PureVolume

Vocalist, songwriter Rhett Frazier is Rhett Frazier. Drummer, producer, and electronic guru Donny Gruendler is "Inc." Together they form the soulful musical powerhouse Rhett Frazier Inc., now emerging with their divertingly eclectic debut, Escape from Dee-Troyt.

The project only recently stepped into the Los Angeles limelight after
years of collaborative woodshedding - but their meticulously crafted
recordings and incendiary, diverse live shows have already gained them
acclaim from audiences and critics alike. Revered nightclub Little
Temple and resident DJ A-Ski described them as "a combination of Funkadelic, Rare Earth,Flaming Ember, Frank Zappa and Al Green rolled into one along with
that raw, gritty Detroit sound that would make the late, great Norman
Whitfield proud." LA Examiner's Patrick Hamilton declared that Escape
from Dee-troyt "takes Stax-era guitar licks, blues attitude and 70s
R&B crossover appeal and blends it into a tasty milkshake of auditory
heaven."

Neither Rhett nor Donny are strangers to the stage or studio. "We've
been the 'consummate sidemen' for a long time," says Gruendler. He got
his chops playing drums behind members of The Funk Brothers, Motown's
legendary in-house band, first in Detroit and later, around the
country. Picking up a degree from Boston's Berklee College of Music, he
spent years as a hired gun, on the road with artists as diverse as
jazz pianist John Medeski of Medeski, Martin and Wood, and turntablist
DJ Logic. Frazier, the product of a musical family, cut his teeth as a
stand-up singer in his home state of Oklahoma, where he honed
crowd-pleasing skills performing soul songs in front of often volatile
audiences. "You'd really have to sell a song with soul and grit," says
Rhett, "when you'd be playing to a bar that was half Creek Indian and
half redneck." It was that very soul and grit that would land Rhett
gigs with a series of bands, including with Austin guitarist Denny
Freeman - who would in turn, introduce him to his future collaborator
after both musicians had migrated to Southern California.

Freeman organized a one-off gig in Hermosa Beach, featuring Donny on
drums and Rhett on vocals. "The gig went OK," remembers Donny. " But I
figured, 'I'll never play with those guys again, they weren't into
it.'" To his surprise, he was called back for a follow-up with the
same personnel a month later, and struck up a friendship with the
vocalist. "We both thought we were the cooler dude," says Donny, "and
we found we had similar musical likes. I said, 'Why don't you come
over for drinks?'" Hanging out at Donny's house days later, the pair
found themselves in front of a MPC (sampling, drum machine) writing their first song together that very night.

Later, Gruendler was back on the road, but the collaboration
continued, with both men swapping ideas via FedEx - although no plans
of a true "band" or album had materialized. Eventually, they decided
to splurge for a quick demo session for the couple of tunes they had
worked out, expecting little. "But that day, we were sitting in a
restaurant after the session saying, 'Wow - these are actually really
good tracks,'" says Donny. Soon, what began as a diverting side
project for both musicians developed into a full-time collaboration,
as well as a lifelong friendship. "Rhett's the closest thing I've got
to a brother," says Donny.

Escape from Dee-Troyt, then, is the culmination of that collaboration and bond, as well as the official emergence of Rhett Frazier Inc. In
fact, the image of the vintage orange car that adorns the album's cover inspired the official solidifying of the group. "We found that
picture," says Donny. "And immediately, we knew, this is the cover of
the album, and this is on." By now, both men have dropped all other
projects and work-for-hire gigs in favor of devoting themselves to
Rhett Frazier Inc. full-time. "We just wanted to see how weird we
could get, just go off the deep end," says Rhett.

The pair have reveled in the musical freedom that has come with
running their own group for a change, indulging in a veritable library
of influences from artists as diverse as Tom Waits, Prince, Danger
Mouse and Wes Montgomery. They've enjoyed "playing Steely Dan," as
Donny puts it, cherry-picking favored studio musicians to fill in the
gaps on the tracks. And each of them have found a perfect musical foil
in the other. "If we weren't doing this, Rhett would probably be this
great, obscure soul singer," says Donny. "And Donny'd be on the road
with Miley Cyrus! He's definitely 'Inc.,'" says Rhett, "because I'm
the one who's into poetry, philosophy and history - and he's the guy
that manages to keep it all to a three-minute pop song." Rhett credits
his partner for inspiring musical ideas from him that would have been
"stillborn" otherwise, while Donny recalls a particularly difficult
moment during the sessions for Escape when Rhett challenged him to
drum a part "how Donny Gruendler would play it."

The resulting material is at once funky and playful, steeped in years
of musical history and virtuosity while managing to remain
forward-looking in both songwriting and sonics. A perfect example is
lead track "U Can't Stop," with four-on-the-floor riffs that harken
back to the best days of 70's funk-soul that manage to retain a modern
immediacy and attack, all topped off with Rhett's striking falsetto
and baritone crooning - "It's a fate you can't deny/The future's
caught you from behind/You can't stop what's already happened." The
inspiration for the song was existential, as Rhett explains: "I worked
out a theory that there is actually no such thing as time." The pair's
unorthodox songwriting process came in handy with concert favorite
"BeLong". "We made this backing track, and it just sounded like The
Roots, not us," says Donny. "So I said, 'What would the Neptunes do?'
We took everything off the track except for the drums and the vocal,
and from there we piled on the bass and guitars. It became this
completely other track - almost a full-on rock song." The song is a
tongue-in-cheek paean to an erstwhile girlfriend, with the chorus'
refrain "Won't be long we'll be long together." "Nuthin" was another
example of the group's in-studio upheaval techniques - originally
programmed by Donny in the vein of DJ Shadow, the pair stripped away
all tracks save for one distinctive synth line once Rhett's vocal was
in place. "The thing about it is, once we figured out how to make
music like our heroes, we wondered, 'Why are we even doing this?'"
says Rhett. "We already own those records."

Cocky, funny, funky and fresh, Rhett Frazier Inc. is borne of a deep
love of music and a true brotherhood that results in inventive tunes
and envelope-pushing experimentalism. "The whole point has been to
make cool music that no one could touch," says Donny - and now you can
find that music on Escape From Dee-Troyt.