We’ve spent most of this semester
getting Tony-gifted with all of the older traditions of claw-fist and
rattle-throat Americana, but what about some give back? There’s been a lot of washing
our way through old lyrics, and crooning groopily as much as makes sense to do,
and while the experience has been a culturally grounding one, I gotta say I
don’t care nearly so much about the roots that don’t go anywhere as I do about the ones that are so crept over my
body I never recognized them for roots till somebody cut them open and showed
me the stems. I hope to reverse that process a little here by showing where the
roots of Folk Music have grown to, so without further ado, here’s me returning
the favor.
Shovels
and Rope, Gasoline + Dreaming My Dreams
with You
Liner Notes: A really great country ruckus, and
the place of it comes through strong as music. The band is a southern couple
(South Carolina) making married music in the great matrimonial tradition of
Johnny Cash and June Carter, though of course they really sound nothing like
either of those two. Shovels and Rope play loose hootenanny beats over
well-lived rockabilly shouts, and in this video the family dogs run around the
whole time. It’s a bit little perfect.
Just
heard this one for the first time and it’s undoubtedly a cowboy song, but
played with an intensity that almost certainly would have been illegal in the
1930’s. Perhaps what I love most here is that this band had the folk-guts to
play an abandoned building. Nobody but the artistic class gets to play stages,
but everyone has cherished memories of wild nights singing with friends in unforgotten
abandoned places. The band’s choice to situate their music in just such a place
is a powerful statement as to where their musical loyalties lie, and makes me
like them even more than I already did.
Tedious Autobiography:
I didn’t get into
Folk music (or Blues for that matter) on purpose. Far from it, I grew up in an
atmosphere of intense unspoken suburban supremacism. People hated “that country
shit” and treated Chicago blues like it was corny as all. Lucky for me, I was
tricked into liking Folk music in a two pronged way. One prong told me that every
bit of the sadcore acoustic music I listened to was “folk” and the other prong
stabbed me with punk rock.
Alright let’s relive it, starting with the sad part.
Prong 1: “Sad folky shit:”
Tedious Autobiography CONT: I grew up sad. It didn’t come from
anywhere, so I couldn’t fix it. I got very lonely. I couldn’t deal directly
with this loneliness because I felt if I looked straight at it I might go blind
and give up on living, so I spent a lot of time running around self-consciously
destructing relationships. I chose to get lonesome instead of lonely by turning
loneliness into a choice I was making.
Naturally, I gravitated towards the
loneliest music I could find. I started being attracted to the sound of one man
and a guitar. Musicians like Iron & Wine, Elliott Smith, and Kurt Vile were
sources of great solace to me. As I quickly learned, all three were in one way
or another also Folk Musicians.
Iron
& Wine, On Your Wings+ The Trapeze
Swinger
Liner Notes: Iron & Wine produce records that
creak out of porches. They represent the most introverted interpretation of the
American folk tradition, even as several characteristics distinguish it pretty
dramatically from the older folk tradition. The lyrics are overtly rather than
covertly poetic, and the production is often dense and elaborately designed,
and there is precious little of the country roughness that characterizes so
much class Folk and Blues. Nevertheless, the music is really quite
beautiful.
On Your Wings was the first Iron &
Wine song I ever heard and I was immediately hooked. It uses Folk motifs to
drive mechanically through the meaning, sub-meaning, and post-meaning (or
meaninglessness thereof) of the axiomatically unknowable liminal space that resides
just before the gaping chasm of death itself, or perhaps right above it, even
as of course in quotidian terms we disparage the whole construct as merely the
act of life itself… AhhH! Whatever! Just listen to it!
This is
the Trapeze Swinger and it’s rapturous. Some of the most beautiful verses ever
penned. One passage that has always stood out to me…
But please remember me, fondly
I heard from someone you're still pretty
And then they went on to say that the Pearly Gates
Had some eloquent graffiti
Like 'We'll meet again' and
'Fuck the man'
And
'Tell my mother not to worry'
His sister
sings harmony in the live video. Echoes of Carter Family?
Kurt
Vile, My Sympathy+ Beach on the Moon
Liner Notes: KV is without a doubt one of my favorite
contemporary musicians. This is in no
small part due to his place in the ancient Folk tradition of Wise Mumblers. It’s a performance style that leans you in
and asks you as many questions as it gives answers, and singers like
Mississippi John Hurt and Skip James had it in spades.
Vile is also very obviously indebted to the tradition of
great American finger picking guitarists who play strings with the steadiness
and control of automotive wheels. But Vile differs from traditional songsters
in his willingness to twist Americana through emotionally ambiguous chord
change after emotionally ambiguous chord change. His lyrics are really great
sidewinders too, and speak the unspoken as loudly as great folk lyrics should.
So you wanna marry me, oh you got my sympathy
In a daydream I saw my soul in a flashing neon sign waving to myself
So you want a baby well it’s got my sympathy
In a nightmare I saw myself briefcase, watch and a tie
This
one’s not so much of a folk song as it is dazed acoustic pop, but I included it
because the performance is incredibly folk, and a good example of why I was
comparing Vile’s performative wisdom to that of Mississippi John Hurt. His face
throughout the video is one of the better dreams YouTube has ever had.
Elliott
Smith, Condor Ave+ Angeles
Liner Notes: Elliott Smith isn’t really folk (he always described himself
as pop/singer songwriter) but he was nevertheless one of the reasons folk has
remained culturally to my generation, mostly I think because there’s a tendency
in the music press to conflate acoustic guitars and Folk Music. Which is a
mistake, but a mistake that I’m glad someone made around me. There’s a lot that
I could say about Elliott Smith but not a lot that I will except that his music
has been a constant source of solace whenever I’ve felt lost.
Angeles is one of his best, and the
video firmly grounds it to the place from which the song comes.
Another of Elliott’s place songs. The
interpolated country licks in this song are where people get the idea that
Smith was some sort of hidden folkster, and in this case it’s a pretty credible
interpretation, because lyrically and vocally the song is a very emotionally
direct cousin of Carter Family style folk music.
Alright,
that was great, let’s get mad now.
Prong 2: Punk as Folk!!!!
Further Tedious Autobiography: Punk changed my life. I know
everybody says that, but they only say it because it’s FUCKING TRUE. I wasn’t a
“Punk” (because that particular sub-culture did not exist where I lived) but
Punk influenced me profoundly. Punk was ugly, Punk was free, and Punk made me
proud of every part of me. It didn’t matter that I held a low opinion of my
body, my guitar playing, my face, my family, my love life, my singing voice, my
feelings about other people, my feelings about myself, my school. In fact, all
of that became kind of cool. What had been all of my shames became meaningful
parts of a greater struggle against conformist apathy in society at large. And
this was undoubtedly a healing process.
Punk brought me to blues and folk more than anything else.
Which makes a lot of sense actually, because Punk is essentially Folk Music’s
shit-kicking, patriarchy-smashing younger sibling. Much like Folk, Punk is a
participatory, democratic art form developed by disenfranchised people with
little to no regard for the existing conventions of mainstream or classical
music. Both Punk and Folk have deeply entrenched political undercurrents, both
encourage simultaneous attitudes of celebration and reflection, and both value
honesty far above prettiness. It is therefore no surprise that as I became more
immersed in Punk Music, I began to pass into the world of old school folk.
White
Stripes, Death Letter (De Stijl version)+
Death Letter (Live at Glastonbury)+ Black Jack Davey
Liner Notes: The White Stripes are one of my
favorite things ever but when I first heard them I couldn’t stand them. The
music is brutal and spare, the drumming is barely in time, and the best
description I’ve heard of Jack White’s nasal shriek is that “his voice makes me
feel like whatever I’m sitting on is about to break… “
I couldn’t wrap my head around how anyone could possibly like
the White Stripes. Until about two days later. By which point, unable to stop
listening to this awful and yet somehow deeply appealing music, I had gone mad
with White Stripes. I don’t think I listened to anything else the whole summer
of ‘09.
Jack White is also relevant to this
class as an artist who has been very outspoken about how much influence early black
blues artists have had on his career. In particular, he has frequently cited
Son House as his favorite musician of all time, and covered countless Son House
songs. The version of Death Letter Blues found on the White Stripes second
album, De Stijl, remains one of their most down home tracks, with great passion
and a barroom slide.
The
White Stripes also played Death Letter live, with many less fucks given. The
live Stripes shows were higher energy than anything, ever, and I’m to this day amazed
that neither Jack nor Meg White exploded at any point in their careers as the
White Stripes. In particular, the Death Letter they performed live in
Glastonbury remains my go-to example for why Jack White is a possible source of
renewable fuel now that we’ve hit peak oil.
The
White Stripes cover of Black Jack Davey is also excellent. It’s acoustic, but
the vocals retain a rawness that allows Jack White to tell the story of the
song with unmatched dynamism.
Mischief
Brew, Preacher and the Slave
Liner Notes: Mischief Brew is a semi-legendary Folk-Punk
collective known for their free form Anarchist politics and drunken
sing-alongs. They write prolifically, but I’ve always felt much more drawn to
their covers of old songs than to their original material. In particular, their
version of Preacher and the Slave, written by radical IWW unionist Joe Hill in
1911, remains the best I’ve ever heard of the great old song.
Blackbird
Raum, Honey in the Hair
Liner Notes: Blackbird Raum is a great punk band
circa 1860. There’s nothing electric about them, and they make a lovely racket
with washboards, mandolins, banjos, and homemade washtub bass. Their harmonized
gang vocals echo both the music of the Chain Gang, and the Sea Shanty, even as
they remain independent of both traditions. Their live shows happen everywhere,
and often feature mosh pits that merge quickly into colonial dance. Here is a
video of them playing on BART. If you get a chance to see them, go.
Well,
that’s my disjointed origin story and a whole ton of music for you. Thanks for the class, I really needed it to keep my faith in school. Best of luck to you next year and I will definitely stop by!
P.S.,
here’s more that didn’t fit neatly
Gogol
Bordello, Through the Roof n’ Underground+
Eugene Hutz playing guitar
Liner Notes: These guys are the only reason I
know anything about East European folk music, again through the Punk
connection. Their music is wise, politically conscious, hilarious and
wonderfully full of life. Check them out. Through the Roof n’ Underground tells
the immigrant story with that mercurial joy that allows a great folk song to
sing a tale of woe in the major key, and get everyone to sing along.
Just a
clip of their frontman playing Punk/Jazz/Ukraine style guitar.
Shakey
Graves, Late July
Liner Notes: Couldn’t fit Shakey into either prong,
but he’s gonna be a hero to millions soon. Shakey writes murder ballads with
unusual compassion, has an impeccable Americana voice, and accompanies himself
expertly on guitar and suitcase drums, which he made at home and plays by
walking. A real rambling man.
