Bio
An acoustic duo writing original American music, steeped in harmony singing, contemporary songwriting, and bluegrass instrumentation.
Kings of Ghost Town wasn’t the starry-eyed, dreamed-up-in-a-dorm kind of adventure that often overtakes young musicians. Indeed, Kings of Ghost Town happened despite two men’s best efforts. It snuck past their repeated assurances to each other that the music was “just for fun.” The day it took up too much of their time, they promised, they’d scale it back.
In fact when they first started spending time together Evan was already on the road well north of a hundred dates per year with his full-time band Mile Twelve. Danny was settled into a professorship at Boston University after a decade of touring with his breakout group Jones Street Station. What they had together was simply a friendship. It was just beers and tunes, a chance here and there to fit some picking into their busy lives. It was a drunken dare to learn iconic duo albums note for note. But late night chats about their favorite writers - Springsteen, Prine, Hartford, Welch and Rawlings - led them against better judgment to put pen to paper.
The songs that came were as real and new to them as anything either had ever written. So they packed the guitars up in their cases, and hit the stage, and the words you're reading now represent a (near) surrender to what was becoming inevitable.
People who see them play say there is an ease to a Kings of Ghost Town show, a kind of confidence that only comes from real friendship (and of being sovereigns over nothing in particular). There’s also a simple intimacy to the music, a sense that nothing else really matters except the songs.
Danny Erker
Danny Erker was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri. He grew up in a big family in a little house, full of music and musicians. He moved to New York City after attending college in Wisconsin, where he studied literature, languages, and theater. In NYC Danny split his time between school and music, earning a PhD in linguistics at NYU by day and by night diving into the City’s burgeoning bluegrass and folk rock scene. In 2012 he moved to Boston to teach linguistics at Boston University. He lives in Cambridge with his wife and little boy, who, like Danny’s pal and bandmate Evan, loves to bake.
Evan Murphy
Evan Murphy was born and raised in the suburbs of Boston. He grew up doing theater and thought about pursuing it professionally. But after graduating from Boston College in 2012 and moving briefly to New York he collided with the fact that auditioning is really hard and there weren’t enough hours in the day to learn to dance. He’d been cautiously nurturing an interest in acoustic music throughout his college years, ever since toting a guitar along to his freshman dorm, and now seemed like the moment to dive head first. After hearing Bruce Springsteen's rollicking album The Seeger Sessions he spiraled ever deeper into bluegrass and roots music. He sought out pub jams, guitar gurus, festivals and pickup bands. In 2015 he began a full time career in music with the formation of Mile Twelve. Shortly after that his duo with fellow troubadour Danny Erker matured into the Kings of Ghost Town. When he’s feeling burnt out on music he fantasizes about being a baker in the misty green hills of northern California. But for now you can find him singing and picking.