“How else am I supposed to get with Jessica Alba?” According to emcee and lyricist Kevin Turner, these ten words epitomize the sound and personality of The Blackout Project. “At this point we’ve done everything,” comments keyboardist Christ Plietz of the bands eclectic musical background.
Three of the band members, Turner, Plietz, and bassist Ryan Gilchrist, are recent U.Va alumni. However, the five band members did not know each other before the band was pulled together by guitarist Robert Word, or “the facilitator,” in 2007. In a series of “I know this guy” moments, Plietz and Gilchrist, who played in the U.Va Jazz Ensemble together, and Granville Mullins, drummer and (at the time) graduate student, were roped in by Word, who “knew this dude who raps,” or Turner.
Two months after forming the band, the entered and won U.Va’s Battle of the Bands, which caught the attention of producer Chris Keup – producer for Jason Mraz, OAR and Parachute. Keup offered to record The Blackout Project’s first EP at his studio, which, according to their bio, has been “endorsed by Maxine Jones of the Grammy-nominated R&B group En Vogue as a ‘must for purchasing’”. Sixteen hour road trips to Knoxville, a car breakdown in NYC, and most of all, playing music together fused the band members in a bond of visionary music and sound.
Plietz explains “blackout” is a noun describing
The “project” is to blackout in every song they play, live or in the studio, and “to further hip-hop beyond the two-bar loop with intricate arrangements, dynamic variation, and (introducing) the solo section.” Although compared to The Gym Class Heroes, Turner emphasizes the relation is there, but “we’re way better.” “I’ve never been satisfied with people pinning us down,”adds Gilchrist, a feeling apparent in their musicality and diverse musical backgrounds.
This innovation is clearly seen in their first EP, The Blackout Project EP, but especially their proud new musical child, A Second Look. In Spring 2009, The Blackout Project collaborated with the 19-piece U.Va Jazz Ensemble for an epic three-song performance of innovative hip-hop. Plietz did the arrangements for the entire ensemble, impressing “jazz trumpet great and ensemble leader, John D-earth.” At the concert, they premiered their song “Smile for the Cameras,” for which Plietz created a looped riff and what Turner called a “musical boner.”
The band recommended “Soldier’s Song” off their new EP, a diverse and experimental song-writing process that involved lyrics Turner wrote when he was 17 or 18, a blues guitar riff and vocal chorus by Word, and verse arrangements by Plietz “to build the music to tell a story along with the words.” In their recently released EP, the band incorporated the horn arrangements from the ensemble concert to push the envelope further.
“I’d like to avoid getting a real job as long as I can,” comments Gilchrist. Although Mullins is currently at Berklee finishing his degree in Jazz Composition and Turner is living in the D.C. area, the band is still pushing their music and playing shows regularly. “If things start cooking, we’re all ready to leave what we have to kick in,” affirms Plietz about the future of the band.
An important part of continuing to push their music is promotion. “The internet provides a way of promoting without being on stage,” explains Plietz. For example, the band emailed out their new EP to college radio stations and has recently finished their website, on which they are offering a copy of their new EP for free to those who join the mailing list.
Check out their music and upcoming shows www.myspace.com/theblackoutproject.