Is this town big enough for two bad-ass classic country bands? This could get interesting!
Tag: Memphis
Dude has an acoustic bass. That’s a sin we can live with.
It’s pretty scary. Just to be safe, check yourself into that abandoned college in Holly Springs before you listen to this Halloween Jam from Clay Otis and and the Dream Sheiks.
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Grifters Reunion
As Meanwhile in Memphis: The Sound of a Revolution premieres November 2nd at the Circuit Playhouse as a part of the Indie Memphis Film Festival, fans of recent Memphis music history will have a triumph of their own.
Directors Robert Allen Parker and Nan Hackman’s biggest coup may have been convincing local indie-rock godfathers the Grifters to reunite after more than a decade of inactivity. The band was both one of Memphis’ biggest local draws and most successful exports of the 1990s, releasing several LPs, EPs, and singles (the 1994 full-length Crappin’ You Negative received rave reviews from publications like Rolling Stone and Spin) and touring extensively until around 2000, when exhaustion and the emergence of new projects and opportunities led the Grifters to slow things down and ultimately disband.
“We toured a lot,” the band’s singer/guitarist Scott Taylor says. “When we first took a break from all the touring, we weren’t in a hurry to get back in the van. The musical atmosphere had changed, and the stuff we were doing people weren’t as interested in — it got harder to get good shows. And we were all excited about our new bands.”
So the members of the Grifters went out on their own — Taylor with the Porch Ghouls (“We toured with Kiss and Aerosmith for almost two years,” he says) and Chopper Girl/Memphis Babylon; singer/guitarist Dave Shouse with Those Bastard Souls, the Bloodthirsty Lovers, and, most recently, >mancontrol<; and the rhythm section of Tripp Lamkins (bass) and Stan Gallimore (drums) with Dragoon.
Earlier this year, however, the group received an intriguing offer from the directors of Meanwhile in Memphis, who were looking to book bands for an after-party for the film’s premiere.
“Nan and I decided to make them an offer, even though we knew that the odds of it happening were slim to none,” Parker says. “There were even some people in the Memphis music community who told us that it could never possibly happen. I sent letters to each of the Grifters proclaiming how important they are to our documentary, to their fans in Memphis, and to the legacy of Memphis music altogether.”
“None of us were particularly interested in reliving the past,” Taylor says. “We were more into moving forward in our own directions. With a few exceptions, I’m not really into the ‘cool ’90s band goes back on the road’ thing. It didn’t seem cool to be like, ‘Hey, look at us. Look at what we did in the ’90s.'”
“Never say never,” Parker says.
“The reason we’re doing a reunion now is the documentary,” Taylor says. “The movie talks about our role in the Memphis scene of the ’90s. We all felt it was appropriate to play the show in conjunction. Over the years, we’d get these phone calls from out in the wilderness,” Taylor says. “Some guy would call and say, ‘You guys were my favorite band. I want you to play my wedding.’ It was never anything serious. Of course, we are hard to get in touch with, so maybe that was it too.”
Whatever reluctance the Grifters may have felt at one time about getting back together, the band is definitely enjoying the experience of reviving the project now — at least for one night.
“Practice has been really great. The songs sound better than ever, I think,” Lamkins says.
“It’s amazing,” Taylor agrees. “It’s been refreshing to come back to some of the songs. We’re all pleased that the material doesn’t sound too dated. We were always a band that tried to write timeless songs, songs that weren’t stuck in a particular genre.”
“I expected, at some point (but not knowing when), the Grifters to play again due to the sheer awesomeness and intensity of the band as a unit,” says Sherman Willmott, founder of Shangri-La Records, which released Grifters records through the ’90s until the band signed with Sub Pop.
The Grifters will perform this Saturday at the Warehouse for the Meanwhile in Memphis premiere after-party, along with local heavy-hitters the Hi Rhythm Section, Al Kapone, and Hope Clayburn. What happens with the group after that, though, is anybody’s guess.
Willmott sees the band getting much-deserved recognition.
“Because the Grifters’ hiatus dovetailed with the explosion of the internet (circa 2000), the post-Napster generation knows nothing about the power of this band,” Willmott says. “Given the intensity of today’s digital word of mouth, if the Grifters Mach II is one-fourth as good as their first go-round, there is no doubt in my mind that they will have thousands of new fans overnight.”
“We’re not ruling out doing more shows,” Taylor says. “Nothing is off the table as long as we’re enjoying ourselves.”
One recent highlight is a series of videos based on recordings from their album One Sock Missing. Each song is directed by a different person. One is directed by bassist Lamkins.
“It’s been fun,” Taylor says. “Sherman came to us and said he was tired of seeing our songs on YouTube without any real videos, just stills or homemade stuff. I’m glad we’re doing it. A lot of local filmmakers have done amazing jobs on the videos so far, and the project is moving along very organically.”
www.shangrilaprojects.com/the-grifters
Meanwhile in Memphis After-Party With The Grifters, The Hi Rhythm Section, Al Kapone, and Hope Clayburn’s Soul Scrimmage The Warehouse, Saturday, November 2nd, 9 p.m.
“When you’re a kid, your parents are like, ‘You want to do WHAT?'” Alvin Youngblood Hart says of going musical. “My parents said, ‘You need something to fall back on.'” Hart took their advice, sort of. He has two jobs: playing rock-and-roll with a band and playing solo, acoustic roots music.
“I’ve got the solo thing to fall back on for now. There’s playing rock shows, and there’s the day job. It kind of works out like that. I like playing it all.”
Hart also plays in the South Memphis String Band, and he was part of a recent session for John Kilzer’s upcoming album. The personnel on that session amounted to a pantheon of Memphis greats, including three guitarists: Hart, Luther Dickinson, and Steve Selvidge.
“Having me, Luther, and Steve on the same session could sound like a disaster, but we’re all old enough at this point in time — particularly me — to exercise some restraint. And I think me and Steve have a new career as harmony singers.”
Hart is looking forward to his Hi-Tone show this weekend.
“Memphis is pretty important to all of us. It’ll be a good Memphis rock show.”
— Joe Boone
Alvin Youngblood Hart’s Muscle Theory with Jimbo Mathus and the Tri-State Coalition, Saturday, November 2nd, at the Hi-Tone
Categories
Local Music Reviews
(ECR Music Group)
Tribute albums. It’s hard to gin up enthusiasm for most of these affairs. They typically involve taking a great artist who made great recordings and handing the songs out to not-as-great artists who make not-as-great recordings. Terry Manning’s second solo album in some 40 years is not the typical tribute album.
West Texas Skyline is Manning’s tribute to his friend Bobby Fuller, who is known mostly for the single “I Fought the Law.” Fuller was an acolyte of Buddy Holly and further developed Holly’s synthesis of high-lonesome mountain singing, wild rhythms, and California guitars.
Manning hails from West Texas and knew Fuller in the early 1960s. These were the days when Fender guitars and amplification were in all of their rickety, not exactly standardized glory. The Stratocaster sounds of that time and place endure, and Manning does a fantastic job bringing them into focus.
If anyone other than Terry Manning had made this album, you could round-file the thing. But Manning has a few tricks up his sleeve. He may be the most accomplished Memphis-based producer ever: Ike and Tina, Otis Redding, Led Zeppelin, James Taylor, ZZ Top, Joe Walsh, Molly Hatchet, Jimmy Buffet, and Shania Twain. He recorded Wattstax. What Manning does with these guitars and arrangements is notable.
The album opens with a bold take on “Love’s Made a Fool of You,” a song recorded by Holly’s Crickets and the Bobby Fuller Four. Manning takes liberties: The guitar has its Californianess turned up with a wavelike tremolo that suggests early-onset psychedelia. This cover highlights the West Texan take on frying-pan-hot clean guitars played in precise phrases. The album is a master class on classic sounds and approaches. It’s also a labor of love for a place and the people who made great music there. That’s something every Memphian can identify with. — Joe Boone
(Archer Records)
Memphis favors its winners: Blues and barbecue dominate our headspace. But there’s a lot more to Memphis than the usual suspects. On musical terms, that drives Lily Afshar nuts. The world-renowned classical guitarist and University of Memphis professor is a passionate advocate of not only the wider musical community of Memphis but also that of the world at large. Her latest recording is another example of her drive to expand the repertoire of both her instrument and our love of music.
Musica da Camera finds Afshar breaking new ground. The album begins with the first-ever recording of Musical Sketches on Pushkin’s Eugene Onegin, a work by an obscure Russian composer, Vladislav Uspensky, for an eight-piece ensemble. The piece is programmatic: It tells a story. In this case, it’s Pushkin’s novel in verse Eugene Onegin, a story of pride, love, jealousy, and regret set in 1830s St. Petersburg. Uspensky divines eight scenes from the story of a world-weary old goat whose cynicism gets the better of him when he dismisses the writings and affections of a young woman named Tatyana.
The opening piece, “The Ball,” sets the mood, creating the atmosphere of a dance but with a tinge of melancholy rather than excitement. It renders the mind of the over-it-all Onegin being hauled through another social affair. The tight orchestration and muted dynamics paint the picture and establish the mood. The following piece renders Tatyana’s romantic earnestness with rising and falling dynamics and expectant harmonies, all laced in a sweetness that does not become bothersome. It’s remarkably redolent of the emotional roller coaster that is expressing love — or anything sincere, for that matter.
The “Onegin” piece exemplifies the guitar technique that earned Afshar spots in master classes by Andrés Segovia, the Spanish master. Afshar is on a personal quest to expand the vernacular of the instrument beyond the body of work established by Spanish composers. Her earlier album Hemispheres incorporated modified guitars that could play intervals found in Persian music. Afshar has transcribed work by Persian, Turkish, and Azerbaijani musicians.
Musica da Camera marks another example of Afshar’s curiosity and technique coming together in a way that motivates both the artist and the listener to expand the scope of their musical understanding. — Joe Boone
All sorts of stuff going on here:
The Mallett Brothers look like they know how to party and fix your suspension. They’re at the P&H Wednesday night.
Stop it, y’all. You’re scarin’ me. It’s gonna get worse at Earnestine and Hazels on Saturday night.
Listen to these cats, why don’tcha.