What’s so great about The Shed? Well for starters, Shed regular Justin Fobes will tell you that the sound is impeccable, the workers genuinely care about what they’re doing, and management is great. Fobes, who will be returning to The Shed for his sixth or seventh time tonight, pins the BBQ joint as his favorite venue to play due to its notorious laid back and relaxed atmosphere.
Fobes’ love for music began back in the 1980s when he attended St. Mary’s in Mobile. He claims that every Saturday, a band named The Cantical came to play and he grew to know every word of every song they performed. Afterwards, Fobes attended Spring Hill College as an English major, then transferred to the University of South Alabama where he pursued his degree in Philosophy. Throughout his college experience, Fobes states that his professors strongly encouraged and pushed him to be a writer, and write his own music. This resulted in the release of his original tunes, which he has presently put on the back burner for the sake of entertaining his current crowd.
Following his college years, at age twenty-four, Fobes had the opportunity to tour with Counting Crows and pursued numerous musical projects, including an act in the Virgin Islands with Ryan Balthrop called The Burning Sensation. However, presently, Fobes is focusing on the entertainment side of the music industry in restaurants and bars, where he is able to connect with his audience, who he states is his inspiration. Fobes describes the happy moment where he is able to play a song that he knows has meaning for a particular person in the audience, while at the same time, the person in the audience knows the song is meant for him or her; it’s a win-win situation.
Recently, Fobes has been performing with his girlfriend and partner Melissa, the duo is known as The Spring Peach, and they have played approximately seven hundred shows in the past three to four years. Their upcoming project is Canned Peach Jams. Though Fobes is only a part-time musician now, he has taken on the role of a full-time student at Faulkner. A friend, Rebecca Barry, who toured with Paul McCartney of The Beatles and is a current member of the band Bust, got Fobes involved in school at Faulkner where he is currently studying Jazz. Talk about connections! As for the music scene in general, Fobes describes musical opportunity in the Mobile/Gulf Coast area as a free market. If musicians choose to be here, then there is a lot of opportunity. However, it may not be the opportunity that they dream of. The audience that musicians will find in Mobile is very personal and real; there aren’t any crowds of a thousand people on a Tuesday night.
If you want to meet somebody with immense musical experience, this is your guy. Come out to The Shed tonight and see an artist who has performed thousands of shows and memorized hundreds of songs throughout his career. You just can’t beat good music, good times, and good BBQ. See you tonight at 7!
Great show, Great time!