World beats

Trout Fishing in America do it for the kid

by Don Fluckinger

It takes special talent to beat Disney on its home turf of children's entertainment. Especially when you're not a rival corporation, but just a couple of guys in a van touring the country and playing coffeehouses, clubs, and folk festivals. Yet that's exactly what Trout Fishing in America did this year, pulling down an Indie, the independent-music industry's Grammy equivalent.

Their My World release was nominated for top children's-CD honors along with CDs by Disney, as well as John McCutcheon, Arlo and Woody Guthrie, NRBQ, and NPR's Bill Harley. The remarkable thing is that the Trouts' material stands on its own merit, becoming popular at a grassroots level without the aid of big record-company advertising budgets, bribes to big retailing chains, and an army of marketing people who do nothing but sit by the phone and "build awareness" all day.

And the best part is that children's music is only a part of the duo's repertoire. One never knows what's going to happen at a Trout Fishing in America show, which is a combination of folk-rock performance, vaudeville, and stand-up comedy. Will the 6' 9" Ezra Idlet finally outdo his 5' 5 1/2" counterpart Keith Grimwood in "Duelling Moronz"? (It's a little musical skit in which the shorter man -- playing an upright bass -- must mirror the acrobatic actions of the tall acoustic guitarist.) Will they come up with a pun so bad that people will actually toss rotten fruit stageward? Will they play their hilarious kids' music (with titles like "My Hair Had a Party Last Night," "When I Was a Dinosaur," and "Baby's Got the Car Keys"), adult-oriented ballads, or a mix of both?

"I think the ability to change our style to fit the room and the way that we enjoy that has kept it interesting to us," says Grimwood, who started playing with Idlet while he was temporarily out of work with the Houston Symphony during a labor dispute in the mid-'70s. "Not every song is funny, and not every song is serious. It's the blending of the serious and the stupid with us that keeps us [from] . . . being one-dimensional."

Early on, the duo toured mostly in their home state of Arkansas as well as Texas and Louisiana. Their congenial, snappy stage presence was only half their appeal: their musicianship was excellent. The duo have a surprisingly large sound for two guys with two instruments. Seriousness and hilarity aside, they can also bash out Southern-flavored rock chestnuts such as "Pico de Gallo," "Not Fade Away," and "Iko Iko." Taken all together with the on stage banter -- some well-polished, some improvised -- they put on a great show wherever they go, night after night. For this, the Trouts have been rewarded with a large number of fans which shows up in droves at folk festivals and club gigs. They've also opened for Bob Dylan, Mary Chapin Carpenter, and Bela Fleck; and they've twice been featured entertainment at the White House Easter Egg Hunt. On their current East Coast tour, Keith and Ezra will sing the national anthem at a Philadelphia Phillies baseball game for the second time in their career.

Off the road, Idlet and Grimwood are working on their fifth release geared toward their adult fans, complementing their three children's CDs. In March, they recorded a live album and video, Family Music Party, which includes material for both generations. The video was aired on many public television stations this spring, and features three backing musicians, a rarity for Trout Fishing in America.

Recorded at the Austin City Limits soundstage, Family Music Party captures the total Trout Fishing in America experience, which sometimes doesn't totally translate to their studio CDs. The CDs are great, don't get the wrong idea -- but in the context of their stage show, the ballads are more poignant, the rockers rock out more, and the funny stuff can be side-splitting. This special album came about at a French trade show, where Trout Fishing were hawking their wares and won over PBS producer Fred Bogert.

"So often in the music business when people offer to do something for you it's just a lot of hot air," Idlet says. "Between his saying that he wanted to do a PBS video and actually getting it done was less than a year."

Adds Grimwood: "They knew what they were doing. It was really a pleasure to find something like that."

Coming from Trout Fishing in America, that's high praise. Doing it on their own for all these years (yes, they've turned down offers from labels big and small), they couldn't have found it easy to entrust their material to someone else. But who can blame them? After all, by themselves, they took on Disney . . . and won.

Trout Fishing in America play at 7 p.m. on June 19 at the Iron Horse, in Northampton. Tickets are $10. Call (413) 584-0610.