Saturday February 6
Scrapomatic
at Pisgah Brewing
8pm
Mike Mattison and Paul Olsen are Scrapomatic, also known to their diehard fans as "The Great American Music Machine." The duo pour their influences in the top and out come perfectly calibrated Americana gems. Scrapomatic have recorded three critically acclaimed blues-roots albums since 2002 -- "Scrapomatic," "Alligator Love Cry" and 2008's "Sidewalk Caesars," which they are currently supporting on a nationwide tour.Their mission: Make music rooted to the blues canon, but dodge becoming a museum piece by taking up the flag of the modern blues innovators -- Taj Mahal, Nina Simone, Dr. John; artists who used their deep-seeded knowledge of the genre to push it into the future. Needless to say, the Great American Music Machine is not afraid of its influences.
Mattison started his music career as a bass fiddle player with a jones for Ray Charles, whom his mother took him to see seven times before the age of 11. Mattison attended Harvard University, where he served as vice-president of the Harvard Lampoon humor magazine, and graduated in 1991 with a cum laude degree in English and American Literature. He split the country soon-after to sing jazz in Budapest, Hungary. Upon his return, he met Olsen in Minneapolis, three hours into a P-Funk concert. A musical partnership was born.
Olsen began studying guitar in the second grade. At the age of 17, he became the de facto sideman to local blues legend Little Bobby E. His prowess earned him a scholarship to the University of Minnesota, where -- between blues gigs at night -- he studied classical and jazz guitar, and earned a degree in composition.
After being recognized with Minnesota Music Award nominations for Best R&B Group and Best Male Vocalist, the duo decamped to Brooklyn, NY in 1997 and formed Scrapomatic. They proceeded to stomp their way through nearly every venue in the New York area, including Carnegie Hall.
In 2002, Mattison joined the Derek Trucks Band as its lead singer. To date he tours year round with the Allman Brother's slide player and erstwhile Eric Clapton sideman, and has appeared on three DTB albums -- 2003's "Live at the Georgia Theater," 2006's acclaimed "Songlines" and the group's next major-label effort, to-be-named and released in early-2009
http://www.myspace.com/scrapomaticnyc
http://www.pisgahbrewing.com/