Rachelle Garniez Plays a Hell of a Birthday Show at Barbes

Birthday concerts are usually good, whether you buy into the astrological theory that it’s the performer’s power day, or the simple logic that being surrounded by good friends and good cheer makes for lively entertainment. That was the case last night at Rachelle Garniez‘ show at Barbes. She’s not known as a guitarist, but she’s a good one: she started and ended her long, practically two-hour set playing six-string, snaking her way through a handful of nimble solos, hitting her bottom strings hard, oldschool blues style. She also played solos on piano, accordion and bells that were even more edgy and interesting. Lately she’s become a charter member of wild New Orleans/klezmer/reggae/jamband Hazmat Modine, so she brought along her guitarist bandmate Michael Gomez as well as her longtime bassist Dave Hofstra. Her duo shows at Barbes with Hofstra can be pretty hilarious, with as much surreal storytelling and free-association as music. With Gomez fleshing out the sound, this show gave her the chance to do as much playing as singing and flex her instrumental chops.

She did Luckyday (title track to her classic 2003 album) on piano, giving it a resonant Debussy-meets-Steely Dan gleam, along with a moody, expansively minimalist soul/gospel take of God’s Little Acre, cruelly exploring the dilemma of whether or not to reconnect with someone from the distant, distant past on Facebook. Playing accordion, she indulged a couple in the crowd with a sweet, torchy take of Broken Nose, from her first album, and later encored with Silly Me (from her 1999 Crazy Blood album), playing up its warm latin sway rather than the wary ambiguity of the lyrics. The jaunty Pre-Post Apocalypse had a narrator “maxin’ and relaxin’ on this morphine drip” while the water and the thermometer kept rising, while Jean-Claude Van Damme, which may or may not be a tribute to the action film personality (actor might be a stretch) and antidepressant pitchman, was a showcase for Garniez to air out her immense range with some joyous (or semi-joyous) operatics.

A couple of times she dropped the double entendres and the jokes and went straight for the jugular, which makes sense considering her teenage roots in punk rock. People Like You had less of its usual sarcastic, tongue-in-cheek bounce than raw uncut hostility, Garniez lashing out at the type of New York newbie who’s always looking over your shoulder to see if he/she should be talking to someone more popular. And After the Afterparty, as Garniez explained, took its inspiration from a high school classmate who went on from spending his wee hours at Danceteria to become some alternative kind of sex therapist (Garniez wasn’t clear on this, and maybe he isn’t either). Her sotto vocce “I can’t remember a thing, Captain” refrain is a Star Trek reference, a line that this time out made for a fleeting respite from the song’s terse, sullen, wounded beauty. Garniez will be back at Barbes on April 4, which is usually where she plays when she’s not recording with Jack White, playing with Hazmat Modine, or serving as the music director of the Citizens Band, among other projects.

An Auspicious Kickoff to Daphne Lee Martin’s Late Winter Tour

Midway through a rather ominous minor-key reggae song, Daphne Lee Martin’s keyboardist played most of a verse from Besame Mucho, using a glockenspiel setting to max out the menace. That was one of the high points of her show last night at the Way Station in Fort Greene, the unlikely setting for the first stop on her current tour which winds its way down to South by Southwest. Once word of her new album Moxie gets out, it’s not likely she’ll be playing places like the Way Station. She and her fantastic band Raise the Rent did most of that album, in sequence, with an exuberant expertise to match its eclectic style. Martin’s down-to-earth, uncluttered but finely nuanced alto voice might remind you of June Christy or Erica Smith, which makes sense since she and Smith were bandmates around the turn of the past century.

Martin and her five-piece band opened with Sweet & Low Down, a pulsing noir blues fueled by creepy funeral organ and then a fiery Strat solo from the lead guitarist that exploded in a frenzy of tremolo-picking as he went up the scale. The minor-key noir mood lingered through their second number, Whiskey & Sin, a luridly grim waltz, sort of a House of the Setting Sun: some girl in the crowd let out a scream timed perfectly to the end of the first verse as it reached a peak. Belly, a strutting vintage 70s-style soul groove, first fueled by echoey Rhodes piano and then woozily hilarious Dr. Dre-style synth, was next. Martin and band picked up the pace from there with the uneasily swinging House That Built Itself, lit up by some more bitingly bluesy lead guitar, then went scampering through Molotov with a torchy gypsy jazz-inflected intensity. Most of the night, Martin’s vocals were too low in the mix to reveal the level of detail that she typically brings to a song, but this one was a showcase for some unselfconsciously spine-tingling blue notes and melismas.

The next number, a duet with the keyboardist, had a planitive flamenco-rock feel, like the skeleton frame of an early Firewater song; then the bass and drums agilely transformed it into roots reggae in a split second. New London, Connecticut, where Martin and band have made their home for the last few years, has had a fertile music scene since the recently, tragically reduced Reducers first came up in the 80s: it’s good to see such a fantastic band representing that city on the road.

Kelli Rae Powell: Surreal and Intense and Funny As Hell at the Jalopy

Kelli Rae Powell is a woman of many voices: there’s literally nothing that she can’t sing. Last night at the Jalopy she was a gospel mama, an unstoppable bon vivant, a slink, a vamp and from time to time, a wayfaring stranger traveling through this world completely alone. This was the album release show for her new one Live at Jalopy, recorded here almost a year ago in front of a packed house. That show was a lot of fun (you can read about it here) and this one was even more so. Sleep-deprived (she’s a new mom) and laughing at her own jokes, she settled quickly into surreal storyteller mode as she voiced a million different personalities, switched between ukulele and guitar and held the crowd in the palm of her hand, backed by her husband Jim McNamara on bass and M Shanghai String Band’s Shaky Dave Pollack on harmonica.

She nonchalantly brought the intensity to redline immediately with a new song dedicated to her daughter Donna Lillian, channeling a rapt gospel intensity over McNamara’s darkly rich bowed basslines. Powell is the inventor of the drinkaby – a lullaby and drinking song – and she did a couple of her best ones. Sweet Dorina – the drinkaby to end all drinkabies – gave off a blissed-out early evening buzz, dedicated to a longtime Jalopy bartendress. Pollack hung close to the lyrics, sometimes adding an extra layer of blues-infused poignancy but just as often having fun with them. As usual, he and Powell had a lot of unspoken banter going on, to the point where she asked him for a couple of extra trainwhistle intros for Midnight Sleeper Train, a dissociative passenger’s reverie with a dark undercurrent – we never know where she’s going, or why, only that she’s finished with the person she’s dreaming about. McNamara did three jobs simultaneously: anchoring the lows, holding the rhythm and coloring the songs with snaking lead lines and made it look easy.

Some of the songs were sweet – Summertime, a deliriously happy account of an unexpected romantic reprieve, and Grace, a pensive reflection on a family member now gone off to where she can drink rum and Coke and smoke all the Camels she wants. Powell put down her uke and raised the roof on Cowboy, wry and irrepressible over a sultry bass-and-harmonica groove. She duetted jauntily with Matthew Brookshire on a twistedly funny, Pogues-ish Irish ballad about a total communication mixup with potentially disastrous results. The trio closed with a defiantly resolute cover by Terry Radigan (who produced the new album) and encored with one of Powell’s best songs, the band-on-the-road narrative Don’t Slow Down, Zachary, playing up the laughs and the lust in the lyrics rather than its hauntedly understated desire to escape and never return. All of these songs and more are on the live record which was great fun to experience as it was being made and which you will hear more about here later.

The 50 Best Albums of 2012

About five years ago, people were saying that the album was a thing of the past. How wrong that turned out to be! This year’s crop of albums was so absurdly good that it felt criminal to whittle it down to a hundred, let alone fifty. And the only way of getting it down to that number was to cut out all the “world music,” including reggae and Afrobeat and most of the gypsy sounds, because there was so much of that and it was all so good.

Bookmark this page and return often. Virtually all of these albums are streaming (click the links) or are available as free downloads: consider this your place to discover some amazing sounds that were too smart for the Bushwick and Wicker Park blogs, and too dangerous for corporate radio and tv.

1.  Ulrich Ziegler – their debut album
Dating back to the 90s,  guitarist Stephen Ulrich has been New York’s most distinguished noir composer. When he wasn’t writing film and tv music, he was leading the ferociously creepy instrumental trio Big Lazy. When that band broke up (the drummer left to join Gogol Bordello), Ulrich eventually teamed up with Itamar Ziegler from Pink Noise, and then released this haunting, reverb-drenched, surf/skronk/jazz/soundscape masterpiece. Stream it

2.  Chicha Libre – Canibalismo
Chicha Libre’s 2008 debut album Sonido Amazonico landed in the top ten and this one is arguably even better, a trippy, wickedly dub-influenced mix of Peruvian surf rock, slinky Andean and latin grooves, and surrealistic psychedelic rock. There is no more fun, or more danceable, band in New York than Chicha Libre. Band info and audio/video

3.  Raya Brass Band – Dancing on Roses, Dancing on Cinders
This fiery Brooklyn crew distinguish themselves from the hundreds of other excellent Balkan brass units by virtue of their long, scorching jams: nobody does that better. Stream it

4.  Botanica – What Do You Believe In
This era’s pre-eminent art-rock band’s most brooding, haunted album, a rich blend of gypsy-tinged melody, raw, roaring guitar, edgy piano and spooky organ. Stream it

5.  The Universal Thump – their full-length debut
The final and concluding installment of the most massive, richly orchestrated album on this list, a lushly symphonic double-cd mix of chamber pop, art-rock, psychedelia and quirky, theatrical indie pop. Stream it

6.  Rachelle Garniez – Sad Dead Alive Happy
The iconic, eclectic accordionist/chanteuse – who has sort of become the Dorothy Parker of underground rock – took a deep dive into soul and gospel sounds, with richly soaring results. Stream it

7.  The Japonize Elephants – Melodie Fantastique
One of the original gypsy bands, this enormous, theatrical circus rock crew took their game to the next level with this one. Stream it

8.  Lianne Smith – Two Sides of a River
An iconic presence in the New York Americana and rock scene since the late 90s, Smith’s debut album was legendary before it was finally released – and it’s as eclectic, psychedelic, haunting and funny as anything else on this list. And her amazing voice is better than ever. Stream it 

9.  Bobtown – Trouble I Wrought
Nobody writes more cleverly creepy acoustic Nashville gothic and bluegrass than Bobtown. With four first-rate songwriters, their sound is as diverse as it is dark. Stream it

10.  Jan Bell – Dream of the Miner’s Child
One of the great voices in Americana music, Bell made this into a concept album that linked British folk with the American country and bluegrass sounds that grew out of it  with a vivid sense of history and a tantalizing mix of classics and originals that sound like Appalachian standards. Stream it/free downloads

11. M Shanghai String Band – Two Thousand Pennies
The mighty eleven-piece Brooklyn acoustic Americana crew’s most lush, haunting, diverse and ultimately best album, ranging from gypsy and chamber pop to brooding Appalachian ballads and the rousing singalong songs they’re best known for. Stream it

12.. Love Camp 7 – Love Camp VII
An expertly wry, tuneful, catchy janglerock concept album looking at recent history through the prism of the Beatles, with a jaundiced eye and expertly labyrinthine polyrhythms. Given up for dead after the tragic loss of brilliant drummer Dave Campbell, the band has recently regrouped and is as playful and fun as ever. Stream it

13. Hannah vs. the Many – All Our Heroes Drank Here
Ferociously literate, white knuckle intense female-fronted punk and powerpop, with some noir cabaret and Jarvis Cocker-style art-rock thrown in for good measure. Stream it

14. The Larch– Days to the West
The follow-up to their 2010 masterpiece Larix Americana finds the Brooklyn retro new wavers sounding more psychedelic and more savagely lyrical than ever. Stream it

15. Lorraine Leckie and Anthony Haden-Guest – Rudely Interrupted
A blackly amusing, gorgeously orchestrated chamber-pop collaboration between the caustic social critic and the Canadian gothic rock siren.  Band info and a/v

16. Black Fortress of Opium – Stratospherical
Lush, roaring, darkly psychedelic Middle Eastern-tinged art-rock from this powerful, female-fronted Boston band. Stream it

17. Matt Keating – Wrong Way Home
The respected Americana rocker’s best single-disc album, a brooding, offhandedly menacing blend of classic soul, country and elegant chamber pop. Stream it

18. Alec K. Redfearn and the Eyesores  – Sister Death
Not to have this album in the #1 spot is pretty absurd: the Rhode Island band’s swirling, psychedelic, gypsy-tinged art-rock masterpiece is the most downright macabre collection on this list. Stream it

19.. The Sometime Boys – Ice & Blood
The second album from cabaret siren Sarah Mucho and art-rocker Kurt Leege’s sharply lyrical acoustic Americana project finds them funkier, more lush and more intense than ever. Stream it

20. Animation – Transparent Heart
As historically important as it is richly arrranged, saxophonist Bob Belden’s collection of cinematic instrumental themes traces the decline of New York over the past couple of decades, centered around 9/11 and the fascism that ensued. Band info and a/v

21. Tift Merritt – Traveling Alone
Marc Ribot’s guitar is amazing beyond belief, and Merrritt’s pensive Americana songs and nuanced vocals are as vivid as always.  Band info and a/v

22. Out of Order – Hey Pussycat
The loudest album on this list is by this assaultive all-female Long Island noiserock/punk trio, raw but richly produced by John Sharples. Stream it

23. Changing Modes – In Flight
With three keyboards and edgy lead guitar, these women and guys play biting, lyrical art-rock and new wave-influenced sounds. Stream it

24. Chris Erikson & the Wayward Puritans – Lost Track of the Time
Erikson has been one of the great guitarists in Americana for years, in other peoples’ bands. This is his long-overdue debut as a leader, a careening, gorgeously twangy mix of Americana, paisley underground psychedelia and riff-rock. Stream it

25. Marissa Nadler – The Sister
The Nashville gothic/noir cabaret chanteuse/songwriter’s most haunting and atmospheric album since her debut, a darkly nebulous, allusive gem. Stream it/free downloads

26. Spanking Charlene – Where Are the Freaks
Female-fronted Americana punk band with  powerful, intense lead vocals, hooks that run the gamut from the Stooges to X and a potently snide, sarcastic, spot-on worldview. Stream it

27. Frankenpine – In That Black Sky
Creepy original bluegrass, Appalachian ballads and elegantly dark acoustic sounds from this diverse Brooklyn band. Stream it/free dowloads

28. Choban Elektrik – their debut album
A side project by members of Zappa cover band Project/Object, they take classic Balkan and gypsy themes and make trippy psychedelic rock out of them. Stream it

29. Slavic Soul Party – New York Underground Tapes
The wildly popular Brooklyn Balkan brass band at the top of their funky, surprisingly eclectic, intensely danceable game. Stream it

30. Saint Maybe – Things As They Are
A throwback to the paisley underground bands of the 80s like True West and the Dream Syndicate, this project by a Patti Smith guitarist and Bob Dylan’s drummer mixes surreal, apocalyptic imagery and raw, surreal, psychedelic Americana rock. Stream it 

31. Mike Rimbaud – Can’t Judge a Song By Its Cover
The New York underground rocker – who also put out an excellent album of originals last year, and constantly releases video singles – puts his indelibly New York spin on politically charged classics by Phil Ochs, Dylan, the Stones and others. Stream it

32. When the Broken Bow – We, the Dangerous Weapons
A surreal, fearlessly political, apocalyptic concept album by this Oregon band  that runs the gamut from soul-pop to careening art-rock to goth and gypsy sounds. Stream it

33. Tim Foljahn – Songs for an Age of Extinction
Grimly lyrical, pensively psychedelic noir chamber pop and Americana-influenced songwriting. Stream it

34. Demolition String Band – Gracious Days
The well-loved New York Americana/bluegrass/rock twanglers’ best electric album, an intoxicating blend of guitars, mandolins, banjo and Elena Skye’s velvet vocals. Stream it

35. The Brixton Riot – Palace Amusements
Sort of the missing link between the Jam and Guided by Voices, this New Jersey band blast their way through a series of hard-hitting, swirling, lyrically biting three-minute songs. Stream it

36. L’il Mo & the  Monicats – Whole Lotta Lovin
Americana chanteuse Monica Passin’s most intimate and eclectic album to date, with soaring harmonies from fellow Americana siren Drina Seay. Song samples

37. Leigh Marble – Where the Knives Meet Between the Rows
Brooding, bitterly lyrical songwriting with a mix of hypnotically psychedelic and Americana-flavored tunes from the Portland, Oregon bandleader. Stream it

38. Eilen Jewell – Queen of the Minor Key
Truth in advertising – Jewel excels at noir Americana, ghoulabilly, garage rock and oldschool psychedelic sounds. Band info and a/v

39. Mucca Pazza – Safety Fifth
A characteristically high-voltage mix of short but sonically titanic gypsy punk and gypsy rock songs from the brass-heavy Chicago dance orchestra. Stream it

40. Chicago Stone Lightning Band – their debut album
With a raw, guitar-fueled edge, their twin-Gibson assault covers classic 60s style Chicago blues, riff-driven stoner rock, original soul and funk. Stream it

41. Emily Jane White – Ode to Sentience
Intense, broodingly lyrical, intricately orchestrated Nashville gothic and art-rock sounds. Band info and a/v 

42. My Education – A Drink for All My Friends
The Austin postrock/instrumental band have never sounded more lush or guitarishly intense on this mix of desert rock and cinematic themes. Stream it

43. Tom Shaner – Ghost Songs, Waltzes and Rock n Roll
That such a great album would be this low on the list attests to how amazing this past year was for music. The former Industrial Tepee frontman has never written more richly or lyrically than he does on this southwestern gothic gem. Band info and video

44. Jon DeRosa – A Wolf in Preacher’s Clothes
The Brooklyn crooner comes across as sort of a cross between Jarvis Cocker and Leonard Cohen, with a mix of lush chamber pop, Americana and 80s-influenced gothic art-rock. Band info and a/v

45. The Sweetback Sisters – Lookin’ for a Fight
This amazing two-frontwoman honkytonk band not in the top ten? How can that be possible? Take a look at the rest of the list. Stream it

46. Band of Outsiders – Sound Beach Quartet
The 80s psychedelic punk legends are still going strong, with a richly jangly, snaky new ep that evokes Television as well as the Jesus & Mary Chain, both groups whose careers they’ve now eclipsed. Stream it 

47. Mighty High – Legalize Tre Bags
The funniest album of the year blends roaring Motorhead-style biker rock with woozy stoner riffage and some of the best weed jokes ever put on vinyl. Stream it

48. The Weal and Woe – The One to Blame
Gorgeously harmony-driven oldschool honkytonk and 1950s style proto-rockabilly sounds from this wonderfully retro Brooklyn band. Stream it

49. Guided by Voices – The Bears for Lunch
Agelessly energetic, prolific indie surrealist Robert Pollard hasn’t lost a thing: this is the third and best release in the band’s incredibly productive 2012, not including Pollard’s own solo releases. Band info and a/v

50. Ian Hunter – When I’m President
Last but hardly least on this list, another ageless rocker from an even earlier era put out an album that could be the great lost Stones classic from 30 years ago. Band info/free downloads 

Another Creepy Winner from Bobtown

Among oldtime Americana bands, no one has better original songs than Bobtown. That’s probably because the band has four first-rate songwriters. Between them, percussionist/keyboardist Katherine Etzel, singer Jen McDearman, guitarist Karen Dahlstrom and bassist Fred Stesney blend their voices and instruments in a dark mix of bluegrass, country blues, gospel and other rustic Americana styles alongside new band member and brilliant guitarist/banjoist Alan Lee Backer. Their new album Trouble I Wrought also features cameos by drummers Dave Ciolino-Volano and Charlie Shaw and pedal steel player Mike Nolan along with M Shanghai String Band’s Philippa Thompson’s stark violin, and Dock Oscar Stern’s wry jawharp on one song. The new record expands on the eclectically haunting sound of their brilliant 2010 debut: this time out, they’re a little less stark, a little more lush but just as grim, fixated on death and despair. Consider this stuff antique folk songs for a new century.

On this album, Etzel is the main songwriter. Bobtown’s first album has a number of her songs written in the style of 19th century chain gang chants, and this album opens with one, Mama’s Got the Backbeat – which with different production, could be trip-hop, or gospel-flavored hip-hop. But that’s hardly the only style she works here. Skipping Stone is part banjo-fueled gospel bluegrass, part oldtime hokum blues with jaunty Roulette Sisters-style harmonies: “Today’s precious lover is tomorrow’s tasty bourguignon,” mmmm…

Etzel’s most lavish song here is Burn Your Building Down, a sepulchral grand guignol anthem with swirly violin, banjo and harmonies, building to a towering angst in the same vein as Vespertina. By contrast, her title track clocks in at barely two minutes, its rage semi-concealed in a soaring gospel arrangement over an organ drone. Resurrection Mary is a cheery, harmony-fueled Boswell Sisters-style swing tune…about a murder and a ghost. And Coalville, the lurid tale of a doomed couple now sharing a graveyard, reaches for a plush Nashville gothic ambience.

McDearman seems to specialize in sarcastically cheery, upbeat bluegrass songs. One Public Enemy would have been a perfect fit on one of Dolly Parton’s bluegrass albums (hey Dolly, there’s still time…). And McDearman maxes out the suspense factor in the otherwise very pretty Magilla Lee, as the listener grows closer and closer to finding out what happened as the poor girl waited to die. Dahlstrom contributes only one song here, Battle Creek, but it’s the best one on the album. With her searing gospel wail rising over an ominous minor-key backdrop, she paints a cruel portrait of a farm girl slowly losing it in early Rust Belt-era Michigan. Dahlstrom is no stranger to historically-informed songwriting: her Idaho-themed solo album, Gem State, was one of last year’s most intense releases in any style of music.

Not everything is so overtly bleak. Stesney’s two songs here each work a blackly humorous vein: Live Slow Die Old, which comes across as a mashup of Smog, Flugente and the Mountain Goats, and the irresistibly funny faux-gospel Flood Water Rising, possibly the only country gospel song to namecheck both L. Ron Hubbard and Herbert Hoover. There’s also a deadpan cover of Don’t Fear the Reaper, done as tersely creepy Nashville gothic, Backer’s banjo carrying the hook under the womens’ angelic harmonies, a terse banjo/accordion interlude in place of Buck Dharma’s shredding guitar solo. Like Bobtown’s previous album, this is one of the best of the year. The band’s next gig is Sept 21 at 9 PM on an excellent bill with eclectic alt-country siren Alana Amram & the Rough Gems at Union Hall for $10.

More Good Oldtime Songs from Tumbling Bones

The proliferation of new oldtime string bands has grown almost to the point of overkill. Is this a bad thing? Not if they sound like Tumbling Bones. The quartet of banjoist Jake Hoffman, fiddler Sam McDougle, guitarist Peter Winne and bassist Steve Roy are based in Brooklyn: they take the kind of stuff that was coming out of Memphis circa 1930 and do it nonchalantly and soulfully, 2012 style. Much as most of the tracks here are covers, this band isn’t trying to reinvent the wheel, or copy and paste something that’s already been done to death.

Their latest album Schemes is a potent reminder of how much cross-pollination there was between country and blues back in the day, despite the obstacles against it. Forget for a second that there was no internet: throughout the Bible Belt, there were an awful lot of places where, if you were black, it could be a lethal mistake to associate with whites. But musicians have always been ahead of the curve. That’s not to say that there weren’t racist white musicians, but that the cool ones were playing black music, and vice versa: proof that good music will bust through any divide-and-conquer scheme, every time.

The album kicks off with Prison Wall Blues, inspired by a 1930 Cannon’s Jug Stompers recording, done as a steady backbeat banjo tune with a hot jazz bounce, a hillbilly melody, high lonesome harmonies and gospel allusions everywhere. “I once was lost but now I’m found,” goes one line, but it’s obvious that getting over life in the slammer was as tough then as it is now. Where the Palm Trees Grow, by Winne, is a plaintive update on a Stanley Brothers-style sad waltz, with soaring harmony vocals from Kristin Andreassen. McDougle’s Five Points is next, a catchy, countryfied Irish reel. Chris Connors joins the choir on an a-cappella version of the old spiritual Trouble Around My Soul: grounded in rich, low harmonies, it blows away anything you might have heard on the O Brother Where You Bound soundtrack.

Their take on the traditional ballad Moonshiner draws on the Dylan version, but with more of a wink and a grin: the drunk in this tale isn’t about to give up just yet. McDougle’s aching, overtone-drenched violin solo is one of the album’s high points. The album winds up with an unexpectedly and impressively majestic version of Viola Lee Blues with slide guitar, harmonica and Roy’s growling bass way up in the mix. There’s also a brief fragment of a song that fades up and then out in about thirty seconds, which is a good thing because it sounds like it was recorded on somebody’s old phone: all that treble will have you reaching for the mute button. Fans of vintage Americana will eat this stuff up: the whole thing is streaming at their Bandcamp site. The band is currently on European tour; their next New York gig is on Sept 25 at Dinosaur Barbecue, 700 W 125th St. at 12th Ave.

The 2 Man Gentlemen Band’s Sly, Edgy New Album Is Their Best

Today we stagger from songs about smoking pot to songs about getting drunk – hey, it’s been a long week, and this blog has been fixated on a lot of sad and depressing stuff lately. The 2 Man Gentlemen Band’s new album Two At a Time - streaming at the band’s Bandcamp site - is anything but sad and depressing. Who is the audience for this? Probably the same kind of people who built the oldtimey duo’s fan base as they ascended from the dives of New York to larger venues, a more impressive feat than it may seem considering that what tenor guitarist Andy Bean and bassist Fuller Condon (is that a great name or what? Just think about it for a second) play is pretty quiet music. That’s not to say that it’s mellow, not by a long shot, but they also don’t come blasting at you through Marshall stacks. Their shtick has been the same since the git-go: funny lyrics and an oldtimey sound that moves from country, to blues, to swing and all points in between. If music had ended in 1935, these guys would probably be fine with that. Bean has never played more expertly and soulfully (he really nails that magic sound that grew out of country musicians trying their hand at jazz) ; Condon stays on task, keeping the groove deep in the pocket. These two gentlemen will be playing the album release show on June 13 at 9 at Joe’s Pub and as of today, $12 advance tickets are still available.

It’s a lot edgier, sometimes mean-spirited, than anything they’ve done before, which makes it their funniest and best album. It’s Depression-era music with a sarcastic undercurrent that fits this era’s depression to a T. They open it with a swinging, shuffling cover of the old blues standard Pork Chops, with a nice biting jazz guitar solo straight out of the Wes Montgomery playbook and a tasty break for bass. Please Don’t Water It Down is based in experience: “Sneaking weak-ass beverages might have worked at Applebee’s,” but this guy wants something sweet and fruity. Panama City Beach is a most likely sarcastic tribute to the nastiest of the Florida spring break fratboy hellholes, while Pool Party has the same kind of snide undercurrent. They follow that with Shut That Gate, a post-WWII style country song that’s sort of a cross between San Antonio Rose and Blue Moon of Kentucky.

There’s also the self-explanatory jump blues Let’s Get Happy Together along with a couple of sly hokum numbers, the innuendo-packed shuffle Cheese and Crackers and the considerably darker Two Star Motel. In between is Poolside, a steady walking Hawaiian-tinged swing instrumental. Tikka Masala winkingly chronicles a visit to the taxi driver hangout with the cute girl behind the counter, while the album’s best track, Prescription Drugs is just plain hilarious: it’s Mother’s Little Helper for the Oxycontin age. It only makes sense that they’d follow that one with the title track, a singalong drinking song. There’s also a “secret” track, The Gentlemen’s Blue Drag, which is surprisingly moody: the point might be that these guys are a lot deeper than all those jokey songs might make you think. The production is so fat that you don’t realize that it’s just guitar, bass and vocals unless you think about it. Raise your glass and sing along.

Fun Oldtime Pre-Rock Sounds from Woody Pines

It’s been pretty harrowing and intense around here lately, so today it’s time for fun. How about some upbeat, oldtime Americana swing? That’s what Woody Pines does. He got his start in Oregon (with a name like that, figures, huh?) around the turn of the century with the popular jugband the Kitchen Syncopators. Since then he’s led his own band; he’s got a new ep, You Gotta Roll which seems like something fresh for the merch table when he’s on the road (which seems to be pretty much all the time – that’s the new paradigm in music these days). And he’ll probably move a bunch of them: it’s a good party mix.

Like Susquehanna Industrial Tool & Die Co., Woody Pines mines the late 40s/early 50s pre-rock era when all the country guys were getting into jazz. His not so secret weapon is eclectic lead guitarist Lyon Graulty, who also turns in a nifty clarinet solo on the jaunty proto-rockabilly tune Long Gone Lost John. Zack Pozebanchuck’s standup bass and Mike Gray’s simple, straight-up drumming keep a steady swing beat. The songs are a diverse mix of styles: Dock Boggs’ Red Rockin Chair gets a lickety-split but brooding remake with eerie chromatic harp and a deliciously murky dobro solo. Leadbelly’s Ham & Eggs plays up the absolutely surreal, bizarre lyric; Hank Williams’ Can’t Keep You Off My Mind gets a casually swaying treatment with just a little swampiness. They wrap things up with a briskly fingerpicked take of the country blues Treat You Right. Pines’ vocals are unaffected and laid-back – he makes his way through this stuff without sounding like a caricature, which isn’t easy to pull off. The whole thing is streaming at Bandcamp; if retro is your thing, he’s worth getting to know.

The Sometime Boys Strike Again

The Sometime Boys started out as an infrequent acoustic side project from guitarist Kurt Leege and singer Sarah Mucho of art-rockers System Noise. When their main band went on hiatus, the Sometime Boys became their main focus: a year or so later, they’re suddenly one of New York’s best bands. Their debut album, Any Day Now was one of 2011′s best, and their gentle but intense and unselfconsciously beautiful new one Ice and Blood is a strong contender for best of 2012. It’s a mix of brisk bluegrass vamps, soulful acoustic funk, spiky blues, gospel, straight-up rock and a couple of classic covers that they completely reinvent. This time out the core of Leege and Mucho is abetted by Pete O’Connell on bass, Rebecca Weiner Tompkins on violin, Jay Cowitt on drums and Erik James on piano, accordion and keyboards. While the instrumentation tends to be rustic and the melodies steeped in traditional Americana, their sound is unique and eclectic to the extreme, with elements of 70s jamrock and funk intermingled with swing jazz, ragtime and oldtime country music.

The album begins with Winter Solstice and ends with its summery counterpart. The first holds out hope on the year’s darkest day, Mucho musing about “what fun we missed when leaves were left unturned” against jaunty ragtime piano and insistent violin. The second is a crescendoing, optimistic showcase for Mucho at her most soaring and spine-tingling, packed with neat polyrhythms, a slinky bass groove and a warmly Jerry Garcia-esque guitar solo that slowly and hypnotically winds out. They take Eden, an older song by Noxes Pond, the predecessor band to System Noise and jazz it up with dreamy Rhodes piano, Mucho at her most nuanced. “”I have no need for miracles, just ice and blood and all that’s real, I’ll heal myself,” she asserts with a quiet intensity. She sings of an icy clarity, but her voice is the furthest thing from icy: a star in the cabaret world, where she’s won multiple MAC awards (the cabaret equivalent of a Grammy), she’s one of New York’s most gripping vocalists in any style of music. She blends a raw torchiness with a commanding jazz sophistication on a syncopated piano swing version of Brother Can You Spare a Dime, bringing the anthem alive for a new generation of the down-and-out. By contrast, she transforms the Beatles’ Mother Nature’s Son into a wary gospel number over Cowitt’s perfect Ringo evocation.

Unsurprisingly, the best songs here are originals. The absolutely gorgeous organ-driven anthem Drop by Drop might be the single best song of the year so far: it’s a sad, elegaic country waltz that builds to an angst-fueled grandeur. Slowly, its forlorn narrator comes to grips with the fact that the person “who’s supposed to love me most” is turning into a ghost before her eyes, underscored by Leege’s tersely biting, bittersweet acoustic guitar.  The Good People of Brooklyn, with its ragtime piano and stark violin, pensively yet ecstatically pays tribute to Mucho’s adopted “city of trees,” an unselfconsciously heartwarming message of hope for the 99% struggling through “another day, another turning of the screw.” Igloo, a broodingly atmospheric mix of fingerpicked guitar and accordion, builds a haunting ambience that could be the apocalypse, or just a portrait of clinical depression, where someone can “Curl under this blanket/It’s peaceful in our early graves.” There are also a couple of duets, one a folk-pop tune, the other an acoustic goth rock song, and also a bouncily shuffling pop song that sounds like Rumours-era Fleetwood Mac. The whole album is streaming at Soundcloud; the Sometime Boys play the album release show for this one on May 31 at 9 PM at the Parkside.

Intriguing Vintage Sounds from Mary Lorson & the Soubrettes

Pianist/chanteuse Mary Lorson has a new album, Burn Baby Burn, with her band the Soubrettes. It’s an unassumingly charming, deceptively upbeat, pensively lyrical blend of oldtime-flavored Americana, sultry torch songs and jaunty purist pop. Lorson first rose to prominence back in the 90s as the frontwoman of Madder Rose, whose raw, moody blend of trip-hop and downtempo with rock instrumentation made them a cooler alternative to bands like Tortoise. She was a decent singer in that band, and later in Saint Low; she’s an extraordinary one now. Her voice is clear, unadorned, usually gentle and matter-of-fact, a quietly powerful vehicle for her allusively brooding songs, which reveal themselves slowly, with repeated listening: don’t go into this expecting to be able to make sense of it the first time through. On this album Lorson plays piano and guitar alongside banjoist/guitarist Leah Houghtaling and bassist Amelia Sauter, with contributions from Michael Stark on piano, Joe Novelli on lapsteel and AJ Strauss on horn on a couple of tracks.

The opening track, Busboy, sets the stage for what’s to come, Stark’s hypnotically pointillistic piano mingling with the banjo for a bell-like backdrop that mutes the grimly surreal, apocalyptic lyrics, delivered by Lorson with a deadpan coyness. That contrast between starry melody and bitter resignation recurs a little later on with Only One Number Two and its offhand Satie allusions. The album’s second track, Mancub, puts an oldtimey spin on an indie rock tune, with a blithe “bump bump badump bump” chorus over Kathy Ziegler’s swirling organ and a lyric about a guy who may not realize just how bizarre his life was on his way up. The lush, soul-infused ballad Lately wouldn’t be out of place in the Aimee Mann songbook; Houghtaling does a memorable job mimicking a violin’s pizzicato with her muted touch on the banjo.

The rustic, swirly nocturne River, with its lush blend of acoustic guitar, banjo, bass and organ downplays Lorson’s downcast vibe, while the catchy, matter-of-fact pop tune Bubble of Pretend evokes Greta Gertler in an especially theatrical moment. The hypnotic title track, its resonant lapsteel contrasting with boomy bass, creates a bucolically atmospheric milieu that reminds of Hem. By contrast, the upbeat country song Crystal Ball nicks a Jenifer Jackson lick: “Are you looking at me, I’m the only one in here,” Lorson asks enigmatically.

These Police, a ballad contrasting upper-register piano with Lorson’s finely nuanced, torchily wounded vocals, looks at the consequences of exhausting yourself to please others who probably couldn’t care less. The inscrutably seductive, pulsing, cabaret-flavored Let ‘Em Eat Little Debbie Cakes asserts that “Marie Antoinette never made that crack about the poor and their petits fours for breakfast.” The album winds up with its only cover song, I Don’t Care, brassy tune punctuated by big ghostly flurries of guitar, brass and backing vocals. This was the signature song for Eva Tanguay, proto-flapper feminist, vaudeville star and contemporary of Sophie Tucker and Mae West. But rather than channeling the lyrics’ impunity, Lorson delivers it wistfully, as if she really does care and has taken a beating for that. It’s an apt way to close this thoughtful and thought-provoking album.