Remembering US Expat & Musician Randy Abel, 1969-2022
The curtain has fallen one last time for Randy Abel, an American musician who headed the popular Beijing band The Randy Abel Stable, who passed away in the UK on May 29 from leukaemia.
Formed in 2011, The Randy Abel Stable combined classic American genres like honky tonk, bluegrass and blues to create their own distinct yet Americana-influenced sound.
Beyond this, though, one of the things that really made the band work was Abel’s songwriting, remembers bandmate Peter Schloss. “Having played his music for many years, I can tell you firsthand Randy’s lyrics were magical in the way it could tell a story that allowed the characters that populated his songs to come to life.”
Abel would sing at any opportunity he got, with harmonica or not
Schloss adds that The Randy Abel Stable wasn’t a cover band, although they did play some good covers. “Our first album was all originals, as was our next record. Our live shows were always heavy with originals.”
It was this penchant for originals and classics that make up Schloss’s fondest memory of Abel: when they first met. Together with the band’s future mandolin player, Parker Trevathan, the three attended a weekly scheduled jam session in the hutongs in April 2011, only to find they were some of the only ones there.
“Parker played the mandolin while Randy played the harmonica, and I was on the banjo,” Schloss recounts. “We played long into the night, with Randy singing songs we knew and songs we had not yet heard. The three of us knew something special was happening, and one week later, Randy asked if we wanted to form a band.”
Abel and The Randy Abel Stable playing at DDC
The trio got together to form The Randy Abel Stable, with Abel singing lead vocals and on harmonica, Trevathan on mandolin, and Schloss on banjo. They were soon joined by Josh Dyer and Liu Yusi on guitar.
Abel was one for good first impressions, with Dyer echoing Schloss with his own memories of the musician. “I first met Randy in the courtyard at the original Great Leap, and he was here to jam,” says Dyer. “Everyone there had guitars and ukuleles and mandolins and banjos, and the leader of the jam, Chris Boehner, who led a band called the Redbucks, asked Randy if he wanted to sing a few songs.”
Dyer hadn’t noticed Abel at first because he wasn’t carrying an obvious instrument, and he seemed very quiet. But when he was asked to sing, Dyer remembers, Abel opened up with this big, authentic country voice. It seemed as if he had stepped out of a country song — which fit the bill as Dyer found out later that Abel grew up in Rust Belt Ohio with family members who hailed from the Appalachia part of the state, close to West Virginia, which Dyer believes contributed to those authentic roots.
Abel at a rehearsal outside DDC's old hutong location
It was quite a contrast, but Dyer soon found it was characteristic of Abel. He was shy and withdrawn at times, but then he’d suddenly release everything in huge, energetic performances while under the spotlight, whether he was backed by a band or just his harmonica.
This country demeanor and unstoppable thirst to sing at any opportunity translated to the stage as well, with Schloss saying Abel should be remembered for his stage presence, which, next to the songs, is what brought people to the shows; they came to see the band because they knew they would always see a great show — sometimes a spectacle — and often the unexpected, says Schloss (you can see that spectacle first hand at the QR code below, in footage of the band's rendition of "Love in Vain" at the Taihu Music Festival, VPN on)
Stage presence and the nature of the music The Randy Abel Stable played had not just foreign audiences, but Chinese audiences hooked as well, eager for an American sound that many of them hadn’t experienced before. Parker Trevathan, the band’s mandolin player, expands on this: “Randy was a connection to an older form of American folk art, and while he might not have been the slickest player or singer, he was real and his performances were magnetic.”
Another gimpse of rehearsal at DDC
Liu, on the other hand, remembers Abel as a brother. One time Liu got drunk at a wedding with a gig right after. He found himself on a subway heading to the gig with Abel, completely passed out with head resting on Abel’s shoulder for almost the entire ride. When he came to, Abel told him it was a bit awkward on the ride over, but that their connection as band mates and brothers trumped that.
The band lasted until 2014, effectively ending when Trevathan moved to Tianjin and Dyer to Dali, but during its short history, The Randy Abel Stable went on to play shows at a number of venues, including DDC, Paddy O’Shea’s, an annual Halloween Show at Yugong Yishan, and Dazefest at Dos Kolegas.
Along with playing at a number of Midi Festivals, their biggest show, according to Schloss, was a headliner at Taihu Lake Festival in Wuxi.
Abel (center, arms outstretched) and the band playing at Beijing MIDI Festival
“As a musician and a person, he knew his strengths and weaknesses well,” says Liu, adding that when Abel had a vision, he would not hesitate to put forward and maintain his points. That being said, Abel would never push others to do anything they felt uncomfortable with.
Liu believes Abel should be best remembered for the music he recorded with The Randy Abel Stable. “I’ll always cherish the memories of us playing and recording music together, though it’s a pity some songs like ‘So She Stays at Paddy O’Shea’s’ never got recorded.”
The Randy Abel Stable recorded one EP and one full album, “Stable Condition,” which was released to much fanfare back in 2013.
Scan above to listen to the album and more of the band’s music on their Bandcamp page (VPN on).
A copy of Stable Condition, The Randy Abel Stable's sole studio album
It was also in Beijing that Abel found love. In 2016, he met Rosie Eade, a meteorologist and folk musician who was on a two month work assignment in Beijing, at an open mic night at Caravan. The two spent time together after that, and a relationship slowly blossomed. Eade would return to Beijing for another trip, during which she and Abel played a few gigs together before eventually moving to the UK in 2017 and marrying in 2018.
Before Abel left China, though, it wasn’t without one last hurrah. Together with members of The Randy Abel Stable and other fellow musicians, one last gig was held at Caravan, titled simply Anyways Folkways.
The memories of Abel, The Randy Abel Stable band, and his mark on the Beijing scene stuck, and it was in the later part of his life that Dyer says his second memory stuck out, the last time he spoke with Abel.
A poster for the Anyways Folkways show at Caravan
By this time, Abel had been diagnosed with leukaemia and was reaching out to former bandmates to reminisce and hear about how they were doing. “I don’t think I had talked to him for a couple years at that point,” Dyer admits. “We talked on video chat, and I’ll remember this conversation my whole life probably, he was just very honest. I don’t think he had come to terms with death at this point, but it was as if he was a guy going through a transformation; getting ready to face this thing.”
Abel always wanted to make the most of everything. Dyer says Abel always had a quiet warmth and soulfulness, but it was accompanied by a kind of reticence. In that last conversation, though, it was out there on full display; he became quite expressive, and all that warmth and soul seemed magnified.
Abel playing at DDC in 2015
Although the man behind Randy Abel Stable has left this world, his music and the memories and connections he made throughout his time in Beijing and China remain steadfast, and hopefully it’ll stay that way for years to come.
Images courtesy of 69 (Zhang Jincan) of DDC and the Randy Abel Stable band members
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