It only makes sense that at his home in northern Indiana, Delvon Lamarr’s garage is packed full of Hammond B-3 organs.
“I had seven, but I just sold one, so now I got six,” Lamarr told me. “I always regret when I get rid of things. I’ve had all kinds of synthesizers and stuff, and then I got rid of them and like, instantly regretted it. So now I don’t get rid of anything.”
Delvon Lamarr is an organist whose instrumental music combines elements of ’70s soul, groove-heavy R&B, and fusion-era jazz funk. Over the last decade, with his ever-evolving trio, he has released several Billboard-charting studio albums and played anywhere and everywhere he could carry his touring 1971 Hammond B-3 organ.
The Delvon Lamarr Organ Trio plays at xBk in Des Moines on June 10. Little Village caught up with Lamarr last month before he embarked on a European tour.
A Seattle native, he grew up in a house full of music.
“My brother was a rapper,” Lamarr said. “He had a little studio where he was making beats when he was like 15, so we always had records and were listening to hip hop and stuff like that. My mom was into old soul and R&B, listening to Mahalia Jackson and B.B. King, so I got a very diverse musical background.”
He started learning the trumpet and drums at a young age, and eventually began picking up gigs playing either instrument wherever he could in the Seattle area. One night when Lamarr was working as a drummer in a trio with organist Joe Doria and guitarist Dan Heck, another drummer sat in with the group.
“I just asked Joe if I could play the organ. I literally sat down at the organ and played like I’ve been playing it my whole life. I was kicking bass pedals and everything just right out the gate,” Lamarr recalled.
He took what he knew about brass and percussion, combined it together, and worked out how to play the organ without any formal instruction.
“I got separation from playing drums, and I kind of got the melodic side from playing horns. So it’s kind of the best of both worlds,” he said.
In 2015, Lamarr started his namesake trio with fellow Seattle stalwarts guitarist Jimmy James and drummer David McGraw. They self-released their debut album Close But No Cigar the following year.
Then, in 2017, they filmed a performance for Seattle’s famed nonprofit radio station KEXP that altered everything Lamarr. The video, which has the innocuous title “Warm-up Set (Live on KEXP),” now has over 13 million views. It is still among the top 10 most viewed videos of KEXP’s unmatched performances.
Lamarr said the irony is that it almost wasn’t filmed at all.
“The warm-up was never actually supposed to be recorded. What happened was our setup was really fast, so we had like 20 minutes to kill,” he explained. “They were like, ‘Why don’t you guys play some music and we’ll dial in some sounds?’ So we just started playing and I called three tunes that we weren’t going to do on the main performance. So we did that, and when the time came, we just started our actual set that we were supposed to do.”
The performance starts with a quiet, dead room clearly not ready for music. Before they start, Lamarr asks how everyone is doing — to little response. He remarks, “Is that it? Damn.” But by the end of the set, a crowd of people have gathered at the windows, watching Lamarr and company wax and groove, a trio totally in time and absolutely smoking.
“My wife had been working tirelessly, tirelessly. And when that video came out, man, it just kind of thrust us forward,” Lamarr said.
He went on to sign with famed soul label Colemine Records, who re-released Close But No Cigar. The record went to number one on the U.S. Contemporary Jazz Albums chart. In the years since, Lamarr’s released two more full-length studio albums, two live shows and eight 45 RPM singles through Colemine.
For the last few years, the Delvon Lamarr Organ Trio has been rotating drummers and guitarists regularly, evolving the music and pushing his creative notions further. “It actually helps me write music, because you listen to different styles. Not everybody plays the same, so I like writing music that caters to the style of the person I’m playing with. I got a lot of new music that we’re going to be putting out.”
For this current run of dates through Europe and the Midwest, Lamarr will be featuring some newer members of the extended “DLO3 Family.”
“I found them all on TikTok,” Lamarr admitted. They include Atlanta-based drummer Sam Groveman and guitarists Josh Perdue and Bryce Calvin.
The last gig he recalls playing in Iowa was at Gabe’s in Iowa City, and he mostly remembers it for the precarious load in/out. “You have to go up through the alley on this super rusty long staircase and, honestly, I did not know if that thing was going to hold us and the organ at the same time. I remember that we pulled up in the alley and I was looking at those stairs, and I was like, ‘I don’t know…’” he said, laughing.
“We got it up there and got it back down, but man, it was kind of nerve-wracking.”
With a garage full of Hammond organs, one would assume that Delvon Lamarr’s house is constantly filled with music. But that’s just not the case.
“I don’t hardly ever play music at my house. I should probably practice more but I don’t, to be honest, man. I play so much on the road that when I get home, man, I’m a video gamer.” (When we spoke, he was considering purchasing The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom to play while traveling on tour.)
There’s something special somewhere in that sentiment, something about performance and mutual discovery for both performer and audience, live and in-person. Rest assured that Delvon Lamarr and company will explain it much better on stage at xBk, and they’ll do it without words and only with their instruments. Oh, and a whole hell of a lot of feeling, too.
This article was originally published in Little Village’s June 2024 issue.
