While enjoying major-label success, Illiterate Light stays connected to its roots
JODY WHARTON
FROM THE GROUND UP
September 16 – 22, 2020 c-ville.com
@cville_culture
facebook.com/cville.weekly
18
By Desiré Moses arts@c-ville.com
N
early a decade ago, a traveling troupe of musicians was midway through its set at the now-demolished Random Row Books in Charlottesville when the power went out. While darkness settled over the crowd, the band continued its performance undeterred, with no noticeable change in sound. That’s because the group’s set-up was running on a bike-powered generator: With one member pedaling a bicycle on a generator stand, a small PA system kept functioning. From the darkness sprang Charlottesville’s next big thing: Illiterate Light.
That night at Random Row, JMU alums Jeff Gorman and Jake Cochran were playing in Money Cannot Be Eaten, one of a handful of socially oriented bands cycling around the state together under the heading of Petrol-Free Jubilee. In 2015, Gorman and Cochran set off on a new project, the rock band Illiterate Light (the name is taken from a line in the Wilco song “Theologians”). Since then, the pair has toured widely, developed a devoted following, and signed a deal with a major label. But they still find themselves recalling those foundational days. Petrol-Free Jubilee “really pushed Jeff and I to think like, alright, there’s definitely big-picture solutions that we [don’t] know how to contribute to yet,” says Cochran. “But diving in with a bunch of friends and
