Grood Music

Grood Music is the roof under which the following bands take shelter: Grood, Babe-alon 5, This Must be the Band, DJ noDJ, Dance Tribute, and Old Timey. It’s more of a greenhouse, diligently tended by Chicago’s fabbest power couple, Kasey Foster and Charles Otto. They have sold out 1000+ capacity rooms in the west and midwest and played alongside their idols, acts like Umphrey’s McGee, Vulfpeck, and members of King Crimson. Their music and music videos have a reasonable subscriber base, and one remake recently received over a million views on FB. Everything they produce follows the 3 guidelines of their mission statement more or less: Embrace the strange, employ mistakes and catch the falling fruit. Grood Music unofficially started being made in 2007 when Kasey joined Charlie’s fledgling Talking Heads tribute This Must be the Band. During TMBTB’s meteoric rise to the absolute top of everything, the two recorded original songs under the name “Savvy” but soon realized there was a Disney pop band of the same name, and discarded it in a fit during Grood’s (somewhat failed) first ACTual Show in 2011. They laid low and sporadically performed as “Definitely Not Savvy” until their glorious resurrection as “Grood” at the second ACTual Show a year later. The name is a combination of Good and Great and was sampled from this ridiculous Homestar Runner cartoon. Around that same time, Kasey developed “Dance Tribute to..,” a yearly 60 person movement performance showcase: often comedic, other times tragic, everything between but always very strange. The show has so far honored Björk, Mr. Bungle, Aphex Twin, David Lynch, and Jock Jams. Meanwhile, Charlie and TMBTB drummer Alan Maniacek came up with the idea for DJ noDJ, a 6 piece electronic band that emulated their favorite DJ’s and producers, but with the unpredictability and force only bands can achieve. With the help of TMBTB keyboardist Vince Naples, they proceeded to fall on their face for several years reaching for this lofty goal. Somewhere during this time as well, Kasey and Charlie’s 1940s duo Old Timey morphed into Babe-alon 5, a shtick-filled Andrews Sisters-esque trio featuring Kasey, Kiley Moore and Tara Smith. 2014 brought change: This Must be the Band went dormant and the beloved bassist Jamie Jay moved to Denver, Kiley and Alan took over leadership of DJ noDJ, and Charlie and Kasey joined Vince to create a community-supported art group under the name Strangecrop. Matt Gunsaulus and Patrick Dinnen have since become the anchor keyboard and bassist, in between tending to their own creative gardens. The greenhouse has produced much since then, the annuals still make their appearance to mild acclaim, the albums are getting tighter, the live shows are budding with energy. More importantly, fruit continues to fall, and thanks to the love they have for and from all the bandmates and fans, it seems Kasey and Charlie are only now starting to learn to savor the taste. 6 Piece Progressive Rock Electro