Spend 30 seconds or so with Gary Gerloff and you'll come to the quick conclusion that both the man and his music are, shall we say,... unique.

Take, for example, his original answer to the tired question, "What is it that provides your great inspiration?"

"The only reason I get out of bed and make any of this is because at the end of the day, I want to know that I contributed to having the designated hitter rule removed from baseball."

And how would you describe your music, Gary? "Psychedelic Dixie-land."

The 50-year old Gerloff has been in the biz for 3 1/2 decades. While the blues are really what chips his potato, his passion and roots run all over the pop music landscape. Pay attention. Gerloff's personal journey is the equivalent of American Pop Music 101.

"I consider myself a bluesier first," Gerloff explained recently from a Southside Richmond front porch. "My heroes are Charlie Patton, Muddy Waters, Tommy Johnson, Elmore James, Robert Johnson. That really charmed me when I was about 15... Like everybody else, I was exposed to the Beatles thing. That was interesting enough, but it really wasn't compelling to me. I came across the Rolling Stones on N. That led me to get interested in a blues-driven thing. But I wasn't totally conscious of blues as an art form.

"Then I started hanging out at the old coffee- house at First Baptist Church. I saw some amazing things there... I saw these folkies and they'd hypnotize me with softer music, more direct and pointed and delivered with a lot more drama than pop music. I met a ragtime guitar player who wasn't as old as me. He astonished me -played ragtime and knew all these old songs. He was literally the book to me, opened me up. My life has never really been the same.

"Because of that I got into black music. It wasn't novelty stuff to me, it was something to explore. It led me all the way to the Chicago blues, the Kansas City blues, swing music and derivatives of those kinds of things.

"I ended up in high school as a big James Brown fan. The Mosque would host 'Dick Clark's Caravan of Stars: I saw Marvin Gaye, I saw Otis Redding, I saw James Brown, the Temptations, the Marvelletes ...Igot to the point that I embraced beach music. It riveted me. About the time I really got to loving that stuff, it became Jirni Hendrix time, it became Led Zeppelin time. About that time, I became embracing more blues-driven rock.

"It's all been part of a process. I was still hanging out with the follies and going to the bluegrass festivals, ...but at the same time I was playing that hard rock down at VCU. I went to Jamaica in the 70s and was exposed to reggae. I still love it:'

No surprise that Gerloff's impossible-to-pigeon- hole January 2001 release; ANCESTOR WORSHIP is a bit on the eclectic side. You'll hear echoes and per- mutations of all those influences and experiences in the nine-song mix of originals and traditional tunes.

"Some of those tunes are ten years old that I've just been carrying around. They were the songs that seemed to be important, that begged to be done. There's a certain life that you have to commit to songs to do."

Gerloff credits the low-tech approach to recording the album to its warm feel.

"It turned out better than I expected. One of the reasons it turned out as well as it did is that it was recorded on well-conditioned analog equipment as opposed to digital, cutting edge, too much sterility. Analog produces a warmer tone all the way. Digital is fine if you're selling cars and hamburgers but the ambience I work towards on this recording is enhanced by working in an analog, old-fashioned format.

It doesn't hurt to have guys like Gerloff’s high school pal Steve Bassett as well as Charles Arthur on the CD.

"I had Charles in mind from the beginning...I met him many years ago and had fallen under his spell like everyone else that has heard him. He's the franchise. He's all over the CD -banjo, fiddle, electric guitar, acoustic guitar. There aren't but a handful of people that have the breadth of understanding of the lap steel that he has. 

He's one of the few people that has embraced almost every  style of music that I can think of'"

The CD is finding a life outside Central Virginia.

"We shipped a few units around the world. A distributor in North Carolina picked up a big chunk. I get sold in Europe; I get sold on the Internet. They play me in Australia. We're doing real well- I have no complaints. The real fun part is when I check my e- mail and find out that I'm being  played in Belgium:'

Catch Gerloff live and you'll hear cuts from the CD but also much more.

"I do the songs from the album. And I'll do some other songs that I don't have any plans to record. I try to contour it for the type of audience that I have. I like to do things that speak to the collective group, that are going to make everybody enjoy. I don't expect people to turn a nightclub into a church. I try to give them something that they can dance and hum and tap their feet to.

"But something at the same time, that's not old, contrived and predictable. I want to do something that's got a little twist, a little charm to it That's why I like jug band music. My current favorite thing is to do jug band driven songs electrically. I like to do some Dead songs and at the same time I'll do a New Orleans set It's not school, there's no test It's not about saving a whale, it's not about bad karna in the middle of the street let's all have a good time. If we can get that done, that's plenty. I'm not trying to convert the world to a new paradigm. Let's enjoy the time we've got:'

Gerloff's current hope is to put together a tour of Europe in the near future. "They (Europeans) are a lot more open and embracing of American music, especially roots stuff. I'm focusing on the mechanics and logistics of making that happen.”

For the time being thought, Gerloff is content in the knowledge that he has carved a niche in a town that's not particularly embracing of musical niches.