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Perfect Strangers

Rebel Records recording artist, Perfect Strangers is a new band of established bluegrass veterans and exciting new talent that has recently been generating a lot of interest and enthusiasm. The group was assembled by Chris Brashear to play on his CD Wanderlust, which was released on Copper Creek Records to much critical acclaim and a lot of airplay. They jelled so well they decided to continue playing together. All of the band members sing and write songs. Perfect Strangers’ presentation is unusually warm and friendly, their repertoire unique and their musicianship outstanding. Their showcase at the 2000 IBMA convention was interrupted numerous times by applause for their goosebump vocal harmonies and inventive, emotive playing. Their first band CD, produced by Jody Stecher, and appropriately entitled Perfect Strangers, was released in March, 2003 on Rebel Records.



A Perfectly Strange History of Perfect Strangers by Jody Stecher

Perfect Strangers has something no other bluegrass band has--a guy named Forrest Rose. Now there's a name. The Beatles had Ringo Strarr. Fehptooey, nuttin. Many years ago, Forrest got into bluegrass music after hearing a longhaired fellow Iowan playing mindbogglingly good banjo.

That Iowa boy was Bob Black. Bob joined Bill Monroe's band and Forrest became a journalist who moonlighted playing bass for all the great old-time fiddlers. Forrest introduced a young female journalist protogeé named Betsy to Chris Brashear, a skinny kid from Ozark, Missouri, who could fiddle up tornadoes, and the youngsters married and moved west.

Meanwhile, back in Virginia, Peter McLaughlin was developing an exciting and muscular guitar style. Peter also moved west, and his kid brother David stayed close to home and joined the Johnson Mountain Boys. Peter won first at Winfield and played several years in Laurie Lewis' band. In Tucson he and Chris discovered that they were kindred spirits and formed a duet that was the foundation of what was to follow.

Earlier still, an even longer haired kid from Brooklyn, who had already been a teenage Greenbriar Boy, won the World's Champion guitar cup as well as "World's Champion: Afternoon" (not many have that honor) at Union Grove and at his earliest opportunity-what else?-moved west. That was me. I developed as a singer and multi-instrumentalist and became interested in psycho-acoustics, which I applied to record producing. My success at that endeavor led Chris to write me from Italy (he just kept moving west until he got to the other side of the world) asking me to produce and play on his first solo album, Wanderlust (Copper Creek, 1999). The recording was a success.

Chris assembled a bunch of musicians who clicked so well we just didn't want to quit. Laurie Lewis, who had been the bass player on the sessions, was a leetle too busy to join another band. Chris contacted Forrest to come play some test gigs in Arizona. Forrest was dubious about playing with a bunch of perfect strangers and the name stuck. He was the perfect man for the job and we've been at it ever since.

Now to introduce you to five Perfect Strangers:

Chris Brashear is a charismatic singer with a high, clear voice, a dynamic instrumentalist, and a songwriter with a penchant for writing memorable, perhaps classic, bluegrass songs on topics other than failed love. He has been Laurie Lewis' bass player (and she his), the fiddler for Kentucky Rose, and played jazz violin with the Maurizio Geri Swingtet.

On the banjo is Bob Black, a veteran of Bill Monroe's Bluegrass Boys. He played with Bill for two solid years and has performed and recorded with Kenny Baker, Wilma Lee and Stoney Cooper, John Hartford, Frank Wakefield, The Whites, Rhonda Vincent and many others. Bob's stunning solos and subtle backup are a joy to hear.

Jody Stecher is a music innovator of considerable stature who also is a repository of tradition. Jody received a 1999 Indy Award, has been a Grammy finalist several times for his work with Kate Brislin, and is an inspired song finder and arranger. He sings in a true bluegrass style and plays surprising mandolin with a big round tone.

National Flatpicking Champion Peter McLaughlin is the band's guitarist. He is equally powerful as a rhythm player and soloist. Peter Played in Laurie Lewis' band for six years, records for Dog Boy Records, and is the elder brother of (Johnson Mountain Boy) David McLaughlin. Peter and Chris have a special musical telepathy that is one of the not-so-secret weapons of Perfect Strangers.

Forrest Rose plays upright bass with a mighty thump and is Perfect Strangers' erudite MC. Forrest is from Iowa, Texas, and Missouri (you decide) and is a master "talker", which he does in a no-hurry midwestern conversational style. Forrest has played with Bill Monroe and the Bluegrass Boys, toured with David Olney, and has played extensively with most of the great Missouri Fiddlers as well as with Kenny Baker.

What people have to say about Perfect Strangers:

Big and Lonesome! Perfect Strangers could be just a collection of terrific songwriters, dynamic singers and dead-on players. What makes them a great bluegrass band is their extremely high Coefficient of Lonesomeness.


Perfect Strangers performing at the IBMA showcase in Louisville, Oct, 2000.
Pictured from left to right: Bob, Forrest, Chris, Jody, and Peter. Photo by Kristie Black.

The music is cast in shades of light, dark, and darker. It takes you places like the end of life's journey, the beautiful shore and the river of life. It puts you out on the street with Homeless Joe and down in the mine with two mules. You'll shiver in your little home while you wait for the twister. Beware! The fog on the water is rising while you are trapped in your bed! The judge tells you to stand up, and you'd better do it, friend.

Desolate places, for the most part, contrasted with playing that perfectly balances the mood. Why do songs that are so sad make you feel so good? It's that old tension between light and dark, heaven and hell, church and honky-tonk, Vader and Skywalker. Each needs the other. We hear the train, see the smoke, get a little edgy -- then find redemption in a cross-picked guitar and a blues-tinged mandolin. From the darkness of the well, a glimpse of the daylight!

Chris Brashear pleads to hear a song that will keep him lonesome. If he sounded any sadder, the casual listener might be tempted to remove all sharp objects from the area and order a banjo intervention. Jody Stecher sings so mournfully about a funeral train, it makes you want to shut your kids in the house, away from the tracks. The sounds that come from his throat will thrill and haunt you. Don't try this in the shower! Peter McLaughlin delivers a plaintive true story of the Hermit Miner whose sole consolation was a fiddle and whose only company was a two-mule team.

The album's greatness is in the blending of these sad and wonderful songs with tunes where all the players shine.

Chris' fiddling marries astonishing technique to Ozark soul. It is warm and rough and smooth all at the same time, sort of like your daddy's cheek used to feel on a Saturday morning. Peter doesn't just have chops. He plays guitar with taste and wit. When you hear "Bluegrass in the Backwoods," you know where he got his reputation as one of the very best. Jody -- who could make music on a garden trowel if you put strings on it -- handles the mandolin with sure fluidity, punctuated with the occasional exotic accent.

Bob Black makes banjo playing sound easy when it really isn't. His touch on the slower tunes is peerless. I once saw Bill Monroe frown, then laugh when Bob's solo on "Monroe's Blues" got a better response than Monroe's did. I've also seen Bob sing 10 stanzas of "Old MacDonald" to a group of delighted children. His easygoing good humor shines through in the celebration of his romantic career as a touring musician, "Canned by the Best" -- always a showstopper. The real heart, soul, legs and lungs of the group is bass player, Forrest Rose, whose bell-like tones, rugged jaw, and aging Oldsmobile station wagon lend the group an almost elemental gravitas.

This is one of the best live bands I have heard in years, and the recording is a joy. Thanks guys. Like the song says, this album really is tons and tons of fun."

Taken from Perfect Strangers CD liner notes by Lee Bjorndal, Austin, Minnesota

"The musical highlight of my week was hearing Chris Brashear and Perfect Strangers perform. This group goes on my must see list."
Murphy Henry, Banjo Newsletter

"Perfect Strangers are something quite special... The true and deep understanding of bluegrass, coupled with a strong creative charge is a very unusual combination these days. They are a bluegrass supegroup!"
Pete Wernick

How to contact Perfect Strangers: