By Suzanne Hodgson
Staff Writer

During the summertime, getting gas at Kennebunk’s Lower Village Guay’s Sunoco station may be a problem because of the crowd.
 Not the crowd of cars lined up, or even the crowd of mopeds out front, but the crowd of people sitting in lawn chairs hanging out and listening to good music.
Every Monday night for the past 10 years, the Sunoco station turns into a stage for a group of friends who enjoy hanging out and playing music around the loose screws, engine parts and oil rags inside the shop.
The self-described “jam session” has no name and members have come and gone over the years. The core of the group consists of David Dionne, 60, of Kennebunk; John Jellison, 60, of Kennebunkport; and Dick “Ziggy” Knight, 61 of Kennebunk.
“There’s a lot of people over the years who seem to enjoy it a lot and a lot of people who listen to one song and walk away,” said Dionne.
The music is a mix of blues, country and soulful classic rock with storytelling reminiscent of Tom Petty and guitar riffs similar to those of Johnny Cash.
“Johnny Cash riffs coming from his [Jellison’s] guitar,” says Dionne. Jellison says Dionne is Petty – he even thinks the two look similar.
It’s wintertime and the group is winding down for the year. There are no more crowds or an open garage bay to let the music out into the night. The friends don’t play in the garage much during winter because they try to protect their instruments from the weather.
A few people are here to watch the weekly jam session. Ten years ago, one older couple heard the music from up the street where they live and came down to see what all the noise was about. Today, they’re regulars, sitting in padded chairs in the front office of the station, the woman tapping her cane in beat with the music.
Then there’s a young man who works at Bentley’s Saloon, Walker Donovan, who sings along to all the songs and keeps trying to convince the group to play during the saloon’s Monday open mic night.
If you want the history though, Butch Harding is your man. He has been working at the Sunoco and watching the guys play for more than 20 years.
All the members of the group say they started playing guitar around the time they were 13, thanks to the Beatles. Jellison and Knight have been playing together in bands since the 1960s. Their last serious musical group was called “Great Northern Band” in the 1980s and the gas station has one of the group’s old records hanging up on the wall. Harding says Jellison used to have a group called “Johnny Sunoco and the Pump Tones.”
Knight is married to Jellison’s sister, but aside from their weekly jam sessions, the group says they don’t hang out much. According to Harding, Dionne used to be a customer and started playing an old guitar the guys keep at the shop.
Throughout the years, members of the band have changed. At one point they welcomed an accordion player, and in the summer there’s a bass player.
“Sometimes they have a kid that comes in and plays drums with them,” said Harding.
“We had this guy and turned him into such a song-writing machine he dumped us and moved to Nashville,” Dionne said.
All three write their own songs, with similar harmonies and styles from years of playing together, the only indicator of who wrote what is who is singing the song.
The group does covers as well, including a song by Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show called “The Cover of the Rolling Stone.”
“It’s the thrill that will get you, when you get your picture on the cover of the Kennebunk Post,” rings out Dionne’s voice.
The weekly jam sessions last from approximately 6:30 to 9 p.m. most Monday evenings.

Staff Writer Suzanne Hodgson can be reached at 282-4337, ext. 233.