Zach Deputy atThe Engine Room Friday

Super-nice, super-cool and funky Zach Deputy plays the Engine Room in Tallahassee Friday night. Deputy has become a welcome regular at Bear Creek Music and Art Festival, and North Florida fans even chipped in a year or two ago for a special benefit after someone stole all his one-man-band looping equipment.

He's been touring nonstop and has watched his star rise accordingly. Zach's a looper, yes, but he's also a killer guitar player, a great singer, and a good songwriter. His shows are a lot of fun. Friday's show is with the band Wisebird. Tickets are $10 advance and $12 day of show

Here's an excerpt about Deputy from Relix:

“Imagine Ray Charles, James Brown and Michael Jackson all having an illegitimate child and it growing up in the Virgin Islands,” Zach Deputy says of his sound. And it’s precisely this sound of new-age soul that’s garnering national attention for the South Carolinian. His debut album, Out of the Water (2008), utilized the talents of bassist Sam Sims (Michael Jackson) and drummer Sonny Emory (Earth, Wind & Fire); and more recently, the calypso-kissed funk and beatboxing improv of 2009’s Sunshine won him the Home Grown Music Network’s Studio Album of the Year award. But its Deputy’s live performances that truly earn the 27-year-old his keep. Accompanied only by percussionist and life-long friend Paul Kearns, Deputy charms audiences with the soulful dexterity of an R&B crooner while live-looping his acrobatic rhythms and fiery guitar leads to deliver full, band-like sounds. Even with 300 yearly performances, the aspirations remain simple: “I just hope the music helps restore balance in people’s lives.” He quietly adds, “That’s why I do it, to hopefully change people’s lives for the better.”