It was scheduled the weekend of Keep Opelika’s Beautiful’s Garden in the Park, and cancelled due to weather. So this weekend it’s the Two by Two Unity Run has been rescheduled to Saturday, May 9, 5 K at 8:00 and 1 Mile Run, Walk, Wheel at 9:30.
The Lee County Humane Society will have one of those Wash & WaWag and Wash events to clean up that puppy of yours. Nine til Noon Saturday at the Shelter.
And over at Eighth and Rail it’s Ben Deignan. Heavily influenced by Stevie Wonder, The Temptations, and Marvin Gaye, Georgia native Ben Deignan grew up as a soul junky. It wasn’t until seeing U2 in concert at the age of 15 that he began to dive into the world of rock, picking up the family’s six-string, forming various garage bands in junior high and blossoming into a 22-year-old funkster with a sound that’s turning heads in clubs around the Southeast and beyond. Since then, the singer/songwriter has spent the last 6 years crafting a Southern, soulful pop/rock sound that is all his own. “A female friend of mine described my music as ‘orgasmic’ and I thought it was clever,” Deignan says. “I never really took it seriously, but for some reason it has stuck.”
It was only a few years ago, while playing his dad’s company party at the Tin Roof Cantina in Atlanta, that Deignan was discovered by an A&R rep for a major record label. That exposure led him to renowned Atlanta-based musician, arranger and multi-platinum certified vocal producer Jan Smith (Usher, Rob Thomas, Matchbox Twenty, Keyshia Cole, Ciara, Collective Soul, Edwin McCain, TLC, Sevendust, India Arie, Diana DeGarmo, Los Lonely Boys), who signed Deignan to a production deal and has been helping the fresh-faced Deignan prep his pipes. In 2008, Deignan set out on an extensive touring schedule with his band, Ben Deignan & Suburban Soul.
From the Archives — originally published on the Opelika Daily News on May 7, 2009. View the original page.
