'Gangstagrass' rocks Port Clinton with blend of hip hop, bluegrass

PORT CLINTON - Gangstagrass — a band not quite like anything else Port Clinton has seen before — rocked a sold-out crowd at the Listening Room on Thursday night.

“Words are hard to do it justice,” said Gangstagrass banjo player Dan Whitener. “If we said bluegrass hip-hop, which it is, people might think of something bad. We just say, listen to it, come to a show, see what it’s like for yourself.”

While it may initially seem strange to think of a blend of bluegrass and hip-hop, the “mastermind” behind Ganstagrass, Emmy-nominated musician Rench, proved just how well it can work.

“The key to the formula here is really good bluegrass players and really good hip-hop emcees,” Rench said. “It’s kind of like cooking — it’s the quality ingredients. Having that really brings it to life.”

What kind of crowd is drawn to a show with “gangsta” rapping over a jam of acoustic guitar, banjo and fiddle? The answer is all kinds, according to Rench.

“People ask us, ‘What’s your audience like?’ It’s so hard to give them an answer,” he said. “It’s funny, we play in all these different places to totally different crowds everywhere we go.”

The northwest Ohio crowd that packed the intimate setting of the Listening Room, located inside OurGuest Inn, 220 E. Perry St., Port Clinton, was digging it.

“For us, this was an older crowd, but they really grooved. You can tell they were eating it up and that’s always fun,” Rench said. “We were feeling a great energy from the crowd. People seemed to really be driven on it.”

“We’ve done listening rooms before, but never one called the Listening Room,” Whitener said. “You think we’d do mostly standing halls and dance clubs, but we have actually been doing more of this sort of thing where people just sit down and want to listen to the music.”

For more information go to gangstagrass.com.

jstinchcom@gannett.com

419-680-4897

Twitter: @JonDBN