In the song, “Shiver,” singer Adam Levine says, “I won’t be satisfied till I’m under your skin.”
After three long years, Levine and his band, Maroon 5, are there.
They’ll be here at 7:30 p.m. Saturday as part of the Honda Civic 2005 tour at the Everett Events Center. The Thrills open the show.
Tickets are $33 and are still available.
Maroon 5 is the picture of patience, and it paid off with a Grammy for best new artist last year – two years after its debut CD, “Songs About Jane,” was released.
This band has waited so long for its break, a biography from its publicist says Maroon 5 is “looking like the Cinderella story for 2003.”
But their time has come.
Its infectious, rocked-up ’70s-era guitar riffs coupled with Levine’s nasally vocals that come dangerously close to annoying finally struck a chord with mainstream crowds last year, which saw the band put five singles, including “Harder to Breathe” and “This Love” on the Billboard charts.
Levine, keyboardist Jesse Carmichael, bassist Mickey Madden and drummer Ryan Dusick originally came together as Kara’s Flowers while most of them attended West Los Angeles High School.
Kara’s Flowers was signed by Reprise Records, but reality set in when their debut, “The Fourth World,” failed to sell.
The members split, with Dusick and Madden staying on the West Coast to attend UCLA, while Levine and Carmichael headed to the State University of New York and discovered music with a more urban twist.
“The halls would be blasting gospel music and people would be listening to stuff that we’d never actually listened to – like Biggie Smalls, Missy Elliot and Jay-Z,” Levine said in press materials. “When I think of songwriting, I think of The Beatles, (Bob) Dylan, Simon and Garfunkel and the stuff that I grew up on, but then I was like, ‘I want to do this.’
“Stevie Wonder came into my life at that point,” Levine said, “and I just found a knack for doing it.”
Many Maroon 5 songs, indeed, are reminiscent of Wonder’s early years, which is surprising when you look at this bunch that could fill the pages of a J. Crew catalog.
The switch happened so extremely for Levine that he has said he was ready to make a “hard-core, straight-up funk R&B record,” but was urged to keep the rock sensibilities that fans now enjoy.
The band’s album, “Songs About Jane,” is so focused on Levine’s pining over a fading love – we think her name might be Jane – that one wonders what the inspiration will be for the future.
But Maroon 5 is riding the wave, happy to be looking back, at least for the time being.
Reporter Victor Balta: 425-339-3455 or vbalta@heraldnet.com.
Los Angeles Times photo
Maroon 5 – James Valentine (left), Adam Levine, Ryan Duisck, Jesse Carmichael and Mickey Madden – performs Saturday in Everett.
Maroon
7:30 p.m. Saturday, Everett Events Center, 200 Hewitt Ave., Everett. $33, 866-332-8499.
Maroon 5
7:30 p.m. Saturday, Everett Events Center, 200 Hewitt Ave., Everett. $33, 866-332-8499.
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