Starkville will get a little something different Thursday at Rick’s Cafe. Boombox, the duo of producer/DJ Russ Randolph and singer/songwriter/guitarist Zion Rock Godchaux, will make its first appearance in Starkville bringing its new sound along.
Boombox mixes traditional with technology, the old with the new. Randolph, with all of his souped-up bells and whistles, creates the beats and melodies while Godchaux overlaps his funk guitar and vocals to create the Boombox sound.
Godchaux describes Boombox’s sound as “urban renaissance, funk/electronic style, it’s our own thing. It’s good dance party music.”
Randolph and Godchaux met in Muscle Shoals, Ala. while working on an album, At The Table, by The Heart of Gold Band, which includes former Grateful Dead members Keith Godchaux and Donna Jean Godchaux-MacKay, Zion’s parents.
Shortly after At The Table, the duo sat down to record some of its vision.
“We met about five years ago working on [At The Table] together,” Randolph said. “We were both frustrated and tired of doing the traditional band thing; we were looking for something different.”
So they recorded their first album, Visions of a Backbeat.
“When we put that album out we had never played a live show,” Randolph said. “It was very early stage in our development. Now, we’ve had three, four years of touring under our belt. We are a lot wiser and better exponentially as a band.”
Both Randolph and Godchaux played drums while growing up, and even though they do not play live drums at their shows, the beat is what they are all about.
“We’re all about beats; we like to keep that driving energy going throughout the show,” Randolph said. “We’re definitely a dance band [because the] beats are a huge factor in what we do. We like to keep that driving dance energy going through the duration of the show.”
Godchaux agrees that this early experience with the drums has molded the way Boombox sounds.
“Our understanding of drums allows us to have a high standard that we set for the ways our beats come off on stage,” Godchaux said. “We know if it’s swinging or not. That foundation really helps our standard of swing stay high.”
If beats are a huge part of the duo’s shows, then the groove is another part. Boombox pulls this from its history with the Grateful Dead and Alabama funk.
“We’re huge Grateful Dead fans, obviously, but we have our feet planted in the electronic world like San Francisco house and disco house,” Randolph said. “Also, we pull some elements of ’60s Muscle Shoals music, that funky backbeat swinging [music from that era.]”
“We take from old-school hip-hop, Bob Dylan and Jimi [Hendrix],” Godchaux said. “I spent a lot of time in San Francisco listening to house records and Van Morrison. We just love good music.”
Boombox also takes a more jam band-style of playing shows. They do not go the traditional route of mapping the whole set out before hand.
“Every show is different; we don’t do a set list, we don’t have a real game plan or anything,” Randolph said. “We talk about the first song going on stage and then we just play off the energy of the crowd, what’s right for the time. Every night is definitely unique.”
If mapping the route out hinders Boombox, then set breaks are the speed bumps in that route.
“We usually go straight through, depending on however long we can play,” Randolph said. “The set break always kills the momentum of the show. If you start a party and take a break, you have to build that energy back up.”
Boombox is all about the live show, like most jam-oriented bands.
“The live shows are a lot of fun,” Randolph said. “They’ve always been fun, but for us we’re having the time of our lives playing now. We’ve hit a really cool plateau. All the recent shows have been phenomenal. People are coming to shows to celebrate life or whatever they want to celebrate.”
Boombox is comfortable where they are at right now. After years of touring, the band pushes forward toward new sounds and ideas.
“We work very hard to have a world where we do exactly what we want to do, and we’re not going to give that up too easily,” Randolph said.
Boombox’s next album, Down River Electric will be released next spring.