Backwater (band)

Backwater was an American jazz fusion band that consisted of Robby Catlin, Larry Hardin, Scott Pettersen, Trippe Thomason and Gerry Groom. The group (Catlin, Hardin, Pettersen) was formed in 1975 in Mobile, Alabama. The quintet released one record, Backwater (1976), that received national airplay success and led to touring stints with B.B. King, Bonnie Raitt and Emmylou Harris. Hardin and Thomason left the band shortly thereafter over creative disagreements; Catlin and Pettersen continued on with Tom and Myra Woodruff, producing one more recording (1978's Live from the Heart of Dixie/North of the Mason Dixon) before splitting as the decade closed. The band reformed briefly in 1979 with Hardin, Catlin, Woodruff and Nick Rayner on drums. The band's original members reunited in 1996 for a one-off "20 year reunion" concert.

Formation and Backwater (1976)
In the early 1970s, Robby Catlin formed Backwater as a trio playing cover music. The Mobile, Alabama-based trio (with guitarist Bob Bishop) performed covers of contemporary hit radio singles and became staples of fraternity parties and high school dances. In 1975, childhood friends Larry Hardin and Catlin formed a band with Scott Pettersen, Steve Ferrell and Jim Reid (with whom Catlin had performed in junior high school as part of the band Free Will) along with high school friend Jim Henderson and Bishop. The band moved to Birmingham, Alabama where they played cover music at The Morris House club. Ferrell, Bishop, Reid and Henderson left the band (some to return to college) and Catlin, Hardin and Pettersen met Trippe (C.G.) Thomason, who would be incorporated into the band as keyboardist in late 1975. Guitarist Gerry Groom also joined the band in early 1976. Groom, who had been a child prodigy that studied under and performed with Duane Allman, was influential in pushing the group into a more blues-based improvisational style and encouraged the band to find its own voice. Groom also introduced the group to John Hammond Jr., who they backed in a 1975 concert. The group only owned one vehicle — a bread truck — and they lived together in a condemned home on the south side of the city. With confidence high, the band decided to commit the music to vinyl and record their first album.

Rather than sign to any record labels, Hardin, Pettersen and Catlin formed their own independent label, the crudely-named Bongwater Records. The five musicians worked as "session men" at New London Recording in exchange for studio time for themselves. The resulting record — Backwater (1976) — contained a studio side and a live side, recorded at Birmingham nightclub The Midnight's Voice. Edgar Winter performed live with the band during recording (but was not recorded) and encouraged the band to go national. Released amid the late 1970s hard rock boom, radio stations such as Mobile-based WABB were skeptical at first. "The local bands back then all seemed to have platform shoes, long hair, and sequined shirts, and they were either Boston/Aerosmith or Lynyrd Skynyrd imitators," recalled Mobile attorney Lee Stamp. Nevertheless, Stamp found it "as sophisticated as anything coming out of New York or Los Angeles" and it was added it to the WABB play stack, where it sat for three years — an honor usually reserved for supergroups such as Fleetwood Mac.

Encouraged, the band launched a mailing campaign to put copies of the album in the hands of radio stations coast to coast. The exposure helped Backwater land opening slots for B.B. King, Bonnie Raitt, and Emmylou Harris.

Lineup change, second record and breakup (late 1970s)
In 1977, Hardin and Thomason quit for "creative differences," which essentially meant the band could not function anymore as a unit. "We were full of ourselves [...] It was a matter of having too many kids with too many egos," Hardin later remarked. Catlin and Pettersen forged ahead with a long series of replacement players (most notably Tom and Myra Woodruff) who helped cobble together another release, Live from the Heart of Dixie/North of the Mason Dixon (1978). As the decade closed, the band would eventually decide to part ways. "It got to the point where we were just another bar band," Pettersen recalled. Lee Stamp would later cite the state's lackluster music scene and lack of major label interest as factors in the split. "When [label representatives] came to town, I'd try to shop the record to them," he said. "They all said they liked it, but it wasn't the direction they were going. They weren't KISS." Hardin and Catlin, along with Tom Woodruff and Nick Rayner, reformed briefly in 1979 but by decades' end the band dissolved.

In 1996, the group's four principal members reunited for one-off concert at Mobile's USA Saenger Theatre, sponsored by Catt's Sunday Jazz Brunch. In addition, the band's original debut, Backwater, was remastered and released on compact disc the same year.

Band members

 * Former members
 * Robby Catlin – bass guitar, vocals (1975–78; 1997)
 * Larry Hardin – alto/tenor saxophone/baritone saxophone, clarinet (1975–77; 1997)
 * Trippe Thomason – keyboards (1975–77; 1997)
 * Scott Pettersen - drums, percussion (1975–78; 1997)
 * Gerry Groom - guitar (1976)
 * Tom Woodruff - keyboards (1977-1979)

Discography

 * Studio albums
 * Backwater (1976)
 * Live from the Heart of Dixie/North of the Mason Dixon (1978)