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Born and raised on Capitol Hill, now playing Capitol Hill Block Party

Musician Joe Gregory was born and raised on Capitol Hill and can remember attending the Capitol Hill Block Party when it was a tiny, alternative, upstart music festival.

On Sunday he and his band J GRGRY are joining the ranks of CHBP performers. “It’s really exciting to actually finally 20 years later be a part of it,” said Gregory.

It has been a quick rise for the group. J GRGRY has been around for about a year. The group was asked to play CHBP earlier this summer after several successful shows at Neumos.J GRGRY consists of Gregory, guitar player and Gregory’s longtime friend Robert Cheek, drummer Andrew King, and bass/key player Ryan Leyva. The group’s first performance together was at The Crocodile in December 2015. After that first show, J GRGRY submitted for the opening slot for Geographer at Neumos.

“So many people came out for us and we sold a ton of presale tickets – it was just an overwhelming response and the club was like, ‘Holy shit, who are you guys?’” said Gregory. “It ended up being such a cool show, and then I think because of my onstage aesthetic they thought about asking me for the Prince show.”

After Neumos’ Prince tribute show in June, the club asked J GRGRY if they wanted to play at CHBP. “We were like, ‘Fuck yeah!’” said Gregory.

The band will be playing several original songs during their CHBP set. Gregory described the style as dark pop and said much of the band’s material draws from his own experiences of depression and addiction, things he has struggled with throughout his career. “This record that we did last summer obviously had a lot to do with addiction and alcoholism and that decade of my life that was drinking a fifth every day and doing whatever was on the table,” said Gregory. “Some of the stuff I had written as I was knowing that I needed to make a change but wasn’t physically or mentally able to.” As a result, Gregory says most of the songs have a dark overtone, but with a glimmer of hope — the message that you can get better if you put the work in.

Gregory took a couple years off of music to come up for air and devote time to his recovery. For a while, he thought he would never perform again. “My association with music was always alcohol – I wasn’t sure if I could write without it, or perform without it, for sure. I was like, ‘I’ll never perform again, that’s my new life, is not performing,’” he said. After J GRGRY’s first show at The Crocodile, however, never performing again seemed unimaginable. “I remember being backstage afterwards like, ‘How could I think I was never gonna do this again? I’m gonna do this every day if I can,’” said Gregory.

The CHBP is not the only thing Gregory has seen change since he was a kid in Capitol Hill. “In the last two years it’s been pretty uncomfortable seeing all the homogeneous buildings and really vapid architecture,” Gregory said of the area’s rapid growth. “You can’t begrudge a community specifically, but the tech boom has brought a lot of affluence that makes it uncomfortable for natives and locals … sometimes you don’t want a $17 cheeseburger, you just kinda want a Dick’s cheeseburger.” Gregory said that for him and many other artists and musicians, the cost of living has become too high. He is moving to Tacoma in the fall, and says that many of his friends plan to do the same.

Despite rising living cost pushing artists and musicians out of the area, Gregory said he still believes Capitol Hill and Seattle are a good place for musicians, especially because of local venues like Chop Suey, The Crocodile, and Funhouse. “It’s cool that you can be a band of any size and have places to play and have your name in the paper. That’s important for young artists,” he said. “It’s still is a great place to be young and play music, for sure.”

J GRGRY is slotted to perform at Barboza at 6:45 PM on Sunday, July 24. Gregory says the set will be a little under half an hour and will include five or six original songs, plus one cover that he hopes will resonate with the audience and the CHBP vibe. To learn more, visit facebook.com/jgrgrymusic.

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