Derek Trucks is on record as saying something along the lines of this piece of advice to young, up and coming guitarists. If you listen to what everyone else listens to, you’ll sound like everybody else.
Trucks solved the problem by listening to horn players and Indian classical music. He stretched things a little by playing a lot of slide and eschewing the use of effects pedals.
Robert Randolph, on the other hand, solved the problem by not listening to that resembled popular music through his formative years.
That’s slightly difficult to believe in an era where there’s a fairly definite aural soundtrack to most people’s lives, but if it’s going to be possible the most likely scenario involves some form of religious-based community that operated with its own soundtrack.
Robert Randolph started out playing pedal steel guitar in the African-American Pentecostal House of God Church in a style that’s now referred to as Sacred Steel, and was discovered while playing at a Sacred Steel convention in Florida.
Avant-garde jazz organist John Medeski enlisted him as part of The Word, a gospel-based project involving the North Mississippi Allstars, in 2001. A three-part package toured the east coast of the USA, with Randolph and the Family Band opening, the Allstars in the middle and The Word winding things up.
The rest, to borrow a phrase, is history.
Live at the Wetlands, recorded on 23 August 2001, just before the venue closed delivered lengthy instrumental workouts that were enough to whet my appetite. Unclassified suggested the outfit could cut it in the studio as well. Colorblind confirmed previous suspicions and We Walk This Road set things up nicely before we caught Randolph and the Family Band opening for the Tedeschi Trucks Band in Sydney just before Easter 2011.
The Family Band’s current lineup includes Marcus Randolph (drums), bass guitarist Danyel Morgan (bass), vocalist Lenesha Randolph (vocals), keyboardist and guitarist Brett Andrew Haas (guitar, keyboards) and one of three rotating guitarists (Joey Williams, Adam "Shmeeans" Smirnoff, or Cousin Ray-Ray). Former members include Jason Crosby (keyboards and fiddle) and John Ginty (organ).