Baking under a scorching hot sun alongside the highway outside of Gallup, New Mexico, musicians Jherek Bischoff and Alex Guy retrieved their instruments out of a broken-down van and did what they do best — make music.
Jason Webley and Michael McQuilken sat and watched, waiting for the tow truck. That was 2008 and the four were touring the Southwest as the Jason Webley Quartet in support of the band’s album, “The Cost of Living.”
Three years later they’d tour the West Coast, capping it in Seattle with a memorable show at the Moore Theatre. After that concert, having played together for more than a decade, the four would scatter, taking on projects separate from each other.
On May 17, as the final performance of this year’s Fisherman’s Village Music Festival, they’ll reconvene and play together once again. Webley and his band — Bischoff, McQuilken and Guy — will perform at 10 p.m. at the Historic Everett Theatre.
“I’ve always enjoyed the chemistry of this band,” said McQuilken, who now runs a theater company in Brooklyn, New York. “We make good music together. I’m just looking forward to catching up and playing.”
It was Webley, an Everett resident, who had the idea of getting the band back together. He wanted to do something special as headliner of the second annual festival. The shows on his recent “Margaret” tour were the only ones he’d booked since walking away in 2011. Webley wanted the upcoming show to be more than just him getting up and playing music.
So he contacted Bischoff, McQuilken and Guy and gauged their interest. To his surprise, all three said yes. It was no easy get. Besides McQuilken having to fly cross-country, Bischoff now lives in Los Angeles where he scores music for films and Guy, who lives in Seattle, recently released an album as her nom de plume, Led to Sea.
“There all so busy that when I threw this date at them I didn’t expect them to be able to do it,” Webley said. “I’m really touched that they would take time to come and do this gig in Everett.”
Webley’s history with the band members goes back to 1999, when he first met McQuilken at a show at the Sit and Spin in Seattle. Webley was performing a solo show and McQuilken was drumming for his band, Player King. Webley, a theatrical performer himself, was impressed with McQuilken’s stage presence.
“He had this incredible, unbridled enthusiasm,” Webley said.
Soon after, Webley met Bischoff while visiting a friend on Bainbridge Island. Bischoff, who had a nomadic upbringing on a sailboat, was playing bass in an improv jazz band at a local cafe. Webley sat in on some songs, they ended up hanging out and Bischoff eventually joined Webley and McQuilken.
The trio became a quartet when Webley met Guy, who plays viola and violin, while working with renowned violist Eyvind Kang on Webley’s album “Counterpoint” in 2001.
Webley said that early on it seemed that the four were always around each other, playing shows and recording music. The band toured the West Coast in 2005 after Webley released “Only Just the Beginning,” which all three played on, and later embarked on a larger tour of the West in 2008 after the release of “The Cost of Living.”
Three years later, Webley released a live album that Bischoff and Guy played on, and the four played a five-show tour up the West Coast from Los Angeles to Seattle. Following the final show at the Moore Theatre in November 2011, Webley, who was coming off of a year in which he’d played 200 shows in 40 countries, led a procession from the Moore to Elliott Bay, eventually walking into the Sound and into semi-retirement.
From there, the four went their separate ways. McQuilken, who was attending theater school at Yale University, and Bischoff went on tour as part of Amanda Palmer’s backing band, Grand Theft Orchestra, in 2012. Bischoff later moved to Los Angeles, where he put out an album, “Composed,” that included collaborations with David Byrne, Nels Cline and Brazilian pop singer Caetano Veloso. Guy moved to New Mexico and Spain, before returning to Seattle.
“I’m often in awe of the people that I’ve been lucky enough to play with,” Webley said. “They’re phenomenal musicians — in musicianship and taste.”
Webley, who is mostly known as a solo artist with a flair for the dramatic, said playing with a band brings a different dynamic to his shows.
“When I play alone the rhythm (of the show) can be all over the place. With the band those things have to be a little more scripted,” Webley said. “There’s spectacle and tricks and games that can be tough to pull off when I’m alone, whereas with the band there’s more flexibility for me not to have to always be playing. I try to play with that a bit.”
As for the upcoming show, Webley said the four will run through a quick rehearsal early in the day and then let it fly.
“I don’t really have it all planned out,” Webley said.
Aaron Swaney: 425-339-3430; aswaney@heraldnet.com. Twitter: @swaney_aaron79.
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