Emerging Centre County band to bring eclectic show to Boalsburg for New Year’s Eve

The Centre County music scene is surging with an influx of new, young talent, including bands like The Root, the West Beaver Arts collective, Matt Jacobs and more.

One of those new bands, Ma’aM, has been steadily working its way around Centre County and will continue the roll out of its supreme rock ‘n’ roll show — not to be mistaken for folk rock, as some may want to call the band’s sound — at The Bar in Boalsburg on New Year’s Eve.

“They’re a band that’s semi-new and awesome,” The Bar manager Johnathan “Chyers” Myers wrote in an email. “They’ve played here twice and last time it was crazy. They had nine people on and off our little stage playing.”

The core of the band includes songwriters Tiger Cabus and Araelia Lopatic on guitars and vocals, as well as Dan Thomas on horns, and Jeremy Mertz on bass. With that being said, the band has numerous musicians who are local and not so local who sit in on gigs in what seems to be a flexible, reflexive and inclusive approach to making music.

“We write all the songs,” Cabus said, “and figured we could get a band started. We pieced the band together one piece at a time and people have dropped in and dropped out.”

That phenomenon has to do with a policy designed to get people involved.

“We have a rule that everybody is in Ma’aM until you get kicked out of Ma’aM,” Lopatic said, laughing with Cabus.

Ma’aM has released a six song EP called “Can’t Talk, Being Chased,” and it’s quite a triumph considering the speed at which Cabus and Lopatic have come together, written songs, and recorded together, all with the span of about a year and a half. The music is reflective of the Byrds, Neil Young and generally the Los Angeles sound from the late 1960s, the result of an epic cross country road trip Cabus and Lopatic took, which also inspired a relationship between the two, further adding to the musical magic.

“You can call us State College’s most beautiful power couple,” Lopatic joked.

Lopatic is from State College and began playing the guitar at 10, which led her to playing a State College-based punk band around Centre County. She was heavily influenced by the Dixie Chicks as she was getting started and her tastes blossomed from there. Cabus, on the other hand, got his start on the mandolin before switching to the guitar. He made his way through punk bands as well but ultimately gravitated to blues music and music influenced by the Allman Brothers sound.

“Playing Ma’aM stuff is like coming back to the things I’ve always loved,” Cabus said. “Music like the Byrds and the Rolling Stones. Just classic songwriter stuff.”

Together, Cabus and Lopadic combine to make music that’s upbeat, sometimes serious, often country and characteristically personal, all intended to reflect the authenticity they are enjoying at this point in their lives.

Upcoming gigs include the New Year’s Eve show at The Bar, followed by a Jan. 21 show at Zeno’s Pub as part of Chris Rattie’s Rebel Music Club. The band also plays gigs outside of the area, and is currently focusing on rehearsing their show, with the goal of making music a full-time profession.

“This is our first priority,” Cabus said.

This story was originally published December 27, 2019 at 8:34 AM.