South Philly Review

Kevin Bacon never envisioned a song he penned about the Mummers' Parade a year ago would one day include the actual Strutters backing the Bacon Brothers on the track. Yet, in June of this year, the two-man band, the Mummers and Philadelphia songwriter/producer Walter "Bunny" Sigler headed into the studio to record a fresh version of "New Year's Day."

"What's really cool is that you have two kinds of music that are very, very different," Bacon, the star of "Mystic River" and "Apollo 13, " said at a Nov. 12 press conference. "What they play I guess you wouldn't really categorize as rock music, but when it's laid on to the track, it just really works great and it feels very organic."

Proceeds from that track, along with a DVD of the recording session and Saturday's 8 p.m. benefit concert at the Electric Factory, 421 N. Seventh St., will go towards the 2010 Mummers' Parade, Kevin and Michael Bacon said last month at Paradiso, 1627 E. Passyunk Ave., where they were accompanied by the Woodland String Band, based at 2041-45 S. Third St.

"We're very excited about the Dec. 5 concert," Emmy Award-winning composer Michael Bacon said. "The Bacon Brothers will be playing our set, but the Mummers are behind [us] the entire evening -- 100 percent -- and I don't know exactly what all the plans are, but what I've been seeing and hearing about, it should be one of the most spectacular evenings that I've ever been involved in."

Michael and Kevin grew up in Center City and frequented the "freezing cold" Mummers' Parade, as Michael remembered it, with their father, Edmund, a city planner who helped design city staples such as the Penn Center, Market East, Independence Mall and Penn's Landing.

"I can remember we went down every New Year's Day," Michael, 60, said. "Our father would take us. We come from a family of six kids and he would take us all down there and we'd get up on his shoulders. He was a very tall man ..."

"Not at the same time," Kevin, 51, added.

"And it's almost a thing that's like breathing," Michael continued. "It's just part of Philly. You don't think about it too much.

"When we go around the country and play the song, we find out that most people don't know what a Mummer is. They say, 'What's a Mummer?' 'Well do you have 45 minutes? I can fill you in. It's a very complicated thing what the whole thing is about.'"

The song is about a man from Philadelphia who relocates to Los Angeles to make it big as an entertainer, but is waiting tables. He reassesses his values and wants to come back home for the New Year's Day Parade, Michael said.

"In a lot of ways, I think that the older I get, the more I reassess my values and remember what a fantastic city this is and what amazing cultural institutions exist here and the Mummers are certainly one of the finest and needs to be supported," he said.

"There's so much of that song [that] is not true," Kevin added. "I didn't escape Philadelphia to go to L.A. I never lived in L.A. My father wasn't a Mummer. It's strange how feelings just come -- that's poetic license. You have certain connections and I think basically the song is about you grow up somewhere -- no matter where you go in the world, there's always kind of a magnet that pulls you back."

Producer "Bunny" Sigler, left, joined Michael, center, and Kevin Bacon at Paradiso to talk about supporting the Mummers tradition (Staff Photo by Greg Bezanis).

The relationship between the Bacons and the Mummers began last winter. Each year, the brothers host a Christmas party in New York and Michael books a surprise musical guest. In honor of the duo's sixth LP "New Year's Day" being released in November 2008, the invitation was extended to the Quaker City String Band, based at 1943 S. Third St.

"I was really struck by the musicianship that these guys had, so then I thought, why don't we put them on our song?" Michael said.