Friday, February 3, 2012
Midway through Canadian singer-songwriter Kathleen Edwards' show Tuesday night at Cat's Cradle in Carrboro, she welcomed a familiar face onstage to the delight of the hundreds in attendance.
It wasn't necessarily a surprise: A few folks had already spotted Bon Iver's Justin Vernon in his hooded yellow sweatshirt, commingling in the audience with old friends from his Raleigh days, and it's no secret that Vernon produced Edwards' outstanding new album Voyageur. Devoted fans might also have noticed that videos of the two performing a few songs together at her Sunday night performance in Atlanta had turned up on YouTube in the past couple of days.
What had already been a terrific performance by Edwards was kicked up a notch when Vernon joined in on guitar for the exquisite ballad "Wapusk," released last Fall as a single. Edwards explained it was the first song she and Vernon recorded together, an auspicious collaboration that eventually led to much greater connections both professionally and personally.
Vernon stuck around for another number before leaving Edwards in the hands of her very capable bandmates. Lead guitarist Gord Tough's contributions were muscular but tasteful, and opening act Hannah Georgas added gorgeous harmonies to many songs.
Although Voyageur debuted at No. 39 on the Billboard album charts last week, Edwards' fans responded most enthusiastically to older favorites such as "Six O'Clock News" (from 2002's Failer) and "In State" (from 2005's Back To Me). Near the end of the set, she thanked the crowd for their willingness to also hear the new material, most of which was delivered with bounds of confidence and emotion, particularly the fast-galloping opener "Empty Threat" and the brooding mid-set heartbreaker "Pink Champagne."
Vernon reappeared during the encore to join Edwards on "Mercury," another song from Failer that seems to have played a minor role in bringing the two together. (In a phone interview two weeks ago, Edwards noted that she'd heard Bon Iver had covered "Mercury" onstage before the two singers had met; indeed, YouTube turns up a rendition of the song by Vernon and his band at the Sasquatch Festival near Seattle in May 2009.) They closed with "For The Record," a seven-minute coda to a past relationship which concludes the new album and was stretched out even longer onstage. "I only wanted to sing songs," Edwards attested in the chorus; on this night, that was more than enough, with a little help from her friends.
Durham-based folk-rock sextet Delta Rae has signed to Sire Records, a subsidiary of the Warner Music Group. Their label mates will include Avenged Sevenfold, Jack’s Mannequin, Regina Spektor and a host of other bands that water down otherwise interesting musical ideas until they are highly safe and consumable. In short, this is just where Delta Rae belongs.
According to their manager, Adam Schlossman, the group signed the contract a week ago in New York before a show at the Mercury Lounge. The first album in the multi-record deal, a full-length follow-up to the band's 2010 self-titled EP, is expected out in late spring or early summer. Work on the release has already begun thanks to funding from Delta Rae's successful Kickstarter campaign.
Delta Rae unites the backwoods twang of old-time string music and gospel with mainstream forms, a formula deployed successfully by many of their Triangle peers, including Justin Robinson & the Mary Annettes, Hiss Golden Messenger and Megafaun. In Delta Rae’s case, the modern quotient comes in the form of highly varnished Nashville glitz, grinding out the grit of a typically gripping style in the process.
They're the kind of group that can power a single (“Bottom of the River”) with a chain-gang stomp, then make a video in which their platinum-blonde singer marches several hooded African-Americans across a plantation before leaving them lying on the ground, apparently dead. She prances off giggling. Somehow, Delta Rae didn't get the irony or complications, swapping deeper meaning for simple false provocation.
These major labels never learn, do they? There's always the hope that wizened industry vets will help sharpen their approach. Too bad they didn’t sign to American.
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Before last Saturday, I had never heard of a venue selling out twice in one evening. But at Motorco, the first half of the night—a benefit for the Central Park School For Children—opened with a mob of young children and their parents anxiously awaiting the student performances to begin. The joy projected by the student bands, their friends and families was overwhelming. All you could see was smiles everywhere—none more so than with the "adult" instructors, like Phil Cook, Christy Smith, and Heather McEntire, who worked with each student band to develop original material.
After the student performance, the full crowd slowly began to thin and transition to grown-ups attending the event of the evening—The Beast, Mount Moriah and Megafaun. Much like the first half of the show, the second provided a refreshing experience. Between each performance, area high school students in the group Poetic Justice treated the crowd to a number of profound pieces. The Beast, Mount Moriah and Megafaun did not handle this as a standard performance, either. New songs and arrangements debuted, all somehow accompanied by a familial and comforting atmosphere.
Friday night’s performance at The ArtsCenter in Carrboro offered an interesting array of area musicians, centered for an evening around gospel songs. While that might immediately turn off some concertgoers, the songs being played—at least according to Gathering Church Associate Pastor Chris Breslin—were more soul music than anything else.
He was right, too. Jeff Crawford and company worked their way through many of the songs on their new compilation Hymns From The Gathering Church. Throughout the evening, the band switched through countless formations, transitioning smoothly from song to song as though this were a band who had toured on the material previously. Below are several clips from the evening.
Jeff Mangum
w/ Andrew, Laura & Scott
Memorial Hall, Chapel Hill
January 30, 2012
Photography was not permitted at Jeff Mangum’s show in Chapel Hill on Monday night, increasing the sense that we were about to witness a rare, delicate artifact that could be damaged by bright lights. Yet the person that emerged seemed average, affable and mild, more like someone who had just woken up refreshed after being in suspended animation for 13-odd years than a wild-eyed hermit. He could have easily passed for an art-class extra on My So-Called Life, with lank hair hanging down like Snoopy ears below a puffy engineer cap—a doubly appropriate chapeau for the captain of the time-travel machine that UNC’s Memorial Hall had become.
Indeed, our coordinates were set for the late-’90s, just before Mangum mostly absconded from public and musical life after creating one of the most enduringly beloved indie albums ever, Neutral Milk Hotel’s In the Aeroplane Over the Sea. Of the roughly 1,400 of us on the voyage, some were 30- or 40-somethings consummating a longtime dream, and maybe reminiscing a bit. Many others were undergraduates, perched on the edges of their seats to see a musician whose last record came out when they were small children.
Released by Merge Records in 1998, Aeroplane was a surreal pop and folk record with lyrics full of cryptic references to Anne Frank and steampunk machines, sung with overwhelming force. The record felt like visiting a burned-down and quite haunted carnival, thanks to Mangum’s affinity for slackened keys, tin-horn harshness, phonograph wobbles—really, all manner of penny-arcade cheapness.
But this uncanny style only partly accounts for Aeroplane’s seemingly permanent status as a holy relic of indie music. It’s accurate but misleading to say that the record appeared at the dawn of the Internet age: in fact, it was the abrupt twilight of hermetic ’90s indie rock. We cherish it as the beautiful last gasp of something bigger than music—a way of life, or of thinking about life. We got to revisit that magically transient moment, when ’90s indie ended two years early, on Monday night. For a little while, it was as if electroclash, dubstep and chillwave had never surfaced.
The evening began with an opening set by Andrew Rieger, Laura Carter and Scott Spillane—all part of the Elephant 6 Recording Company, a label and collective with strong roots in Denver, Athens and antique pop. All were also involved in the creation of Aeroplane, and their set bore ample evidence of the collective quirks that have come to sound Mangum-esque, thanks to his breakout sainthood. There was incredibly loud singing from Spillane, who looked like a trucker Santa Claus. There was pitchy beer-bottle slide guitar by Carter. There were off-kilter, hollowed-out, two-chord grinders, and there was tinker-toy timekeeping.
With a quirky instrumental palette dominated by guitars and horns, the ensemble drew material from their own bands—Elf Power and the Gerbils—and played covers of artists from Chris Knox to Randy Newman (a sour and forbidding “In Germany Before the War”). The Rieger-led Elf Power songs stood out as being R.E.M.-ishly professional among the weird, ramshackle excursions, marking him as the straight man of this merry carny troupe.
Any worries that Mangum’s set would be as loose and meandering were dispelled when he strode onstage, sat down in a ring of acoustic guitars, and ripped into “Two-Headed Boy Pt. 2.” The set resembled the one captured on the disc Live at Jittery Joe’s, with fan favorites stripped down to voice and guitar but otherwise rendered with all the memorized nuances. In other words, the set was ideal for an artist who hasn’t meaningfully performed or recorded in so long. Perhaps in acknowledgement of the hefty price of the ticket, Mangum reeled through hit after hit with no filler—“Gardenhead/Leave Me Alone,” all the parts of “King of Carrot Flowers,” “Oh Comely,” “Song Against Sex.” The opening crew returned at intervals to supply iconic horn passages and other signposts, as Mangum traced the vocal contours he engraved in vinyl long age. His voice narrowed to a reedy keen, shot up in a vertiginous howl and drew out notes to Guinness Book-worthy lengths, as though it were a willful beast that, once released from its cage, only goes back in when it’s good and ready.
Mangum’s diction bent under the stress of his singing, vowels changing into other vowels, consonants washing out into groans. His voice pushed against the roof of his mouth as if trying to take his head off. That vibrato-resistant howl sometimes felt a little strange in the formal hall—occasionally, an innocent bystander might have wondered if Mangum was hard of hearing. “I know this is a strange place but you guys can yell at me,” Mangum said, searching for interaction. “It’s not like the punk rock days where you got spit on!” That’s just what happens when indie culture goes to the museum.
But it led me to try and imagine: If I walked into this cold, with no knowledge of Mangum’s legacy and no nostalgic attachment to his records, how would I feel about this guy, all alone onstage at Memorial, beating up a cracked guitar and shouting through his nose? But I couldn’t do it—once Neutral Milk Hotel’s oddities get into you, especially at an impressionable age, there’s no going back.
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
- Photo by Todd V. Wolfson
- "It still sounds like me, in the end." —Kathleen Edwards, on her new LP
“I’m moving to America,” Kathleen Edwards sings over and over in the chorus of “Empty Threat,” the lead track of her new album, Voyageur. Thing is, it wasn’t an empty threat: The Canadian singer-songwriter recently relocated to Wisconsin, leaving behind a marriage to a former bandmate and finding a new beginning both musically and personally with Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon.
It’s an auspicious new direction. Voyageur, her fourth album, is brimming with exploration and confidence, perhaps the full bloom of an artist who first surfaced a decade ago with a self-released recording that became the little album that could (2002’s Failer). While Edwards was recognized primarily in Americana circles with her debut, she’s always had a steadfast indie streak, and so Voyageur—co-produced by Edwards and Vernon—sounds less like a departure than an arrival long in her sights.
“Some people have been saying, like, ‘This is a big departure for you,’” Edwards acknowledges, “‘but, well, no, not really. It still sounds like me. Although there are things I set out to achieve in making this record—a different style of production, a different approach to some songs—it still sounds like me, in the end.”
The record was indeed made in an entirely different manner than her last one, 2008’s Asking for Flowers. That was recorded in Los Angeles with ace producer Jim Scott and a first-rate cast of studio musicians; Voyageur was more homegrown. “This was the first time I’d done a significant amount of work in a home studio—Justin’s studio [in Fall Creek, Wis.]—which allowed for a certain amount of trial and error, without having to be careful that you didn’t waste time that you wouldn’t get back,” she says.
Working outside of the pro studio environment presented another opportunity for Edwards to push herself to be more involved in the process of actually making the record.
“It’s really hard when you show up in the studio and you’ve got Jim Scott, the best engineer, and [studio aces] Bob Glaub and Don Heffington and Greg Leisz,” she says. “You can’t help but just barely participate, because those guys are just so incredible. It was an amazing experience … but in retrospect, it didn’t push me to step out of my comfort zone in trying things.”
On Voyageur, though, Edwards is credited with playing 11 different instruments, more than twice as many as she’d handled on any previous record. Many were variations of keyboards—piano, organ, Wurlitzer, B3, Rhodes—and if her new record stands apart in some respects from her earlier work, it’s probably this shift away from guitar twang toward keyboard atmospherics. Part of the credit for that goes to Durham musician Phil Cook (of Megafaun and Vernon’s former bandmate in DeYarmond Edison), who contributed various piano and organ parts to seven of the album’s 10 songs.
“Phil played a huge role in the early stages of the record,” Edwards explains. “He came back to Eau Claire to work on it at Justin’s recommendation, and some of the things he did transformed the early direction of the record.”
The bedrock foundation of Edwards’ touring band—guitarist Gord Tough, bassist John Dinsmore, drummer Lyle Molzan and especially multi-instrumentalist Jim Bryson, whose ties with Edwards go back to before she even made her first record—complemented the newcomers. Bryson and Edwards co-wrote “Sidecar,” which is one of Voyageur’s standout tracks, even as its more straightforward rock ’n’ roll delivery contrasts with the broader sonic palette on most of the record.
If Vernon and Bryson bring different elements to the mix, Edwards says she’s often struck by their common ground. “There have been moments when Justin got credit for things Jim did, and vice versa,” she says. “It’s funny, because I really think they have a similar aesthetic and a similar ear. They’re the two people in my life the most willing to try things; they’re always thinking about new approaches and new treatments, and just throwing stuff up against the wall. And that’s so important.”
Kathleen Edwards performs Tuesday, Jan. 31, at Cat’s Cradle, with opening act Hannah Georgas. Tickets to the 8 p.m. show are $20 in advance—$23 day of show. Visit www.catscradle.com.
Friday, January 27, 2012
Spider Bags, Paint Fumes, Flesh Wounds, Brainbows, Snake
Thursday, Jan. 26
La Salamandra, Durham
La Salamandra isn’t designed for hosting rock bands, and it shows. The unassuming taco shack on Hillsborough Rd. features a long, narrow floorplan, divided by an elevated bar and chest-high barricade. The stage, if you want to call it that, is little more than a nook set back into the middle of the room’s length, just large enough for a drummer and some amps and placed so that, last night, most of the crowd would be treated to a side-view of the five performing acts. The sound was problematic, too.
But none of that really hindered the benefit concert organized as a fundraiser to help alleviate the medical bills that local artist Dan Melchior and his wife, Letha Rodman Melchior, have been accruing since Letha’s cancer diagnosis more than a year ago. The show, despite the less-than-ideal setup, roared away.
Plagued by feedback from the PA, and inaudible backing vocals, for instance, Spider Bags started their headlining set at a disadvantage. Still, through the course of it, and especially in their more well-known songs—“Que Viva El Rocanroll,” “Teenage Eyes” and “Dog In The Snow”—the band managed a solid performance.
That handicap was exacerbated by their placement behind a double header of scrappy, relatively new bands. Charlotte’s Paint Fumes slobbered through a half-hour of addictive garage rock, sneaking flashes of 13th Floor Elevators psych-rock and Cramps surf into their set (which ended, naturally, with a busted Silvertone and a cymbal tossed off the drum kit). Flesh Wounds—the Chapel Hill trio of Last Year’s Men’s Montgomery Morris, The Moaners’ Laura King and The Future Kings of Nowhere’s Dan Kinney—offered a set of Oblivians-inspired garage favorably shaded with early-Jawbreaker melodies.
Brainbows’ post-punk rumble and Snake’s fluid twang-jam served as capable openers as the audience, which eventually spilled out onto La Salamandra’s large patio, filled the room. It’s easy—and probably unavoidable—to wonder if the show might’ve been better in a different venue with stage lighting and a better sound system, but that actually misses the point.
Craig Powell—the Durham promoter who often books shows at his nearby house, The Layabout—took the mic between sets to remind the gathered crowd why they were here, and why he’d organized this gig. Dan Melchior Und Das Menace, the band in which Letha Melchior Rodman plays with her husband, played both Powell’s 29th and 30th birthday parties, he said. This was about returning the favor, he said: “It’s the least we can do for them."
Donate to Dan and Letha Melchior at melchiorfund.blogspot.com.
For more than a few years now, Hillsborough Street’s Schoolkids Records claimed the title of “only independent record store in Raleigh.” That’s no longer the case: In The Groove Records—a used-only record store that buys, sells and trades vintage vinyl, with plans to expand into new goods—has moved into the Carter Building, an art studio-dominated space just down from the intersection of Glenwood Avenue and Hillsborough Street. The store opened on January 18 and is owned by long-time Raleigh resident and artist Greg Rollins, who says he saw a niche for a used-only shop in the Triangle.
“Used LPs—there’s always going to be a need for that,” Rollins says. “There are hundreds and hundreds of millions of them out there.”
One of the inspirations for Rollins’ store, he says, was his father, who owned Treasure Chest Records, a beach music-centered shop that operated on Peace Street between 1979 and 1983. Rollins' own selection comes mainly from the classic rock canon. Last week, highlights included a first pressing of Miles Davis's Bitches Brew and Buckingham Nicks, the 1973 pre-Fleetwood Mac LP by Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks. Rollins eventually plans to diversify his stock, possibly breaking into turntables and stereo equipment, new vinyl and also used cassettes, of which he has a collection of more than 3,000.
Thursday, January 26, 2012
The circulating word is that the International Bluegrass Music Associations (IBMA) Awards are looking for a new home. A group of local bluegrass musicians and enthusiasts are, of course, trying to make that new home here in Raleigh. Indeed, a five-minute video produced by the Greater Raleigh Convention and Visitors Bureau recently landed on YouTube, appealing to IBMA on behalf of the state’s bluegrass traditions and the city’s entertainment assets. I sat down with Hank Smith, banjo player extraordinaire, last week to discuss this effort:
INDEPENDENT WEEKLY: Who came to you with the idea of bringing the IBMA to Raleigh?
HANK SMITH: We first heard about it from a videographer friend of ours who mentioned he interviewed bluegrass stars Jim Mills and Tony Williamson about IBMA moving to Raleigh. He approached us to interview because he wanted our perspective on the subject as younger members of IBMA with the thought that we could appeal to a younger market. Our role is the same as any other person interested in bringing IBMA to Raleigh. Hopefully, our perspective on the subject will help persuade the folks at IBMA to relocate to our fair city.
Our band, Kickin Grass, has been a member of IBMA for 10 years, and we have attended the conference eight times over the last decade both in Louisville and Nashville. We went last fall and showcased three times, attended seminars and jammed in the suites with industry folks. We love what IBMA does for bluegrass and the bluegrass music industry. As the industry and the music itself naturally evolve and change, so must we. We are harbingers of that change, along with all bluegrass musicians involved with IBMA. Bringing IBMA to the home state of such major bluegrass events like Merlefest, for example, seems natural.
Following a MySpace-sponsored reunion show more than three years ago and last year's Folds box set containing some unreleased material, Ben Folds Five is reuniting for its first album since 1999. You can check out Ben Folds' Twitter for updates on the story.
This information is all that was contained in something like a press release that Sony Music circulated yesterday, save for one unfortunate screen shot—of an Internet Explorer window, with a Tweet, containing a picture of the band in the studio. (C’mon, intern, right click, “Save as...”) Folds, bassist Robert Sledge and drummer Darren Jessee are set to record through March. Folds said via Twitter that he anticipates a spring release. Congrats, Five, on the laziest album announcement ever.
It's been an uneven few years for Folds, who sounds more and more like just another guy playing a piano. He recorded an album with author Nick Hornby (weird, but sort of cool) and released an LP of college a cappella groups covering his songs (ha!). Perhaps surrounding himself with a real band is just what he needs.
In any case, '90s band reunions couldn't be hotter right now (read: not cool, if you want), so they stand to make some solid bank. The album will be the band's fourth LP and their first since The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner.
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