The Lilliston Effect

Jean-Paul Lilliston is a Nashville guitarist and songwriter. Raised in the Detroit area, Jean-Paul (JP) grew up listening and playing the blues, R&B and soul music born out of Memphis, Muscle Shoals, Atlantic Records in New York, Chicago and New Orleans. The Lilliston Effect is an original instrumental project comprised of JP and includes Music City veterans Ron Gomez bass; Geno Haffner keyboards; Dave Harrison percussion; Martin Lynds drums and Don Jacobsen, saxophones. JP counts King Curtis & the King Pins, Booker T. Jones, Snooks Eaglin, Eddie Hinton, Jimmy McGriff, Howlin’ Wolf, Grant Green, Ray Charles and James Brown among his many musical touchstones, with an occasional dose of avant-garde and world music thrown into the mix.

JP founded the instrumental rhythm n’ grooves band as a way to play live music at local venues in Nashville. “This all started as an experiment to play music in town,” says Jean-Paul Lilliston. “I started working on these songs and brought together players who were willing to try this instrumental idea out and found venues open to featuring it. None of this should work—but it does.”

JP was nominated for a Nashville Music Award for Best Blues Album with Perry Welsh & The Mighty Johnsons’ 1997 recording She’s Got That Stuff, engineered by Jack Irwin.

As a guitarist, JP has recorded several albums with songwriters Paul Zografi and Joe Nolan in Nashville. He also toured and recorded with Austin blues band Shake ‘Em on Down, releasing Satisfy Me with recording artist and songwriter, Joanna Ramirez.

The Lilliston Effect released its debut album The Funky Turducken in September 2019 followed by juke joint meets honky tonk single “Blue Christmas” in December 2020. In June 2022, they released their second full-length studio album El Bull recorded, engineered and mixed by Drew Carroll and mastered by Andrija Tokic at The Bomb Shelter in East Nashville. That album was followed by Blues March, recorded and released in 2024.