Here’s a look at a recent Family Groove Company show with text and images by Steve Moyles

It had been about a year and a half since Family Groove Company had performed in St. Louis. Fresh off of a free show in Madison, WI the night before, the band arrived at The Old Rock House ready to play. I could tell by the interaction between band members and fans before the show, that FGC had a lot of friends in the house. Not that they needed a reason to put on a good show, but that guaranteed it.

For those of you that don’t know Family Groove Company, they’re a four-person group, made up of Jordan Wilkow on the keyboards and vocals, Janis Wallin on bass, Adam Lewis on the guitar and Mattias Blanck on drums. They originally got together in Southern California in 2001, and then moved to Chicago, which is now their base of operations. They’re regular at music festivals, like Summer Camp and will be performing at the North Coast Music Festival over Labor Day weekend.

When they took the stage the venue wasn’t quite full, but that left room for plenty of dancing and twirling. The opening song was The Unlimited Space Around Us, which is a track from their new album, Models and Metrics. They progressed through three as of yet unrecorded tunes: The All The Everything, Tryin’ to Live Up and Hip Swap. After that they did One Eye Dreaming, from their 2006 release, The Charmer. It was great to hear them cover the old Billy Preston song, Will It Go Round in Circles. I used to have that one on a 45. Next came Just Like I Planned, from their first album, Reachin’. They closed the first set with a Martin, Scofield, Medeski and Wood song, Little Walter Rides Again.

After a short break, the band got back to it. They opened the second set with Through With Tomorrow. Next, they played Movin’ and Groovin’, which is a Melvin Seals song. They followed that with We Could, which is on their Live from Chicago recording. They finished out the second set with Time To Tell Me, Bob Dylan’s Subterranean Homesick Blues, A Misdemeanor’s Worth and Every Time You Shake It. They played until after 1:30am, and because of the late hour, skipped the encore.

These guys do a great live show and are very accessible to their fans, spending a lot of time before the show “meeting and greeting” at the merchandise table. A popular FGC merch item is the “What Would Janis Do?” tee-shirt, which you can always see fans sporting at the shows. There’s actually a Facebook Photo Gallery dedicated to pictures of celebrities and fans wearing the WWJD shirts. You can find such notables as Steve Kimock, Jon Fishman, Kyle Hollingsworth, Victor Wooten, just to name a few.