Biography
Central Services deliver jangly, bright-toned power pop that recalls fellow Pacific Northwest acts the Shins and the Posies, a sound reviewers often label winsome without apparent objection from the group. At the center of the band stands the long-running creative alliance between vocalist and drummer Kevin Emerson and guitarist Jeff Blancato. Both musicians grew up in the small Connecticut town of Cheshire, located between New Haven and Hartford, and first began making music together while still in high school. When Emerson relocated to Boston for college he launched the funky R&B outfit Soulwork, which featured Blancato briefly on lead guitar. That project issued two albums, Connect and Soulwork Squares off with the Super Villain, early in the 2000s and received the 2001 Boston Music Award for best local funk band before disbanding. With Blancato already living in Seattle, Emerson headed west to reunite with his collaborator and launch Central Services in 2004. The first lineup placed Emerson on lead vocals and Moe Tucker-style standup drums, Blancato on bass, Ethan Jones and Damien Koemans on guitars, and Eric Goetz on keyboards. After the group issued its debut EP, We're All Smarter Now, in 2005, Jones departed to devote himself to the Seattle twee-pop band the Math and Physics Club, where Emerson serves as drummer without contributing vocals or songs; Koemans also exited once Blancato reclaimed the guitar chair. Bassist Mark Livingston came aboard in time to appear on the self-titled full-length album released in 2006. Outside Central Services, Emerson maintains his role in the Math and Physics Club and has published young-adult fiction, while Goetz pursues a solo career that yielded the 2005 album Present and Accounted For.
Albums
