For music lovers whose interest is not piqued by the multitude of classical concerts taking place throughout the festive period, the Ram Jam Club is hosting a gig that offers a rollicking alternative to the usual choral works and Christmas carols.

From rockabilly to jazz, Liam Grundy is an experienced purveyor of all kinds of Americana, and he will be aiming to bring down the house at the Kingston venue on Monday night.

“There will be a mixture of blues, country, jazz and rock ‘n’ roll – the best bits from all of them, and I’ll play my own stuff too,” he explains.

“If you like Jerry Lee and Johnny Cash and are not afraid of the bar it should be alright. There will be no ‘yee-haaing’ going on but it is music to drink heavily and have fun to.”

Although this won’t be a traditional Christmas concert, Grundy says he and his band will be doing there best to get into the spirit of things.

“We’ll do some Christmas tunes,” he says. “We might stretch to doing Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer which was a big hit for Gene Autry in 1936, but it is more about the good cheer that happens at Christmas – we always have a good time at the Ram Jam.”

Grundy started his career playing Irish music at venues in the north-west in the late-70s but he soon moved on to rock ‘n’ roll and has played in the MGs, The Blubberry Hellbellies and The Lonesome Pine Review.

He has also toured in the places where all the different kinds of music he loves came from, with gigs in New Orleans, Nashville and Austin under his belt. Grundy has even been joined on stage by some of the musicians who helped shape these genres, including Elvis Presley’s guitarist Scotty Moore.

“We went to meet Scotty and we told him that we didn’t want to do any Presley tribute stuff,” says Grundy.

“We did sets based around all the people who played at Sun Studios. Scotty just wanted to be a member of a band.

“When Presley became successful Scotty didn’t have a band anymore, so he wanted to travel on the bus with us and not be treated differently.”

But for all his American influences, Grundy’s own tunes are inspired by his own very British surroundings. His latest album, simply entitled Richmond, pays homage to his home town in its title track.

“The tune is based on Richmond-upon-Thames but you try not to mention the ‘upon Thames’!” he explains.

“There are so many places in America with songs named after them, so I thought it was only fair that we wrote one for our Richmond.

“When you write your own tunes it is a a question of kicking all of the pretentions out of the door and seeing what you are left with.

“It is about whether you have the right atttitude and are prepared to make the sort of music that people who like rock ‘n’ roll, country and blues will respond to.

“There are some contemp-orary influences thrown in to my tunes too. I don’t want my music to resemble a musical museum.”

Liam Grundy, The Ram Jam Club @The Grey Horse, Richmond Road, Kingston, December 14, 8pm, £5, grey-horse.co.uk/ rjc