The Grays

See also: Jason Falkner, Jon Brion

The Grays formed in 1993 as a "utopian band" built around singer/songwriter/multi-instrumentalists Jason Falkner, Jon Brion, Dan McCarroll, and Buddy Judge. All four experienced some degree of disillusionment with their former bands, and wanted the Grays to be the solution to that, with each member contributing songs, and each adding their ideas to the pool in a round-table fashion.

It worked, but only for one, psuedo-classic album, Ro Sham Bo. The admirable ideals of the group collapsed around their varying degrees of musical ambition. All have had extensive dabblings since, Falkner and Brion the most high-profile with their producing/writing/arranging/playing talents being used on any number of pop albums, including their own. Judge put out an album and toured with Aimee Mann's band, while McCarroll manned Sheryl Crow's drum seat for a while.

Luckily for listeners, the one record of the foursome's collaboration is still preserved on plastic.

Album reviews

Ro Sham Bo (Recommended)
Epic (1994)
The Grays were an inevitably self-destructive band.