Second Slam's twisted glory
Twang usher in the alt-porch-gunzo folk and hope
people can stand it
by John O'Neill
Even though it had become a familiar sight -- these
four guys and their instruments crammed into the neon-lit
corner of Vincent's barroom -- the scene still had a
deep, somewhat unsettling oddness about it. Four
middle-aged men -- mostly acoustic musicians, hunched
over and facing each other like they were circled against
the younger set's potential hostility -- were lost in a
full-fledged hootenanny, as if they were the only ones
around. There was minimal eye contact with the crowd,
some self-deprecating banter between numbers, then yet
another pre-war,
straight-from-the-back-porch-of-God-knows-where tune.
Running on the power of banjo, fiddle, nasal vocals, a
one-stringed bass/washtub, some pedal steel, and a little
electric guitar, Twang careened across America's musical
landscape. Old-time, honkey-tonk, tin-pan, half-baked
early country, lesser-baked rock and roll, and
lunatic-fringe lyricism were coughed up to social
hipsters whose ideas of "old time" were playing Johnny
Cash's "Ring of Fire" on the jukebox between sets.But the
best part was watching Twang as they sank deeper under
the music's spell. It was as though they played more for
each other than for the room -- which, except for a
handful of brave souls opening their minds to the musical
journey, appeared mentally taxed. No braying strains of
Morrissey to set the background for their Saturday night.
One man's folk revelation is another's dumb-ass hillbilly
noise. Either way, Twang were just happy to be playing
for the hat.
"We got kicked out of Vincent's. We were too mellow.
And too loud. It was a small but vocal minority that
didn't dig our stuff," says banjo plucker and vocalist
Jim Reidy with a laugh. But he also knows traditional
folk venues probably won't cut it either. "The
coffeehouse thing is booked in advance and kind of
snooty. We did the coffeehouse thing at Passim [in
Cambridge] and spent our [free] time at the
bar down the street. It was like, `Oh, we gotta go back
and play.' We need to find a new bar to play!"
It's been a long, rather unfriendly road to oblivion
for Reidy and his bandmates Chip Smith and Paul Strother,
all of whom started playing together nearly 20 years ago
with the Chicken Chokers. A '20s string band with modern
influences, Chicken Chokers recorded two albums for
Cambridge's Americana indie giant Rounder Records, toured
with a young Allison Krauss, signed a contract for three
more albums, then faded as soon as fiddler Chad Crumm
split for New York. ("We still get a bill from Rounder
every year for storing our unsold albums," says Reidy of
the label experience).
Next came the more traditional fiddle band, the
Primitive Characters, who, though an excellent
old-fashioned outfit, fell apart as Reidy, Strother, and
Smith again felt compelled to return to less-restrictive
song structure. And so, with the addition of bassist
Robbie Phillips (who also plays with the legendary Spider
John Koerner and did a stint with the less-legendary G.
Love and Special Sauce), and with everyone else trading
instruments, the non-traditional Twang were born. Though
they still play country and rags in their sets, their
writing took a serious bend to the left, now captured in
all its twisted glory on the band's excellent disc Second
Slam.
"Paul's lyrics, they're kinda twisted. The second song
["My Love is Like a Tyre"] is about the carbon
cycle and how it relates to his love," explains Reidy.
"From ancient plants to the vulcanization of tires. It's
pretty scientific. He's a paliobotonist to be precise,
but he still [writes] kinda hokey stuff."
Recorded at Big Deal Studios by Bill Nelson, Second
Slam (the proper CD-release party is this Friday at the
Heywood Gallery) is best described as
alt-porch-gonzo-folk. Loaded with fine instrumentation,
Strother's over-active imagination, and with a few
well-chosen covers, Twang's work stretches the limits of
what's considered folk music just as the Holy Model
Rounders ate acid and turned the folk world around 35
years ago. Which isn't to say that Twang are headed for
the spaced-out nether-regions charted by Peter Stampfel
and Steve Webber: but they hold the same devotion and
irreverence for traditional folk forms. Taking from the
well-known (a fairly clean take of Conway Twitty's "You
Made Me What I Am"), as well as from the obscure (Michael
Hurley's outstanding "Whiskey Willie" is given loving
treatment), Twang mix conventional with the slightly
off-kilter for an album's worth of material that's
fascinating and fun.
Recorded in one session, with help from guitarist Bob
Jordan and "drummer" Mickey Bones (who plays a
refrigerator grate, an empty drywall bucket, and a metal
folding chair to great effect), Second Slam weighs in as
the first local must-have album of 2000, and it's a
required listen for anyone even remotely interested in
how far folk music can be pushed.
"There's all kinds of folk music," says Strother. "One
great thing about old-time music is that it has such an
oral tradition. Some people are aware of the tradition
but we came into the whole thing without any
pre-conceived notions. The way we play, we aren't aping
anybody, but we're back into the pre-electric '20s and
'40s, when people relied on oral tradition, when
[music traveled] from fiddle to fiddle. We carry
the torch for the world of pre-recorded music."
"This band has the potential to bring folk to people
in a way they haven't heard before," adds Phillips. "It's
a constantly changing thing that, if we present it,
people might enjoy."
"Might," exclaims Reidy, laughing. "Might enjoy!"