Darren Eubank and Chima Ijeh had known each other since they were in the sixth grade and were on the same peewee football team. Although they went to school together through their senior year at Red Oak High School, they weren’t exactly best friends.
Ijeh, who took choir in school and sang in church, was set to sing the national anthem at a baseball game during their senior year. Eubank was the designated hitter for the varsity baseball team.
On the night of the game, Ijeh was out in the dugout, ready for someone to hand him the microphone. Suddenly, he looked out on the field and saw the microphone in Eubank’s hands as he walked out to the mound to sing the national anthem. He had known Eubank for seven years and “never heard him sing a lick.”
Eubank went out on the field and “killed” the national anthem.
“He pulled a Kanye on me!” Ijeh said.
In 2013, four years after graduating from Red Oak High, Darren Eubank and Chima Ijeh formed the band D and Chi. Ijeh had no idea that they would end up opening for Grammy-nominated artists, performing on American Idol and developing a friendship that was more like a brotherhood. He also had no idea that his time with Eubank would be cut short.
D and Chi’s new album, And It Feels Like, took four years to make and was originally meant to convey the highs and lows that Eubank, Ijeh and their band mates went through during the period leading up to its release. When Eubank died due to COVID-19 complications in late May, it added a new layer of meaning to the release.
“This has also become like a Darren Eubank legacy album,” Ijeh said. “It’s the last time that he got to go in the studio and record his music.”
To celebrate Eubank’s life and the new album, D and Chi will perform at an album release show on Friday, July 16, which would’ve been Eubank’s 30th birthday. The show will be held at Firehouse Gastro Park in Grand Prairie and will also include performances from local band Texicana and Dallas-based duo Drugstore Cowboy. Ijeh says there will be a dedication video and other elements paying tribute to Eubank.
“People are going to want to listen to his tracks,” Ijeh said. “More people are going to really gravitate to — in some ways — his last words.”
Ijeh says that “One Way Street,” a rock ballad originally written about a lost love, has seen the most significant change in what it stands for since Eubank’s passing. The lyrics read, “It feels like I’m driving down a one way street, never coming back. Don’t forget about me.” The song is now listed as the first track on the album, and it’s been renamed “A Shadow.”
Made up of lead guitarist Austin Jett, keyboardist Courtlin Murphy, bassist Markwayne Kennedy and drummer Mason Grimes, the band’s overall sound reflects the blend of genres that D and Chi have developed over the years: a combination of country, pop, indie and rock. Some of the musicians, including Eubank and Ijeh, also have roots in Christian music, and there is a spirituality present in D and Chi’s music, especially on the new album.
Ijeh says that he and Eubank wanted the album to “feel like life,” and capture the emotions that the band went through during the course of its making, including a pandemic, a change in presidents and a set of historic moments for the Black Lives Matter movement. Marriage, divorce and the death of one of D and Chi’s lead vocalists only added to the eventfulness.
“All we wanted to do is to just bring positivity in this world and really just be a light,” Grimes, the drummer, says. “I just want people to just continue to be encouraged by what we put out.”
Eubank’s wife, Brecia, remembers spending countless hours with the band in the studio while they were producing the album. She hopes her husband’s last project will leave a lasting impression.
“I hope that people love it because they worked so freaking hard on it,” Brecia Eubank says. “I just hope that people can take lessons from his life and how hard he worked and how he never gave up.”
