Taking their cues from early Creedence Clearwater Revival and Tony Joe White, Mofro play a slinky, sinuous brand of Louisiana soul-funk-blues, while Grey himself alternates between the good ol' boy debauchery of Ronnie Van Zant and Lynyrd Skynyrd and the classic soul entreaties of Otis Redding and Clarence Carter. On Country Ghetto, his third album and debut for Alligator Records (of course), Grey and his bandmates revisit the hallowed but largely forsaken musical environs of swamp rock. Sounding forth from his ancestral home 40 miles outside of Jacksonville, Grey's Florida is inhabited by water moccasins, gators, and characters whose murky, besotted Southern Gothic pasts match the dreary, desolate landscape. Billboardįor many people, the word "Florida" conjures up images of sunshine, white-hot sands, and white-hot nightlife. Grey's honeyed vocals make 'Fireflies' a soul-drenched delight, while Hance's slide guitar work brings back-porch authenticity to the atmospheric 'Ten Thousand Islands' and gutbucket fare like 'Gal Youngin' and 'Pray for Rain.' Grey's vocals are also mighty fine on the glorious 'The Wrong Side' and bluesy 'Everybody's.' MOFRO waxes Bo Diddley on 'How Junior Got His Head Put Out.' But the real showpiece is the title cut, a pining, sorrowful lament about the overdevelopment of the act's home state. Down-home funk track 'That Boy,' like most of the songs here, is driven by a rock-solid bottom and more hooks than a tackle box. But the duo is also undeniably soulful and quite adept at what it does. MOFRO, comprising Floridians JJ Gray and Daryl Hance, is a strange bird of an outfit - an unmistakably Southern hybrid that maintains elements of funk, blues, country and Dixie rock. Grey's vocals find the right mixture of smoothness and grit, his harmonica playing on "Blackwater" suggests an otherworldly spirit haunting the Florida swamps, and while he doesn't have the distinctive off-center sensibility of the late Lowell George, for example, he does have a sense of humor he even tells an amusing short story about dumb criminals on "Cracka Break." Of course, Daryl Hance, Fabrice "Fabgrease" Quentin, Nathan Shepherd and George Sluppick are all a crucial part of Mofro's sound, and label-mate Robert Walters also contributes to the album by playing clavinet on "Ho Cake" and "Santa Claus" and an electric piano solo on "Lazy Fo Acre." Some of the laid-back funk workouts may seem a little long to those who prefer tight song structures to a jam band sensibility, but Mofro delivers a solid album overall. Nonetheless, the music is exactly what you'd want from this type of project: firmly rooted in tradition but still sounding fresh and spontaneous.
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Also, Grey's Luddite tendencies didn't prevent his band from releasing an enhanced CD-ROM with bonus audio tracks, full screen video, an interactive mixer, and a virtual reality studio tour. Granted, some listeners might not share Grey's simpleminded enthusiasm for a time with "no car, phone, or electric light" after all, there weren't any funk or soul records back then, and contrary to what Grey says, there was plenty of strife in the good old days. His lyrics decry overdevelopment and the homogenization of American culture he romanticizes the early days of his home state before "skyscrapers and superhighways carved through the heart of Florida," while his band celebrates the American musical heritage of Muddy Waters, early Bootsy Collins, and other funk, blues, soul, and rock practitioners. This is particularly appropriate since singer/songwriter John "JJ" Grey seems to be a big fan of old-timey authenticity. This collection of "front porch soul and jookhouse funk" is very tasty, and not just because the band celebrates ham hocks and other Southern delicacies on "Ho Cake." In an era when people overdub and compress the soul right out of recorded music, producer/engineer Dan Prothero has managed to capture an organic, earthy sound that perfectly suits this band's sultry swamp funk grooves. In 2007 MOFRO signed with Alligator Records, released the album Country Ghetto, and began performing under the name JJ Grey & MOFRO.
MOFRO's debut album, "Blackwater" was named One Of The Best Of The Decade In Music and One of the 10 Best R&B / Soul Albums of the Year by Amazon. MOFRO is a Soul/Funk/R&B/Blues/southern Rock band from Jacksonville, Florida.
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