Silver Creek and Journey Man Join Forces!

By Chris Marais

On a winter’s night in 2015, Rod Dry of the Silver Creek Mountain Band was busy setting up performance equipment at a little venue in Pretoria when a man detached himself from the crowd and approached him with a CD in his hand.

“Here, Rod. You might like this. It’s a recording of the band from back in the Keg & Tankard days.”

The mystery benefactor slipped back into the crowd and disappeared. Rod hasn’t seen him since – doesn’t even know his name.

But what he handed Rod Dry that night was pure gold, a piece of Silver Creek Mountain Band treasure that was thought to be long-forgotten and never-recorded.

It contained 25 priceless Silver Creek Songs – more than one hour of great live music.

Just play this CD and, within seconds, you’ll be transported back to those magic nights in the late 1970s, when the Creek fired up the student crowd at a legendary Pretoria basement club called The Keg & Tankard.

It was a very special performance, scant weeks after the accidental death of their star player, the multi-talented Roger Cumming.

Double-bass man Rod Dry, fiddler Dave “Plod” Tarr and banjo specialist Dennis Schultz played to a packed room at The Keg, on a memorable night that turned into an homage to their departed band member.

“We had no idea whether we could pull this show off as a threesome” says Rod. “But the Keg crowd was fully behind the band, and it turned out to be a great evening.”

If you were part of the “rocking generation” of that era, you would remember the Silver Creek Mountain Band. You might well have caught one of their shows somewhere around South Africa.

You might not, however, have been part of the audience over at the Keg & Tankard on this particular night. I was there, however, as a young music writer for the Pretoria News and it was a helluva party.

The guys pulled off the evening in style. I remember a normally reserved colleague of mine slamming down his drink and leaping up on the table. He proceeded to dance a merry jig right through the whole performance.

Ten years later, I was invited to join the Silver Creek Mountain band. You can read all about that in The Journey Man – A South African Reporter’s Stories.

The great news is we’re celebrating that particular era in a special offer: the book and the Silver Creek Bootleg Tape all in one package, for R300 including SA postage.

Contact Julie or Chris at info@karoospace.co.za for bank details or additional costs if you prefer a courier delivery.