Review: Gryph - Nash Angeles (Elbow Grease)

West Coast, LA, Record label with the moto 'Love, Peace & Elbow Grease' is bound to be working hard to find the best talent for next convert from Tennessee rock and blues to soft rock house - gets this 'Nash Angeles'!

If you're born in Nashville and raised in L.A., what better title for you're debut album than 'Nash Angels' (Ed. did you see what they did there?)  Gryph (aka Michael Griffin) with co-producer Dave Aju (who initially made his name in the minimal/techno genre) who has been running the Elbow Grease label for the past 5 years, have got together with a set of top vocalist and live session musicians to produce this 9-track album that covers lots of bases - "from disco to dub, modern soul to post-punk, Italo to R&B, jazz-funk to classic house" - and even then, there's more!

Over the 9 tracks you'll get an over-powering sense of party from bouncy bongos and synths on 'Gotcha Love' featuring Shirtz to the "eye-to-eye contact" upgrade on the following 'Dangereuse' (featuring Dina Moursi): get you're Euro disco strut-on baby.

So that's two great tracks and the party continues with some deep "way down" basslines at one end of 'Feeling It' (featuring Masho) and big string sweeps and sexy sax at the other. 

You don't want to miss out on the jazz-house-funk-fusion (mostly)instrumentals 'Pierce' and 'Body Body'.  And no idea what 'St. Barts' means to these guys but it's not the London Hospital around the back of Smithfields market as the track 'St. Barts' goes into flute gang jazz mid-tempo instrumental that Herbie Mann would have been proud of.  

And talking of the greats, 'Dr. John' is a deep as a spirtual jazz trade route to 'Orleans of sax and upbeat Lonnie Liston Smith keys. The album ends on 'Dr John' but warms up with a Latin tinged disco 'Summer Nights' that grooves you into beachwear via West Coast yacht rock captained by the Mizzell Brothers; don't forget that these are "HOT, summer nights"! 

I think we've all got the idea now and as everyone has said this album is full of a variety of influences, I guess Aju's hand is on this as much as Griffen's but as a duo, they've put an awful lot of elbow grease into this album an it's paid off big time as it's going to be a big success: Nash Angeles is the place to be! 

BUY LINK / PRE-ORDER: https://elbowgrease.bandcamp.com/album/nash-angeles

Artist: Gryph 

Title: Nash Angels

Release date: 3rd July, 2026

Label : Elbow Grease

Catalog Number : TBC

Format: Limited Edition Vinyl / Digital / Bandcamp