Saturday: TC & The Troublemakers at Mattison's City Grille

Set right in the heart of downtown Sarasota, Mattison's City Grille is an all-outdoor, covered dining restaurant with live music seven nights a week. While there are lots of tables and seats at the bar, when TC & The Troublemakers get going with their brand of Southern rock, classic rock and blues, it's hard to stay seated. IMHO (in my humble opinion), they are the most fun dance band in Sarasota on a Saturday night.

Let's start with TC's smooth growl of a singing voice. He just throws out those lyrics like a seasoned baseball pitcher, and he can adjust the mood and tone verse by verse, to set the crowd jumping or slow dancing. His lead guitar breaks are fluid and creative, oozing with soul. It continues to amaze me how many extraordinary guitar players we're gifted with here in Sarasota. And TC (Tim Chandler) is surely among the best of the best.



Backing him up energetically on bass and vocals is Doc Mambo. Rodney "Hot Rod" Johnson keeps the beat with kickin' drum work and both backup and lead vocals. When Rodney croons a Willie Nelson song, you'd swear Willie was up there doing the honors.

Besides impressing with facile musicianship, TC expertly reads the mood of the "room" on Saturday nights at Mattison's and delivers slow dances that crowd the floor with romantic couples, sweetly teases bachelorettes and birthday girls, and leaves few sitting when he launches into classics like Brown Sugar and Jumping Jack Flash, among other classics. TC & The Troublemakers plays some originals, too, which adds variety to their set list.

On his MySpace page, TC says, "Absolutely LOVE the blues, killer players like Albert King and BB and the like. Clapton has some fantastic songs and I'm REALLY into the sounds of Delbert McClinton. I grew up and started taking my music serious in the "Southern Rock" era, bands like Marshall Tucker and the Allman Bros. are what I began with and still somewhat emulate to this day." While I can hear the influences of those legends when TC & The Troublemakers play, they bring their own flavor to the music. Just can't keep from dancing when I hear it. Maybe you'll enjoy them, too.

If you want to hear an interesting contrast to TC & The Troublemakers' Saturday night party band sound, give a listen to some of Tim Chandler's original tunes on his individual MySpace page.