Join Grayton Beach Catering for a Halloween CD Release Party by The Randall Bramblett Band on Saturday, October 31, starting at 8 pm at Arnett’s Gulfside Trail Rides and Stables. The title cut of the new album, Devil Music, is based on a story about blues great Howlin’ Wolf.
“It’s about the Wolf and his mother, who was very opposed to him playing the blues. She was a very religious woman and believed it was the devil’s music and wanted him to give it up,” Bramblett said. “When I read about it, the story was just so poignant, then I talked to a guitar player from his band, who confirmed it was all true and gave me some more details.”
The song, which Bramblett believes is one of his best, is interesting since Bramblett was a seminary student/philosophy major before deciding to become a musician. Bramblett says his story is different because he had no ultra-conservative Christian influence telling him modern music was evil. The part of the story that is probably the same is the joy the music gave him.
“Once I started writing, that changed everything for me,” he said. “Because once you write something and hear it become music, there’s almost nothing more wonderful than that.
I knew the first time I heard people playing my music that that was what I want to do. “Still, it is not like my love of philosophy and religion went away. It’s all connected. As I write songs, it’s all there.”
Arnett’s Gulfside Trails converts their barn into a unique event space right next to their horse pasture and wooded trails.
Bramblett plays keyboards, saxophones, guitar, mandolin and harmonica. Although he played woodwinds performing with Traffic, sax with the Allman Brothers and with Steve Winwood, guitar and sax with Widespread Panic, and percussion as part of his five albums with the groundbreaking Southern jazz/rock band Sea Level, he is astonishingly humble about his musicianship, saying he’s good on keyboards, OK on saxophone and not good enough to be a lead guitarist.
What he does admit he has is a sense of musical adventure, something he shares with others in the Randall Bramblett Band.
“We tend to take a song and expand and extend it and to get pretty improvisational with it,” he said. “Most of the songs we play over the years tend to get bigger and longer and more interesting than they used to be — we are an improvisational group at heart.
“To play the way we play, I think you have to have the musicianship and you have to have the jazz, or maybe the jam-band, sensibility.”
Max McCann and Cal Benton and Friends will perform the opening act. Drinks and food will be available at the venue. Whether you choose to wear your costume or not, one thing’s guaranteed – it’s going to be an awesome night!
Advance tickets are $25 per person. Reservations for table of 10 or more – $20 per person. Day-of-show tickets are $35 (subject to availablity). Buy tickets online at Grayt Events or purchase at Central Square Records and The Blue Giraffe.
