The Greyboy Allstars are an American

soul-jazz Soul jazz or funky jazz is a subgenre of jazz that incorporates strong influences from hard bop, blues, soul, gospel and rhythm and blues. Soul jazz is often characterized by organ trios featuring the Hammond organ and small combos including ten ...

band from

San Diego San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the List of United States cities by population, eigh ...

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

, United States, whose current members include

Karl Denson Karl Denson (born December 27, 1956) is an American funk and jazz saxophonist, flutist and vocalist from Santa Ana, California. He was a member of Lenny Kravitz's band and has co-founded and led The Greyboy Allstars. Denson has recorded with ...

on Saxophone, Robert Walter on Keys,

Mike Andrews Michael Jay Andrews (born July 9, 1943) is an American former professional baseball player. He played in Major League Baseball as an infielder for the Boston Red Sox, Chicago White Sox and Oakland Athletics. After his playing career, he served fo ...

(under the pseudonym Elgin Park) on guitar, Chris Stillwell on bass and Aaron Redfield on drums. They have released six albums to date.

History

Initially formed in 1993 as the backing band for

rare groove Rare groove is music that is very hard to source or relatively obscure. Rare groove is primarily associated with funk, R&B and jazz funk, but is also connected to subgenres including jazz rock, reggae, Latin jazz, soul, rock music, northern soul ...

luminary

DJ Greyboy DJ Greyboy (a.k.a. Andreas Stevens) is an acid jazz DJ from San Diego, California now residing in Long Beach, California. Early in his career he was the partner of Rob Dyrdek in Crime on the Turn Tables. His style of music includes hip hop, so ...

. DJ Greyboy and saxophonist

(who was touring with

Lenny Kravitz Leonard Albert Kravitz (born May 26, 1964) is an American singer-songwriter. His style incorporates elements of rock, blues, soul, R&B, funk, jazz, reggae, hard rock, psychedelic, pop and folk. Kravitz won the Grammy Award for Best Male Roc ...

at the time) collaborated on two tracks for Ubiquity Records' ''Home Cookin'' compilation, and then worked on Greyboy's 1994 solo album for Ubiquity, ''Freestylin. After forming their own label, Greyboy Records, the duo gradually amassed members for a house band". The founding members included Denson, guitarist

(under the pseudonym Elgin Park), keyboardist Robert Walter, bassist Chris Stillwell, and drummer Zak Najor. The Greyboy Allstars started playing weekly at San Diego's now defunct Green Circle, weekends at San Francisco's Elbo Room and various clubs throughout Europe. Their debut album, ''West Coast Boogaloo'', was self-released in 1994, and featured

Fred Wesley Fred Wesley (born July 4, 1943) is an American trombonist who worked with James Brown in the 1960s and 1970s and Parliament-Funkadelic in the second half of the 1970s. Biography Wesley was born the son of a high school teacher and big band lead ...

on Trombone of

James Brown James Joseph Brown (May 3, 1933 – December 25, 2006) was an American singer, dancer, musician, record producer and bandleader. The central progenitor of funk music and a major figure of 20th century music, he is often referred to by the honor ...

fame. Several years later, ''Live'' was released, followed by ''Town Called Earth'' in 1997. In 1998, the band scored

Jake Kasdan Jacob Kasdan (born October 28, 1974) is an American filmmaker and actor. He is best known for directing ''Walk Hard'' (2007), ''Bad Teacher'' (2011), ''Sex Tape'' (2014), '' Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle'' (2017) and '' Jumanji: The Next Level'' ...

's movie

Zero Effect ''Zero Effect'' is a 1998 American mystery comedy film written and directed by Jake Kasdan in his feature directional debut. Starring Bill Pullman as "the world's most private detective", Daryl Zero, and Ben Stiller as his assistant Steve Arlo, ...

, under the direction of Mike Andrews. After dominating the jam-jazz scene of the ’90s, "the band parted ways in late 1999 to allow its members to take the creative steps necessary to stay musically fresh." and drummer Zak Najor officially departed the touring group. In 2007, the original band (including Najor) reunited in the studio and released their third album, ''What Happened to Television?'';. Robert Walter revealed that “Zak is not touring with us anymore, he is on the album and he is a big part of the album, but he just doesn’t want to go on the road at all.” The band played several live shows with new drummers including Eric Kalb and Alan Evans (from

Soulive Soulive is a funk/jazz trio that originated in Woodstock, New York, and is known for its solos and catchy, upbeat songs. The band consists of Eric Krasno (guitar), Alan Evans (drums) and Neal Evans (Hammond B3 organ, bass keys, clavinet). Althoug ...

) before current GBA drummer and

native Aaron Redfield officially joined the band. ''Inland Emperor'', the band's next studio album, was released in 2013. In June 2017, the band published several photos from recording sessions for their latest record and announced that a new album was coming. On December 17, the band released a track called "Rudolph’s Lament", described as "one of our favorite tunes from the outtakes bin... a spacey Waltz that found itself as an outlier on our upcoming release." 2018 saw the band return to soundtrack work with

for the Jennifer Lopez film Second Act. In June 2020, the band officially announced that their next studio album, Como De Allstars, and first in seven years, would be released July 3, 2020. They released the first single "Como De Allstars". Elgin Park shared: “I think it’s more important to remember the power we all have to make change in our own lives and society in general. We made the point at the time because we felt it was relevant then, but in extreme times like these, we’re reminded that the power of our collective voice is needed more than ever.” Their classic and long out of print album West Coast Boogaloo was reissued and released on vinyl by

Light in the Attic ''A Light in the Attic'' is a book of poems by American poet, writer, and musician Shel Silverstein. The book consists of 135 poems accompanied by illustrations also created by Silverstein. It was first published by Harper & Row Junior Books in 1 ...

on August 7, 2020. August 2021 saw the announcement of ‘Soul Dream’, and four-part livestream concert specials. The first installment aired Friday, August 20 with the subsequent shows premiering each Friday in the following weeks. The series was filmed and recorded at Elgin Park Recordings in Glendale, CA. In August 2022, the band's classic 1997 album A Town Called Earth was reissued/remastered and available on vinyl for the first time.

Discography

Albums

*''West Coast Boogaloo'' (with

)

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Greyboy Records/ 021Knowledge Room Recordings *'' A Town Called Earth''

997 Year 997 (Roman numerals, CMXCVII) was a common year starting on Friday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. Events By place Japan * 1 February: Empress Teishi gives birth to Princess Shushi - she is the first ...

Greyboy Records/ 022Knowledge Room Recordings *'' GBA Live'' -

999 999 or triple nine most often refers to: * 999 (emergency telephone number), a telephone number for the emergency services in several countries * 999 (number), an integer * AD 999, a year * 999 BC, a year Books * ''999'' (anthology) or ''999: T ...

Relaxed Records *'' What Happened to Television?'' - 007SCI Fidelity Records *'' Inland Emperor'' - 013Knowledge Room Recordings *'' Como De Allstars'' - 020Knowledge Room Recordings *'' Get a Job: Music From The Original Broadcast Series Soul Dream'' - 022Knowledge Room Recordings

Singles

*''

Jungle Strut ''Jungle Strut'' is a single by Japanese Jazz fusion band T-Square, who were then known as ''The Square''. The single was released in 1982 and included as a demonstration tape in newly purchased Sony Walkman Walkman, stylised as , is a brand ...

'' -

Explorations Into Dancefloor Jazz Vol. 1 *'' Rudolph's Lament'' - 018self-released *'' Como De Allstars'' - 020Knowledge Room Recordings *''

A Town Called Earth - Live A, or a, is the first Letter (alphabet), letter and the first vowel of the Latin alphabet, Latin alphabet, used in the English alphabet, modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name ...

'' - 022Knowledge Room Recordings *'' I've Got Reasons'' - 022Knowledge Room Recordings *'' Happy Friends'' - 022Knowledge Room Recordings

Soundtracks

*''

'' -

998 Year 998 ( CMXCVIII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. Events By place Europe * Spring – Otto III retakes Rome and restores power in the papal city. Crescenti ...

Various Artists *'' Second Act'' - 018Various Artists (credited as Michael Andrews)

References

External links

Official websiteGreyboy Allstars live audio recordings
at Archive.org {{DEFAULTSORT:Greyboy Allstars Ubiquity Records artists Musical groups from San Diego Acid jazz ensembles