Bassist brings eclectic sound back to Mobile Thursday, September 27, 2007 By LAWRENCE SPECKER Entertainment Reporter BayFest usually features a number of musical homecomings and familiar faces, mixed in with a heaping portion of novelty. With Christian Grizzard's Electric Experiment, next weekend's festival has all of the above in one package. Grizzard is an Atlanta native now living in Nashville. Though he spent only about three years of his career in Mobile, from 2000 to 2003, he nonetheless made an impression, playing bass with Molly Thomas, Hank Becker & the Boogie Chillin, jam/jazz/funk band Kung Fu Mama and an offshoot, the Cozmos. Since leaving Mobile, he's been even more active. Band projects have included the jam group Bee Speed, which has played in the Mobile area, and the newer Cosmic Blues Authority. He's worked as a sideman for acts including Jimmy Barret and Carolina Rain. And somehow, in his spare time, he's managed to put together his first solo album, "Life on the Blue Dot." It's a freshly pressed disc full of brand-new music that Mobile gets to hear live for the first time next weekend. The album is remarkable on a couple of levels. For one thing, while it includes no shortage of tasteful bass playing, it serves primarily as a showcase for Grizzard's songwriting and singing. For another, it includes a virtual Who's Who of his talented friends, including many contributors with Lower Alabama ties: guitarists Corky Hughes, Guthrie Trapp, Beau Berman and Ricky Chancey; drummer John Milham; didgeridoo player Joel Andrews; and vocalists Jimmy Hall, Donna Hall, Stan Foster and Lisa Mills. In all, 24 musicians had a hand in "Life on the Blue Dot." "I knew I was going to use a bunch of different people," Grizzard said, "but I didn't know it was going to be that many." Given the way it was put together, you can make the case that Grizzard should have named his troupe the Electric Illusion. About a year and a half ago he got together with percussionists Justin Amaral (of Nashville, a Bee Speed partner) and John Milham (Mobile, Kung Fu Mama) to lay down percussion tracks. Then he started carrying the same portable recording deck to his collaborators, adding instruments and voices piece by piece, sometimes in Mobile or Florida, sometimes in various Nashville "living room sessions." Hearing the finished project, it's difficult to believe. The album opens with, "3D," a dreamy, bass-centered instrumental fringed with sitar and didgeridoo, and it ends with an acoustic version of the same song. Both sound like in-the-moment jams from a very tight circle of musicians. Other than a few songs where the background vocals resonate differently that the leads (and many of them weren't even recorded in the same state, let alone the same room), the illusion is seamless. The swampy call-and-response between two slide guitars on "Standing Still"? Both played by Mobile guitarist Corky Hughes, formerly a partner in Kung Fu Mama and the Cosmos. The soaring lap steel line that makes "Lost Song" so memorable? Grizzard was thinking about having Hughes try his hand at the part when he bumped into Ricky Chancey on a trip to Mobile. "He was like, 'Man, come over, let's record,'" Grizzard said. "So that's how that happened." In terms of overall feel, the album is dominated by Grizzard's affinity for jam music, favoring upbeat, slightly trippy imagery and mellow meditations rather than anything dark or edgy. Musically it folds in Caribbean flavor, rock, raspy blues and touches of country. Aside from "3D" and "Lost Song," standout tracks include "Gabriel," a gentle song where Grizzard hits a sweet spot with voice, tempo, emotion and instrumentation. Named for his infant son, it benefits from soft trumpet and rich backing vocals from Ann and Regina McCrary, sisters who've sung with everyone from Elvis to Stevie Wonder to Bob Dylan. Once serendipity and his itinerant recording process brought them into the picture, Grizzard said, it took him "about one and a half seconds" to decide to ditch his own backing vocals. Also memorable is "Tomorrow's Yesterday," a song that pairs Grizzard's bass with Clint Parris' piano work in a way that's deliberately reminiscent of Vince Guaraldi. "When I wrote that, I wanted it to sound like Charlie Brown on acid," Grizzard said. Grizzard gives a good deal of the credit for the album's flow to co-producer Trina Shoemaker, who not only made her Tennessee studio available to him, but guided him through the mixing process and then mastered the album herself. During all the many hours he spent at the studio console, he could see one of Shoemaker's four Grammy statuettes was sitting nearby. "It was quite inspiring," he said. "Next time I definitely would like to have a rehearsed band all in the studio together," Grizzard said. "That's just kind of the way it worked out. It worked out well in the fact that I was able to get really good musicians who could make it sound like they were all playing together." As far as a touring band, next weekend's trip to Mobile will see Grizzard playing with Milham, Hughes and Parris. At BayFest he'll also be joined by Donna Hall -- who, as a historical aside, became the first artist to record one of Grizzard's songs when she put "Good at Being Blue" on her 2005 solo album "It's Never Too Late." Hall said "Life on the Blue Dot" makes her think of a blend of Grateful Dead, Leftover Salmon and Phish. "It's really good-time music," she said. "He was so creative in his arrangements." Hughes, whom Grizzard praises as his most enthusiastic and creative collaborator, said the recording process didn't strike him as being that odd, aside from all the travel involved. "In a way, it's no different from the usual process of doing a rhythm track and putting other stuff on top of it," he said. "I'm thrilled to be on there with all these cats," he said. "It's really neat." (Hughes, in what might be a record, expects to play five separate gigs at BayFest -- with Hank Becker, 2:30 p.m. Oct. 6 on the Cafe Stage; with the Vibration Configuration, 5 p.m. Oct. 6 in the Radio Avalon Jazz Tent; with the Electric Experiment, 8:30 p.m. Oct. 6 on the Launching Pad; with Dat "B," 2:15 p.m. Oct. 7 on the Cafe Stage; and with the "Pick of the Litter" jam session at 6 p.m. Oct. 7, also on the Cafe Stage. It'll all work out just fine, he said, "As long as I get to see Joan Jett.") Grizzard said he might someday record an album that puts the spotlight squarely on his instrumental chops, but in the meantime, he's happy with the balance he struck on this one. "With this, I really wanted it to be about the songs that I had written," he said. "But I also wanted it to kind of be about the musicians I used, too. ... I really wanted my friends to shine." As for what he hopes "Life on the Blue Dot" will do for his career, he said, "I hope it allows me to keep playing my own stuff." He enjoys working as a sideman, he said, but he wants to keep this outlet open as well. And as for listeners, he said, "mostly I hope people are entertained by it. Secondly, I hope it makes people think a little bit." They'll have the chance for themselves next weekend. And if he looks like something of a familiar face and a newcomer at the same time, well, it seems that way to him, too. He's played BayFest before, with Gravy, with Molly Thomas, with Kung Fu Mama and with Hank Becker. "I guess I've done it four or five times," he said. "But never standing up front in the middle." ABOUT THE BAND: THE ELECTRIC EXPERIMENT is scheduled to play two shows next weekend. The first is a 10 p.m. set at the Royal Scam, 72 S. Royal St., on Friday, Oct. 5. The second, the band's BayFest appearance, takes place at 8:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 6, on the Launching Pad. The group also will return to the area for an Oct. 18 show at the Ravenite pizzeria in Fairhope. "Life on the Blue Dot" is available locally at Dr. Music in Fairhope and Satori Coffee in Mobile. It can be ordered online through sites including www.itunes.com, www.theelectricexperiment.com and www.cdbaby.com. Othere sites of interest: www.christiangrizzard.com; www.myspace.com/theelectricexperiment

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