A new musical act is sweeping NKU’s student body. Orchid in the Ivy, a rock group made up of two past NKU students and one graduating senior, was selling copies of its new album, “Minus One,” in the Student Union all of last week.
The group, made up of Brett Scharf, a music major graduating in May, Mark Schulti, who graduated last year, and Zach Rawe, who left NKU and is now a school teacher, said that they were influenced by bands such as Rise Against and Nirvana.
While Scharf and Schulti were selling CDs, a student came up and said, “I listened to your album and I loved it.”
They said that students had been doing that all week, so they feel like they’re doing something right if people are coming up and complimenting them.
Word of their popularity even reached Molly Williamson, NKU’s director of development communication, who was looking for a band to cover The Lumineers’ song “Ho Hey” for a promotional video for the Go Gold Campaign.
Unfortunately, Williamson said, the university was not able to get the rights to the song, so they were not able to get the cover.
Originally, Williamson had talked to the pep band and one of the members recommended Orchid in the Ivy. Williamson said she heard a lot of good feedback about the group from students.
When Williamson talked to Scharf, he offered to record a song for NKU. The band recorded the song, entitled “Rise Up,” over the course of two to three weeks. Williamson said that when they submitted the song, it was already in such high format it didn’t require extra mastering.
Williamson praised the band for being so professional and for doing as good of a job as possible. Rawe joked, “We try to be as professional as you can be in Kentucky.”
Several weeks ago, the band played in the finals for the Madison Theater’s annual Battle of the Bands. Although they didn’t win, they do have another show at the Madison Theater on April 26 at 7 p.m. Tickets and more information can be found on the Madison Theater’s website.
Orchid in the Ivy’s new album, “Minus One,” is available on iTunes.
