Photo courtesy of Brian Kupetz

Sunday Afternoon plays the Mall today at noon. From left to right: Ryan Roscoe, Ryan Janac (sitting), Tyler Tafeaga, Joey Unger, Dan Howarth (sitting) and Rick Paz.

When racing from the Modern Languages building to the student union this afternoon, take the time to listen to the eclectic sound blend of a sax, electric guitar, bass, Warr guitar and drums.

These instruments form the unique music of the six-person group Sunday Afternoon, a local band performing at noon today on the Mall. The group, consisting of graduate, former and current University of Arizona students, is performing on home turf.

Playing at venues such as Frog 'n Firkin, O'Malley's On Fourth and Plush for more than two years, the band has built a solid local fan base and is poised to expand its music beyond the borders of the Old Pueblo.

The first step toward increased exposure is an independent album currently in production, as well as performances planned for locations outside of Tucson. Several shows in Flagstaff are slated for later this fall, and the band anticipates playing Phoenix and California venues in the spring.

The self-produced album is the band's most ambitious project to date; its only existing published material is a demo with five songs of much earlier music.

The band, which often receives requests for CDs at concerts, thinks lack of accessibility to music has been a limiting factor for its growth,

"We draw a huge crowd wherever we play, and people always ask us at gigs if we have any CDs," Joey Unger said. Unger, a UA geography senior, plays the acoustic and electric guitar and guitar synthesizer. He is also the band's manager.

As early as next week, Sunday Afternoon plans to wrap up the three-week recording process at Wave Lab Recording Studios in Tucson, and projects a January release for the 12-song album.

Craig Shumacher, the studio's engineer and owner, played a major role as producer and mixer of the album. For example, he encouraged the group to whittle six- or seven-minute songs down to the three- or four-minutes, more apropos for short radio attention spans.

"It's going to be an amazingly cool album," said Warr guitarist Dan Horwath. "I've never come across a band's first album that blew me away like this."

Rather than a history of the band's songwriting process, the CD is a mix of recent and older songs that covers much more musical ground than the original demo. Two of the last four songs written by the band made the cut, as well as songs originating from an Unger and saxophonist Ryan Roscoe duo two years ago.

In the beginning, Sunday Afternoon was a much smaller group with three members: Unger, Roscoe and lead singer Rick Paz. Unger and Roscoe first met while jamming Dave Mathews Band covers in the former student union Cellar. As the band gained more exposure, they also collected more musicians, including bass player Tyler Tafeaga, Howarth, and percussionist Ryan Janac, a UA music graduate.

The Warr guitar is a unique instrument with six bass strings and six guitar strings on the same neck, allowing the musician to play either guitar or bass, or both simultaneously.

"It (the Warr guitar) fits in really well with the band, because we have another guitar and bass, so we can interchange," Howarth said. "We get a lot of layers out of it. It's a unique sound, a sharp, clear bass tone that is hard to repeat on a normal bass guitar."

The band looks forward to its repeat performance on the mall, which offers a slightly different crowd from the traditional bar scene, as noted by Unger and Howarth.

"It's a chance (for us) to be seen sober," Unger said.

"None of them (the audience) are drunk," Howarth said.