Having twice climbed into the top 10 of Billboard’s Blues Charts, the Avey Grouws Band is hitting the road for its first West Coast tour.
“Musicians support other musicians in the Quad Cities,” said Jeni Grouws, thanking fans and fellow musicians for helping create a space where her band can flourish.
The QC-based roots rock outfit is led by Grouws, the lead vocalist, and guitarist Chris Avey. Having taken shape eight years ago, the band has released two albums: The Devil May Care in 2020 followed by 2021’s Tell Tale Heart, which was recorded in Nashville with Grammy Award winner Casey Wasner producing.
In an interview with Little Village, Grouws reflected on the road that brought Avey Grouws here from her perspective.
On April 22, 2015, Grouws traveled to the Quad Cities to do a seminar on broadcasting to a communications class. Fostering a passion for live music, and being in a city known for it, she noticed a bar next to her hotel called Muddy Water hosting a blues jam night.
She went over to the bar, still dressed in the professional attire she’d worn to her seminar. A few of the future members of the band — including Chris Avey — were running the jam that night, and she signed up to sing with them on the stage. Immediately, they all fell into harmony.
“I felt like it was a kind of magic in a moment,” Grouws said.
After the serendipitous connection of that night, Grouws and Avey performed acoustic shows together, then decided to transition from a duo into a complete band. The Avey Grouws Band has since done shows across the U.S., growing close as a family while on the road.
“We’ve hung out together for years, and sometimes we want to punch each other, but we also know that if one of us were in a rough place and they needed to reach out to the group, all of us would be there for them,” Grouws said.
“We’re definitely not purists, and we’re not snobs,” she added with a laugh.
The group’s latest album includes songs like “Heart’s Playing Tricks,” in which Grouws shows off her range and punchy vocals to a smooth guitar riff and catchy beat. Grouws said the inspiration for Tell Tale Heart is a message that she and her husband instill in her kids: that certain feelings are not worse or better than each other, they are all equally important to talk about, and a part of the human condition.
This month, the band is hitting the road for its West Coast tour. After that, they’re back home in the QC with shows at the Wide River Winery Village of East Davenport and Moline’s Railside Music Series on Sept. 23 and 30, respectively.
This article was originally published in Little Village’s September 2023 issue.
