stay tuned.
Editor’s note: Michael responded to this post via his publicist here.
