Outside Pedestrian is a cross-continental modern instrumental trio with a two decade history of genre-bending experimental music. Founding members Anthony Fesmire (guitar) and David Lockeretz (bass) first began making music together in the early 1990s when they were both students at Boston’s prestigious Berklee College of Music. They reunited in 1999 in Los Angeles and formed Outside Pedestrian.
For two years the band played all around LA and recorded two albums; “Pedestrian Crossing” (1999) and “Sunless City” (2001). Eventually life had other plans. Fesmire’s career as an educator relocated him to various points around the United States and Lockeretz pursued other musical projects. In 2012 the duo reunited and signed on veteran New York drummer, David Oromaner. A third album “Reclaimed” followed in 2014.
Now in 2021, the band is revisiting the record that started it all. “Pedestrian Crossing” is a remastered reissue of a seminal moment in Outside Pedestrian story. The new record includes the original nine songs and is augmented by brand new versions of the record’s bookends “Southern California Highway Song” and “Northern California Highway Song.” With the unadorned arrangement of guitar, bass and drums, the band navigates a terrain of slow blues, fast fusion and avant-garde rock.
The record opens with the appropriately laid-back Jazz/Blues of “Southern California Highway Song.” The track introduces three virtuosic musicians, each with the chops to unleash a dizzying array of notes and the style to know when not to. “Southern Woman ” brings the funk and some legit guitar and bass shredding. Over the course of the record the band rolls through mellow ballads like the Gary Moore/SRV inspired “Believe You Me” and various flavors of Jazz. “Rattlesnakes” and “Northern California Highway Song” bring to mind the edgy bite of Larry Carlton while “Adrenochrome” and “The Sound” recall Pat Metheny’s pre-synth 1976 masterpiece collaboration with Jaco Pastorius and Bob Moses, “Bright Size Life.”
The members of Outside Pedestrian are players, composers and educators. They use their music to inspire the next generation of musicians through clinics and master classes. The newly reissued “Pedestrian Crossing” is a testament to both their undying passion and their continued dedication to the growth and development of their skills. Listen to the album in its entirety below. You can also hear the tracks “Adrenochrome” and “Northern California Highway Song (2020)” on the Deep Indie Jazz playlist. Follow the links below the video to connect with the band. Get on their profiles and get in the loop on all of the fascinating projects from this talented trio.
