Widespread Panic's new guitarist George McConnell said he just wants to do justice to his predecessor, Mikey Houser.
"I don't think anyone ever thought that Mikey wouldn't finish the last Widespread Panic tour," McConnell said during a telephone interview from somewhere in Nebraska. "We knew he was sick, but we never thought he'd not come back."
Guitarist Mikey Houser was The Panic's founder; he succumbed to pancreatic cancer last August after taking a few weeks off the tour to go home and rest. He never made it back on the road.
During the interim, McConnell and Randall Bramlett helped out the band by filling in the guitar parts on the remaining dates of the tour. "Randall and I really were just hired guns," McConnell said. "The boys in the band
wanted to play with the core members as much as possible. We just played on a few songs."
After Houser's death, the band took a few weeks off to decide whether to stay together, eventually asking McConnell to join full time. "It was very unexpected. We all had been friends since way back. I was in a band called Beanland, and we were bar bands, like Widespread Panic was in the early days.
"I have always been a fan of Widespread Panic's music but had no preconceived notion about joining the band. I was asked to help out, and then I was asked to join."
McConnell, who cited Rolling Stones' Keith Richards, Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page and Gov't Mule's Warren Hayes as some of his main musical influences, said the only pressure he felt after joining the band was to do Houser proud. "There are the trademark Mikey Houser licks in the songs that I try to emmulate, but not copy. I'm not taking his place."
Generally, the fans' reception of McConnell has been favorable, he said. "Most of the fans know what happened. They know the situation and support me and the band for keeping the music going.
"But there are times when I do hear some backlash. But a fan told me that those who complain are selfish. They're too caught up in missing Mikey for themselves. They're not thinking about the fact that Mikey left behind a wife and two children, not to mention his parents. They're not thinking of the band."
Regardless, McConnell knew what he was getting into the moment the band asked him to play live. "Widespread Panic is a group of some heavy-hitting players. There's a connection when they start the music. A wink of an eye and they head into a new direction in the middle of a song. It's very rewarding, playing with the calibre of musicians that they are."
To prepare for his gig with Widespread Panic, the band gave McConnell a gift. "They gave me their catalog of studio albums, and I learned how to play most of the songs. But as you know, Widespread Panic studio albums and Widespread Panic live shows are a totally different animal.
"After a few weeks on the road, I pretty much threw the studio albums away, because they rarely played the songs live how it was tracked on the albums. The guys were like, 'Those were recorded so long ago, we don't remember the arrangements.' "
If you go
What: Widespread Panic
Where: USANA Amphitheater, West Valley City
When: Tonight, 7:30 p.m.
How much: $25
Phone: 467-8499 or 1-800-888-8499
E-mail: scott@desnews.com