The Eric Grant Band is based in Gilford, New Hampshire, and for a country band that does make sense. The Meadow Brook U.S. Cellular Pavilion, which presents America’s biggest names in country music, is literally at the bottom of the hill Grant lives on. The 6,000 seat venue has hosted national acts from Brad Paisley to Sugarland to Zac Brown Band.
Singer Grant has, over the years, engorged himself on the country music shows that come to his hometown. Country music itself, though, is just a great feel for where Grant is at in his life. “I love the sound of it,” Grant said. “I love the style. I love the stories that you can tell with it. It’s just feels right.”
The songs that hit Grant right between eyes were “I Melt” by Rascal Flatts and “Remember When” by Alan Jackson.
“Those two songs just took me by surprise and made me go what the heck is this,” he said. “One of them was like an 80s power ballad but with big vocals. The guitars are stripped down a little bit and pretty little sprinklings of other things, mandolins. And I remember they were just great stories. As the years go by, you look back and reflect on it. I’m like ‘God, it’s awesome.’ And I love his voice, even though I don’t sing like Alan Jackson, I still love his voice. It’s like listening to your uncle sing. He’s just really cool.”
Country music just pulls Grant in like a pied piper. “I love the vocal harmonies. I love the natural acoustics of the songs. I love the acoustic guitars and I love the mandolin, and the fiddles and the pedal steels. I love the natural ambience it represents.”
For Grant, who plays with his own eight piece outfit, a lot of that music is challenging to play, having banjos, mandolin, and pedal steel all going once.
“It’s the first band I’ve had eight people in,” Grant said. “It’s like a little symphony. It’s not a bass, guitar, and a drummer and you say, ‘Ok, everybody play.’ and it seems to melt in. You’ve got eight people fishing for a part and you can’t all be playing all the time. It definitely is different.”
Last year Grant won awards at the New Hampshire Country Music Awards show and at the New England Country Music Association Awards show. This year he and his band went to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee to compete in the North American Country Music Associations Awards show where they won again for Best New Country Band and for Best New Country Vocal Group.
“I think for me personally with the band it’s a stepping stone in the right direction,” Grant said. “I think what energizes me the most is how much the team of the Eric Grant Band helps out with it and how much all the fans love it. The fans are so psyched that we are where we are at winning those awards. I can’t tell you the feedback I get. It’s just amazing. They think we’re there. They think we’ve won and we’ve made it. Yet, for me, I just kind of ground myself. I say OK, We did it. But that was yesterday. Now, what are we going to do today?”
Grant has been honored to open for a lot of major name country stars in his hometown of Gilford, New Hampshire on the Meadowbrook stage. “For them to sign off and let us be into that is just one step closer to being in the circle,” he said. “You just to stay humble, keep your head down. Do what’s right and shake hands.”
An outstanding memory is the very first night that the Eric Grant Band played Meadowbrook, on June 16, 2009. It was their first show. “At the end of the night at Meadowbrook, Chris Young was up on stage with us. It will leave a mark on the band forever. It was the first night. We come out and boom. We hit it hard. It was a great night, and next thing you know it, we’ve got a national act standing on stage with us. It was awesome.” It should be noted: It was Eric Grant Band’s first gig, having formed four months earlier.
Grant was formerly in the widely popular area band called Hot Damn and he played out too solo, duo, trio. His new Eric Grant Band CD is based on true life stories and it should be the first of many more to come. “The fans seem to love it,” he said. “I think it’s good work, but I can’t wait to get to the next one because that’s really where my greatest work’s gonna start, is one next one. For me, it’s a stepping stone into the world, and I’m happy that all the fans love it.”
Grant’s goal and vision going into the studio was simply to have a “well-rounded of what we call a bad ass CD, something on there that’s really going to make people want to rock, but I also want to put a song on that will let them cry their eyes out. I want the CD emotionally to reach right inside of somebody, either to tear their heart out, or, I want them to just put their windows down and scream at the top of the lungs because they just love what the song is saying.”
Grant said his songwriting process is inspired by his life, his family, his pains and pleasures. “If it’s hurt me and leveled me, I think I’ve got a story to tell. If it’s made me real excited and it’s a lot of fun, then I think I have another story to tell. It’s got to be something in some way that someone else can relate to.”
His band features his sister Sherry Grant as his co-lead vocalist. “She’s been playing in groups with me since she was right out of high school. She’s got commanding vocals, and she has the best stage presence and personality. We just have the brother-sister-sibling harmony that people really love to hear.”
Keyboard player Paul Dibiaso is high school friend of Grant’s “He just dedicated and focused and believes,” Grant said.
Drummer “John Littlefield has been with me forever, can read my like a book when were playing live, Knows where I want to go, not just the music but with the show, and is just a rock. Him and Dave Haney on bass, those guys are just rocks. I need them to just handle it and keep it the whole song and they let everybody else do their jobs.”
Guitarists Carlos Flores and Tim Kierstead are new family and friends to Grant. “They have Completely different styles,” Grant said. “Carlos is more like Eddie Van Halen. Tim is more like Stevie Ray Vaughn. It gives us this cool, southern rock, edgy kind of sound. Both are phenomenal players. They just rank up there with the best of talent.”
Bill Hayes is Mr. Versatility. “He’s a banjo player. But he plays guitar in a song and rips the snot out of it,” Grant said. “People come up and groove. He comes from the shredding days of heavy metal. He just levels people when he gets into the solo. It’s just unbelievable. He plays mandolin. He plays fiddle. He plays keyboards, and he’s six foot four and you don’t want to mess with him.”
Light crews and sound crews have also accompanied the band for almost a year. The band and its entourage of 15 to 20 people, all decked out in EGB shirts, go into a room at once and they all go to work. The band sets up the equipment. The street team ladies set up their merchandise table and marketing supplies. The techies come in and set up their light and sound equipment. Managers stand in the middle of the room to oversee everything. Grant says nobody is making money but are in it for the fun. “They’re passionate about the music and I’m passionate about the people that support me. It’s a family. EGB is a family.”