Grüv vs. The Chocolate Fountain

2007-09-06T06:40:00.000-07:00

"We melt 40 pounds of chocolate for this thing" she told us, and with that, the battle of willpower and self restraint was fully on. For 3 long hours it taunted us from across the dance floor, as we struggled to maintain our focus on the current task at hand of entertaining the wedding guests. At one point our DJ, Vince, had to be physically restrained from diving right into the fountain. "There is a strict no chocolate bathing policy in effect here" we pleaded with him, but sadly he was too far gone to listen to reason. It was a horrific situation that no man, woman, or child should ever be subjected to. Then, at approximately 2AM on Monday morning, this intense battle of mind over chocolate thankfully came to a close and we were at last in strawberry dipping heaven. Mmmmm, chocolate...

This was a Sunday wedding, and it was held at George Restaurant which is a really great venue near Queen and Jarvis. They have an intimate outdoor courtyard where the ceremony took place, and then the rest of the evening was split between the dining area and the dance / party room.

We took in our full 6 piece party band for this one, and because we had a variety of styles to cover (jazz / latin / party) the lineup we used was Aaron Peixoto on keyboards, Jon Van Geest on guitar, Josh Horvath on bass and background vox, Kevin Birch on drums and background vox, and Jennifer Petrilli and Andrew Austin sharing duties on lead vox. Aaron and Jon provided some fantastic background jazz for the arriving guests from 4:30 - 5:30, and then Jennifer and Kevin joined them to provide latin (bossa) music for a post-ceremony cocktail hour from 6:00 - 7:00. These smaller music combos were set up out in the outside courtyard where the ceremony took place, and they were a really nice musical addition to an already impressive event.

We were scheduled to rock the kasbah at 9:30 (literally, as "Rock the Kasbah" was the chosen first dance tune), but, as these things go the dinner and speeches went long and we didn't get rolling until about 11:30. We killed time as best we could in the party room until the guests had finished their 49-course meals, although tempers started to flare when the clubbers in our band started teasing the jazzers about not being able to keep their eyes open at such an incredibly late hour ;-) All in good fun of course...

Once the party got rolling it was non-stop dancing and the crowd was totally into it, dancing the whole time. We did a few tunes as people were starting to collect in the dance / party room, and then we punked it up and did our best Clash imitation as was requested. The guests were under strict instructions that the bride and groom were NOT going to do this first dance alone, so everyone was up and shaking it for pretty much the rest of the night. A lot of lot of lot of fun.

Despite how well everything did go, we would like to apologize to Lionel Richie for butchering one of his most well known classics, All Night Long. It was just one of those brain toot moments for poor Andrew, who remembered maybe one lyric line in the whole song ("All Night Long") and made up pretty much the rest on the fly. You had to be there, it was hilarious - best way to describe how it came out... Bob Dylan does Lionel Richie. Ah well, it won't happen again and it still turned out to be one of the most popular tunes of the evening.

More repertoire additions have been made - specially requested music that we were happy to accommodate for this event. And, our set lists from the party are posted below (shortened to 2 sets due to the later start).

Stay Grüvy!

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Set 1

Vultures :: John Mayer
Brick House :: The Commodores
Waiting on the World To Change :: John Mayer
Sunday Morning :: Maroon 5
Holiday :: Madonna
Makes Me Wonder :: Maroon 5
Rock the Kasbah :: The Clash
Celebration :: Kool & The Gang
Cosmic Girl :: Jamiroquai
Play That Funky Music :: Wild Cherry
If I Ain't Got You :: Alicia Keys
1, 2, 3 :: Gloria Estefan
Boogie Oogie Oogie :: A Taste of Honey

Set 2

1999 :: Prince
Make It Happen :: Mariah Carey
Dancing Queen :: ABBA
Vogue :: Madonna
Crazy in Love :: Beyonce
Rock Your Body :: Justin Timberlake
Billie Jean :: Michael Jackson
Superstition / Karma :: Stevie Wonder / Alicia Keys
All Night Long :: Lionel Richie
I'm Coming Out :: Diana Ross
Think :: Aretha Franklin
Mr. Brightside :: The Killers

Grüvin' On The Rocks

2007-08-20T04:48:00.000-07:00

Grüv just finished a really cool couple of nights at a new venue in Whitby Ontario called On The Rocks (227 Brock Road S). We went in as a 3 piece - Josh Horvath on Bass, Kevin Birch on drums, and Andrew Austin was doing his first show with us on guitar + vocals. Andrew was a top 18 finalist on Canadian Idol this season and is a really talented singer / songwriter. We've worked with him in a couple of other projects previously and are stoked that he has now brought his grüv into the funktion.

On The Rocks is divided into 2 separate venues. We were playing on the main floor which is a restaurant and bar (you have to try their martinis and nachos!), and then upstairs is a full out dance club. The place is definitely a hot spot in the area, and the crew at the door had their hands full with the long line of patiently waiting customers out on the street.

We kept things more on the acoustic rock & alternative side for this weekend, covering stuff like John Mayer, Maroon 5, Jamiroquai, Dave Matthews, Sublime, etc. The venue provides a nice intimate setting for band and audience interaction, and we were hit with a number of song requests from enthusiastic customers (and staff) that we did our best to accommodate. Talk about winging it though... We'd review the requested tunes that weren't part of our standard repertoire out in the van between sets. Thanks to whoever in that area is running unsecured wireless Internet - enabled us to find these new tunes online from inside the van ;-)

A big shout out to On The Rocks' co-owners Roxanne and Natasa - thanks for bringing us in! You have a great place there and we're looking forward to taking you up on your invitation to come play there again as soon as possible.

Check out our repertoire for updates as a bunch of new tunes were added this weekend. Stay grüvy...

Band Blog

Grüv vs. The Chocolate Fountain

Grüvin' On The Rocks