Steve Pile honors George Harrison, John Lennon in Sebastopol show

For the past few years, Sonoma County’s Lazyman, fronted by Steve Pile, has captured the spirit of George Harrison’s songs in annual tributes, and the band is coming back to Sebastopol’s HopMonk Tavern on Saturday, April 15.

The tributes began with an ambitious night in late February 2013 (Harrison’s birthday is Feb. 25) when Lazyman covered the complex “All Things Must Pass” album. Fans were so impressed they demanded another concert the following year.

The shows, highlighted by Pile’s commanding voice, engaging presence and supremely talented backing band, have become a tradition, and this year the tribute is being expanded to include John Lennon songs.

Pile, who lives in Santa Rosa with his wife and two young daughters, has tried to change up the tribute annually to keep it fresh.

Last year at San Rafael’s Terrapin Crossroads, Lazyman peppered the Harrison tribute with a couple of Bob Dylan songs and some other tunes.

This year the show is called “Dead Beatles,” a tribute to both Harrison and Lennon, with some of the improvisation found in Grateful Dead songs.

The Beatles were the first band that Pile listened to on his own as a kid growing up in Healdsburg where his father was a doctor (he’s now retired). He borrowed his parents’ headphones “from age 6 on, just kind of soaking in the music.”

In his late 20s, Pile moved to Austin to work as a musician and his appreciation for Harrison’s music deepened. Pile felt that Harrison, who didn’t attract the same attention as Lennon and Paul McCartney, was somewhat overlooked.

“I felt like George never really got the kind of tribute” he deserved, Pile said during a phone interview in March.

James Farag, a Petaluma resident who has seen several Lazyman homages, said he “loves” the shows because Pile takes on these projects “with such passion and purity of intent.”

Listeners “can tell that he’s a true fan of the work and wants to give the songs their proper due, letting the source material shine,” Farag said.

“His songwriting and lyricism convey thoughts, feelings, and emotions with a clarity that manages to simultaneously feel personal yet universal.”

Pile, who often performs in an Ascot-style motorist cap, noted there are plenty of Beatles tribute bands but few that play primarily the solo gems from Harrison and Lennon.

Lazyman is eager to see what happens when they open up the songs with a jam-band treatment.

The band’s bassist Brian Rashap said the “grateful tribute” will “dismantle, explore and glue back together” both well-known and rarely heard songs from Harrison and Lennon, mainly from each artist’s post-Beatles solo career.

Lazyman has been playing frequently at Terrapin Crossroads, doing experimental jams and “adding a lot more improv instead of being a straight-ahead Americana rock band,” Pile said.

“We’re not planning to play any Grateful Dead (at the upcoming Dead Beatles tribute), but the show will have the adventuresome spirit of the Dead,” he said.

Asked if the intent of the tributes is to remind people how great Harrison’s (and Lennon’s) songs are, Pile said, “For sure, but it’s a little more selfish: I just love playing the songs.”

Lazyman’s own music is wide-ranging and energetic, accented by a powerful horn section, which will come to the fore on the many Lennon songs that feature brass.

Some Lazyman originals are rooted in Delta blues, others, such as the lilting “Wake Me Up,” are propelled by West African rhythms.

Pile’s appreciation of West African music took hold when he was living overseas just before the millennium.

While living in London in 1999, Pile went to see reggae guitarist Ernest Ranglin, who had just released an African-influenced album. “He had this huge Senegalese band, and I was like, oh my God,” Pile said.

“I thought: I have to go down to Senegal or someplace like that. A friend suggested The Gambia because they speak English and flights there were super cheap.”

That friend knew The Republic of Gambia’s Dembo Konte, one of the world’s top kora players - the kora is a West African string instrument (see sidebar for more about it) - and put Pile in touch with him.

“Dembo said ‘Come on down, we’ll pick you up at the airport.’ I had gotten his CD at the Virgin Megastore, so I recognized him when I got off the plane,” Pile said.

“I stayed for three weeks and his son, Jali Bakary, became my teacher and best friend there.”

Pile vowed to return to Gambia and build a school for musicians who want to study the kora with a “griot,” a Mandinka master of the instrument. “We’re trying to make sure the traditions stay alive,” he said.

It took Pile almost a decade to raise construction funds, but he returned to Gambia in 2008, 2011 and 2012, and now the school has been completed.

“It’s really cool and beautiful - it’s got shiny tile floors and great acoustics in the music hall (with) a communal area for lessons,” he said.

There’s a “huge surge in musicians, especially from Europe, that are super interested in West African music because people like Ali Farka Toure have become popular.”

The tuition students pay is an income source for local musicians, Pile said, while the school “generates interest and enthusiasm for traditional music that (otherwise) could fade.”

Pile plans to issue an album with Jali Bakary called “Cousin-Brother,” a nod to the close connection he feels with Bakary. “Rock is descended from African rhythms,” Pile noted. “My music is a cousin to the music they play.”

He’s hoping to get Bakary, a Muslim, to the U.S. so they can play together again, but with the Trump Administration’s recent attempts to impose travel restrictions, he feels it won’t be easy.

“It’s my dream to get him over here, especially now when we see fear of Islam and Muslims,” Pile said. “I’d love to bring him over at a time like this to celebrate diversity and show solidarity.”