The other Kowalczyk'

Sunday News
Published: November 20, 2005
By JOHN DUFFY, Correspondent

Growing up in York, the brothers Kowalczyk fought constantly. Ed would wait behind a door to jump the younger Adam as he came home from school, or kick the Nintendo in the middle of his brother's game. "We fought constantly," Adam said.

The boys' roughhousing was a constant annoyance for their mother, but it may have served as training for life in the topsy- turvy world of heavy rock. Ed's band, Live, hit it big in the mid- 1990s and scored several hit singles here and around the world. Once success came, Ed wanted more freedom on stage than playing guitar afforded him, so he called his brother.

For the past seven years, Adam has been playing backup rhythm guitar with Live, freeing his lead-vocalist brother to roam the stage at will. "It's been amazing seeing the world, playing to tens of thousands of people I feel very lucky," Adam said, relaxing between segments on a recent edition of WRVV's local Sunday-night "Open Mic" music show.

For two hours, he enthralled radio listeners with stories of lion attacks in South Africa, massive European summer festivals where the crowd's appreciation for the band is measured in how much stuff they can throw at them, and tales of how the brothers played both security guard and deranged fan as kids to add variety to their regular pummeling sessions.

Adam's motive for appearing on the broadcast was to promote his own music, which he will be performing live Wednesday at the Chameleon Club along with The Mint and John Gault Line, all supporting acts for the Jack Dillman Band. "The day before Thanksgiving is supposed to be one of the biggest nights out of the year, so hopefully we'll get a good turnout," Adam said. Live may be one of the biggest bands in the world, but Adam doesn't even have a record deal. His Chameleon gig will celebrate the release of his second self-produced disc, "The Dream EP."

The new disc is 12 tracks long and clocks in at just under 40 minutes, so it's really a full- length album. "It was supposed to be an EP," he explained. "We were going to record just four or five songs, then very quickly that doubled. I kept trying out different songs and (the engineer) would say, Wow, we should record that!'" The product is a rich disc filled with a variety of song styles: loud guitar rock, power ballads, sultry tunes with more than a hint of an R&B influence. Adam's raspy, soulful voice tackles all of them.

There are gentle acoustic guitars, roaring electrics, and every vocal range possible from a whisper to a scream. Adam also possesses a falsetto that might make some think of him as one of the brothers Gibb. Similarities between the two Kowalczyk brothers' sounds is understandable. They listened to the same music growing up. Adam would steal Guns & Roses, INXS, and Black Sabbath tapes from his brother's room, hide them, listen to them in secret, then return them to the exact spot he found them to avoid yet another pounding. "I'd even rewind the tape back to the exact spot I found it at," he confessed.

But as he tuned and retuned his Takamine acoustic guitar, Adam recalled, he was also influenced by his mother, Mary's, taste in music. "I think the melodies I write stem directly from listening to my mom sing in the car when she was taking me to school," he said.

She would blast Carole King, Paul Simon or James Taylor, he remembers, and it served as a form of therapy for both of them. By the time he began writing his own songs, Adam was hooked on Jeff Buckley, REM and U2, artists known for their drama and passion. The first show he played with Live was at RFK Stadium in Washington, D.C., to some 80,000 fans in 1998.

Lately, he's far more likely to be in some coffeehouse or club, singing his own songs to a crowd of up to a couple hundred that allows him some anonymity. "Too often, bands who are starting out aim for the stars right away," he said. "But I've done that, so I think that helps me focus on what's important about the songs when I'm doing my own material. I like that I can do both."

There will be no be anonymity at the Chameleon. This is partisan territory for anyone named Kowalczyk. But with songs as strong as he's got, Adam is clearly not simply living in his brother's shadow. "The Dream EP"