Frank Fairfield's a strange success story. Plucked from the streets of LA to open a Fleet Foxes tour in 2009, he seems to be from another era but still manages to connect to hipsters and folkies alike. No one would have predicted this kind of success from a solo old-time fiddler, banjo picker and songster, but Frank's secret is he never tried to be anybody but Frank. He never watered down his music, never compromised his exacting vision of American roots music. He knows what he likes, and to him this kind of music and lifestyle isn't anachronistic, it's just the way it is. This kind of surety gives Frank an almost mesmerizing charisma. It doesn't matter whether you love or hate folk music, when you see Frank perform and hear his voice, he's got you hooked.

Frank Fairfield's new album, Out on the Open West, is not so much a return to the roots that inspired him, but rather a burrowing deeper into the Appalachian traditions he clearly loves. His voice winds through the old songs like a trucker crossing the Cumberland Gap. There's something timeless to the music, but also something critically alive. And that's what Frank says about the music: it's alive. Frank hears the beating heart of the music and can tap into it. That's what makes his music compelling. The opening track, "Frazier Blues," has a feeling of deep sadness. It's the same kind of feeling you get when you watch the the Greg Vandy's new documentary, Frank Fairfield. It's a feeling that emanates from Frank and it's part of his charisma and I think part of his connection to the old songs.

Frank Fairfield: Frazier Blues

 

Up in rainy Seattle, Greg Vandy, DJ of The Roadhouse on KEXP, is riding high these days. He's the long-time host of a popular roots music radio show on one of the most influential community radio stations in the US and his show plays host to famous musicians all the time. Recent in-studios included Phosphorescent, Ryan Bingham, Frazey Ford, and he's interviewed big-name artists like Iron & Wine or Gillian Welch. But what's got him most excited these days is his documentary about Frank Fairfield's iconoclastic old-timey music, and more generally, his new venture, American Standard Time. Greg discovered Frank's music through local DJ/music writer Kurt B Reighley, who recently released an excellent book on old-time traditions made new. Greg reached out to Frank's agent Matt Popieluch. Here's how Matt pitched Frank Fairfield to Greg:

 “I first found Frank playing banjo on the sidewalk at a farmers market. I started booking shows for him right then and there, and things started happening immediately... Frank travels mainly by bicycle around LA, busking all over town, with his fiddle, banjo and guitar tied to his back with twine! He's also been known to add his gramophone and records on top of that, which I'll never understand how he accomplished. He brings his gramophone on tour and plays records for people in the parking lots of shows. Frank is an encyclopedia of music. He can talk for hours about it once he opens up. I've seen him play probably 30 or 40 times and not once has he played the same set. He's just an onion with a million layers. I'm still learning things about him, and he's only 23! I know I'm forgetting some stuff, but that's some of it. I think he's fascinating because of his intelligence and talent, primarily. He's very unique.”

As Greg says, "I was sold. I hosted Frank at KEXP in late 2009 and immediately thought that such a compelling character and musician should be seen as well as heard." One of the best things about Greg's work, on his American Standard Time blog and on his KEXP radio show, is that he's as interested in culture and context as he is in the music. It's not enough for him to enjoy the music, he wants to know where it's being made, how it's being made, and who's making it. He envisioned a series of videos about his favorite roots artists, a kind of Artist Portraits, and thought Frank would be the perfect subject to kick-start the series. Working with Austin Wilson of More Dust Than Digital, Greg and KEXP filmed Frank on his next visit to the station. This filming snowballed into "B-Roll" footage of Frank at Pike Place Market, shopping for records, and later at the famed Pickathon festival outside Portland. The footage was so compelling that Greg realized it had the makings of a mini-documentary. This mini-doc, Frank Fairfield, turned into a portrait of Frank in a variety of settings, expounding on his views on life and music. In one of the particularly poignant parts of the film, Frank comes off a great set at Pickathon saying how much he enjoyed himself, but immediately follows this with "But then again, whatever, one night I don't enjoy myself. What's the big deal, you know?" It's a moment that shows how you can't understand one man's music without trying to understand the man. Hearing that phrase helped me see how Frank's music has some of its edge, an edge born of the long, lonely roads he's traveled.

FRANK FAIRFIELD (Official Trailer) from austin wilson on Vimeo.

Frank Fairfield, the film, has been doing quite well and has been featured in a number of film festivals, most notable SXSW. It's playing this weekend at the Seattle Film Festival too and being shopped around to other film festivals. And it's just the start of Greg's new work. In 2010, he formed American Standard Time to host the new videos he was producing with More Dust Than Digital. The site became a blog and retains ties to KEXP, but the videos are a key part. As he told me, "The whole idea behind our artist portraits is that musicians like Frank are much more than just the music they play. They are characters too. Same with Blind Boy Paxton and Sallie Ford. And by framing them with relevant backgrounds and good light, you get a beautiful piece that takes you way beyond the music." One of the most popular videos from American Standard Time is Greg's portrait of indie folk star Alela Diane. Greg's portrait was filmed in her Portland home and featured some beautiful footage of her rehearsing and even just singing around the house.

ALELA DIANE & WILD DIVINE from More Dust Than Digital on Vimeo.

Here's hoping that American Standard Time will keep cranking out these videos. But it's not easy to build a new model for roots music video production on a shoestring budget. As Greg says, "I'd like to make more...But so far it's all a passion project, as we have no budget and my web-site is not monetized. Ultimately a budget is needed to continue making these artist portraits." Greg idolizes Les Blank, a pioneer filmmaker in the world of roots music, and with the tools of digital film-making and a plethora of amazing artists at our fingertips, we're in definite need of a new Les Blank. Hopefully, Frank Fairfield, the documentary, will show the potential for more videos and more features for Greg's favorite artists. As he says, "Roots musicians have a certain fabric about them. They tap into a tradition that we all know (consciously or not) and they usually have a quality about them that is very appealing. They tend to run a little deeper than pop musicians. It's as simple as that really."
 
Northwest Friends: Frank Fairfield screens this weekend at the Seattle International Film Festival. It opens for the film Surrogate Valentine.

Harvard Exit
May 29, 2011 9:30 PM

Admiral Theatre
May 30, 2011 3:30 PM
 

Seattle's annual Northwest Folklife Festival is one of the biggest fests in the nation. With 800+ bands, 25+ stages, and a couple hundred thousand people in attendance, the festival grounds at the Seattle Center play host to near-anarchy levels of people. It's our official welcome to summer, and a beloved event. It's also a great place to catch new artists and new musical communities before the rest of Seattle discovers them. But how to do this? Folklife's schedule is easier to use than ever, with iPhone and Android apps, and a new level of interactivity, but you're still looking at hundreds of bands! Here's our insider's guide to what Hearth Music is looking forward to at Folklife to help guide your way. Enjoy!


Hearth Music's Full Recommended List

Indie Roots Stage

This is a brand-new stage at Folklife, and it's about time! Located in the now-defunct Fun Forest, between the EMP and the Center House (it's technically called "Center Square") the indie roots stage will feature a broad range of artists, all of whom relate in some way to American folk music, and will be curated by Folklife staff and partner organizations.

Hearth Music is proud to be one of those partners! Our showcase is on Monday, from 1-4 pm and will feature hardcore old-time pickers the Rabbit Foot Duo, rocking alt-jugband Sassparilla from PDX, and Danbert Nobacon, of legendary anarcho-folk-punkers Chumbawamba. We're really excited to see Mighty Ghosts again too. They killed their last show at Columbia City Theater and are quickly becoming our new favorite band!
 

LISTEN and learn more about Hearth's Indie Roots Showcase 
 

Our buddies over at American Standard Time have also put together a killer show on the Indie Roots Stage. We're looking forward to catching solid Hearth Music favorites like Cahalen Morrison & Eli West and the Crow Quill Night Owls. Plus Sam Watts, or Ghosts I've Met as he's known, will headline. His album as Ghosts I've Met is both eerie and beautiful and recommended.

Crow Quill Night Owls: Wake Up Sinners

Cool Shows

Of course, Folklife is built on shows. All kinds of crazy shows, from folk-punks to pagan-metalheads to fiddle and banjo nerds and maritime sea shanties, and lots of shows from local communities. Here are some cool choices of shows this year.
 

Punk as Folk

Friday, May 27
Fountain Lawn Stage, 6-9pm

If it seems sometimes that the crusty punks have taken over Folklife, that's because they largely have. Word has spread in the folk-punk community that Folklife has great busking and a real love of folk music of all stripes. And many of these young folk-punks are amazing musicians and true folk music aficianados in their own right. I'm not sure if there were crazy folk festivals in the 70s that drew the likes of the Fugs or the Holy Modal Rounders, but there should have been. And if there were, they woulda been like Folklife.

The Punk as Folk showcase is curated again this year by Caspian of our fav band, Blackbird Raum. Di Nigunim is a definite highlight, bringing raging klezmer-punk up from the Bay Area. Check out the great video of them below. The definite show highlight is The Barons of Tang, a folk-punk band traveling all the way over from Australia. There are plenty of bands out there doing punk circus acts, but these guys take it to a new level. They sound like a cabaret spiraling the drains of a seedy Southern backwoods town. But this isn't sloppy punk music, these guys are deliberate and smart and know what they're doing. It's a great sound, and their live shows are supposed to be pretty legendary.

The Barons of Tang: Villain (Stage Left)

 

Di Nigunim: Fascist Degradation

Cascadian Underground Folk

Friday, May 27
The Vera Stage, 7-10pm

Folklife's all about the secret, hidden shows that happen at the edges of the festival. For the past three or four years, one of the strangest and most compelling of these shows has been the Cascadian Underground showcase. Our rainy Northwest is home to a thriving community of nature-minded modern heathens, drawing from the lush vegetation and deep silences of our woods. They play folk music, but don't expect to see a bunch of banjos and fiddles. Instead, they go to the far-lost roots of folk music, appropriating medieval poetry and seasonal rituals, along with organic instruments. We're looking forward to German poet/painter/mystic Waldteufel, and the soft, thoughtful forest folk of Novemthree in particular. In fact, we just saw on their website that Novemthree is planning a split 7" with Mariee Sioux, one of our favorite indie folk artists. Awesome!

 
Novemthree: Beneath the Hemlock, Within the Grove

Mountain Blues

Saturday, May 28
Fountain Lawn Stage, 1-3pm

While a small handful of excellent roots musicians in Seattle get most of the press, there are some insanely talented players lurking just outside this inner circle and sometimes just outside the city limits. Sometimes they pop up as sidemen in awesome bands, as mando whiz Ethan Lawton did with Zoe Muth's band, and sometimes they form killer bands that don't get near as much press as they should. Jangle Bones is one of those bands. Led by country blues picker Cort Armstrong, Jangle Bones plays mountain moonshine music. Not the kind you'd expect in the Northwest, and certainly not what many are used to out here. And more's the pity. The Jelly Rollers feature harmonica player Sean Divine, who's also in Jangle Bones. I love his vocals; they've got the kind of rough edge that will be ground down over the years into a kind of R.L. Burnside drawl, given half a chance. Also, the cover to their debut album was illustrated by the mad woodsman genius that is Jim Woodring. Pyschedelic NW country mountain blues. Yes, please!

Also appearing in the Mountain Blues show, Ben Gilmer is a young talent to watch out for in Seattle roots music scene. He completely won us over a few months ago at Columbia City Theater by picking out heartfelt old-school bluegrass numbers with his brother, but he's best known for his hard-swinging, soft-drawling roots country songs. Growing up in SW Virginia, Gilmer soaked up the songs of the hills, but his music now does a great job mixing that sensibility with a rain-soaked urban vibe.

 
Ben Gilmer & The Sidearms: Sweet Gal

 

Balkan Bridge: Dance in the Vera

Saturday May 28
The Vera Stage, 6:30-10pm

Thanks to Gogol Bordello, Balkan music is all the rage. So expect to catch plenty of it at Folklife. But this show is a special kind of genius. We guarantee that the small, dark Vera Stage will be packed to the hilt with sweaty circle dancers and bands pumping out totally frenetic beats. It will be like a past-capacity Balkan bar way past hours with your favorite gypsy band rocking the house.

PDXperimental Folk

Sunday, May 29, from 7-10pm
Indie Roots Stage @ Center Square

It's no secret that Portland, Oregon has one of the best, if not THE best, indie music scenes in the US. If it was a secret to anyone, The Decemberists 2011 album, which debuted at #1 in the States, changed all that. As did hilarious comedy show Portlandia (highly recommended!). But I still think it's kinda gutsy for this Seattle festival to sponsor a Portland-based music show. And the bands are equally gutsy choices. Death Songs has a slightly unsettling, gettin-close-to-hair-raising take on creepy Americana, and The Ocean Floor remind me of the books of Maurice Sendak: light and hopeful, yet full of urban terror and decay at the same time. But the band we're looking forward to most is John Heart Jackie. They're a popular indie folk duo out of Portland, and their sunny roots pop songs won me over a few months ago when they came through Seattle. They make the kind of music that fits so well in the new Northwest sound: sweet, harmonic songs built for long, rainy days. Their voices whisper, tremble, and float along, and gently lull us to a happier home. It's sad music, but hopeful too. Just the way we all feel after an endless winter of rain.

John Heart Jackie: You've Been On My Mind

 
 

Old-Time Kitchen Party

Sunday, May 29
Northwest Court Stage, 3-5:30pm

This has always been one of our favorite shows at Folklife. It's a chance to catch some of the best old-time stringbands and early bluegrass duets in a small, intimate space. A great listening space, which can be rare at Folklife. This year, the highlight of the show will be RedDog, a Seattle stringband celebrating a brand-new album release! Old-time pickers know RedDog well, thanks to the affable mandolin picking of Cary Lung (ex-member of famed mandolinist Kenny Hall's band) and local old-time guitarist/singer Tom Collicott (check out his excellent duo $4 Shoe). But everyone else would know RedDog from lead singer/fiddler Doug Yule, formerly of The Velvet Underground. Yep, you read that right. The man who once sang side by side with Lou Reed has given up a debauched life of rock 'n' roll to settle down with some old-time fiddling. But listen to RedDog, and listen to Yule's fiddling, and you'll see that he's maybe always had a lot more music in him than just the Velvet Underground.

RedDog: How Can A Poor Man Stand Such Times

Folklife Twang

We've been pretty twang-obsessed lately at Hearth Music HQ. So I went in search of some twangtastic bands at Folklife this year. And found some cool surprises.

Blueberry Hill - Miller Family Band
Sunday, May 29
Fisher Green Stage, 1pm

We love family bands at Hearth Music, and Folklife certainly supports these bands. We like family bands that play tight together, that play music like a real family, the kind of music you have to be born into. Blueberry Hill is a new family band from Stanwood, Washington with some serious twang. I'm not clear on their back story, but I know that I love what I hear. Sweet bluegrass harmonies, tight picking, and just enough slow drawl to smooth out the rough edges. Also, young Forrest Miller has got some seriously gritty banjo lines. He knows how to really pull the funk out a slow bluegrass number, a trait that early Scruggs shared as well. How cool to see kids these days appreciating the funkier side of bluegrass banjo!

Listen to Blueberry Hill on Soundclick
 
 

The Howdy Boys
Saturday, May 28
Fisher Green Stage, 12:20pm

We hadn't heard of the Howdy Boys before, but we knew they'd be good when we saw Doug Bright on fiddle. Doug's a quiet force in the Northwest roots music scene. He can play pretty much anything, and we've seen him playing old-time/bluegrass/country swing/Cajun fiddle, and playing accordion in everything from a cowboy to a zydeco band. He's got a magic way with his music, born from a gentle touch and a tasteful ear. He's got more twang in his pinky than most people do in their whole arm, and he knows how to use it. The other Howdy Boys are hot players too! Rob Bulkely works at Dusty Strings and leads bluegrass jams there, while banjo picker Bill Scott and bassist/singer Jeff Brohier are well-known local bluegrass leaders. The band plays it straight, focusing their music on the hard center line of bluegrass roots, and that's a good thing. There are plenty of other bands experimenting with bluegrass and it's nice to return to the center sometimes.

The Howdy Boys: What Do You Know About Heartaches?

The Black Crabs
Rockabilly Riot
Saturday, May 28
Fountain Lawn Stage, 4:40pm

We can't speak for Portland, but Seattle is a hotbed of rockabilly culture. With Leon Berman and the annually sold-out Shake the Shack Rockabilly Ball, and stalwart venues like Little Red Hen, we've got some hot rockabilly roots. And The Black Crabs are one of the best rockabilly bands in town. They started out as a back-up band for Wanda Jackson (now enjoying a huge resurgence thanks to Jack White), but formed into a tight trio that mixes surf-rock with garage rockabilly. The Rockabilly Show at Folklife (curated/hosted by Marshall Scott Warner) is always a great time, and highly recommended. Bring your own pomade.

The Black Crabs: Rink Lay

 

Safe Bets

Folklife's all about taking chances. But then again, sometimes it's nice to go with a sure bet. These artists/events are guaranteed to please. Or your money back.

The Tallboys w/Tony Mates
Subversive Squares
Monday, May 30
The Vera Stage, 3pm

This is the best square dance you will go to this year. Period. The Tallboys are at the top of their game and Tony Mates is hands-down one of the best callers. Mates is so good, that his calling is as interesting as the music. He sings out each call, grooving along with the dancers, and has a great sense of humor. He's what all dance callers should be: masters of ceremonies first and instructors second. Go to this and dance. You won't regret it. Plus you can learn more about the Subversive Square Dance Society, a group of musicians and dancers who have been throwing square dance house parties (w/alcohol!) and reclaiming square dancing from its stodgy image.


Baby Gramps
Saturday, May 28
Fisher Green Stage, 4:35pm

Gramps is a Northwest treasure, and rightfully so. He's a hokum performer, spinning long, bizarre tales and wrapping musical illusions around our eyes and ears. No performance is ever the same and there's absolutely no telling what will happen when he's onstage. I remember standing halfway across the grounds a few years ago and singing along to his amplified calls of "Scrotum, scrotum" as he sang the infamous Scrotum Song for an ecstatic crowd. We've got a blog post coming soon on Gramps' killer new duo recording with Peter Stampfel. Stay tuned for that too. Baby Gramps has to be experienced live; his recordings can't do him justice. So don't miss out on this!

Sea Shanty Drinking Songs
w/Philip Morgan
Saturday, May 28
Northwest Court Beer Garden, 6pm

This is one of the coolest events at Folklife in our opinion. Join renowned sea shanty singer Philip Morgan in the Northwest Court's Beer Garden for an hour of Sea Shanty Drinking Songs after the Maritime Show. Experience sea shanties as they were meant to be sung: while swilling a hefty pint among friends.
 

Paul Anastasio & Juan Barco
The Violin Music of Tierre Caliente Workshop
Sunday, May 29
EMP Learning Labs, 12pm

The fiddle music of Mexico's Tierre Caliente doesn't seem to be too well known outside of the country, and strangely outside of the Northwest. That's because, for years, the great Tierre Caliente fiddle master Juan Reynoso taught this style of fiddling at Centrum's Festival of American Fiddle Tunes. It's a mind-bending nest of twisting fiddle lines, cracked and soaring vocals and pure virtuosity. Paul's been studying the music for years and was one of Reynoso' proteges, so this is a great chance to discover this music. Here's a great quote from Paul about the music: "It was as if all the musics I'd loved and studied - swing music, and gypsy music, and tango - Cuban this and African that - all of these styles kind of formed the outlines of a puzzle piece that was this music."

Juan Reynoso in his later years. This. Will. Blow. Your. Mind.

Clinton Fearon
Reggae Rising
Monday, May 30
Mural Amphitheatre, 7:40pm

The only way to end your amazing Festival experience is with Clinton Fearon. Period. This old-school reggae master from Jamaica, who was once Lee 'Scratch' Perry's house bassist, is a wonderful performer. And his uplifiting reggae songs are just the thing to mellow you out and send you floating home. Be there.
 

Hidden Gems in the Schedule

The great thing about Folklife is that the size of the festival means the programmers can take chances on brand-new bands or little-known artists. So this is where you should go to find the next hot band in Seattle, or to discover your new favorite band. Here are a few discoveries we found:

Bakelite 78
Indie Roots Stage
Friday, May 27 @ 3:30pm

First of all, they get the Coolest Poster for a Folklife Show Prize. And after listening to their creepy, junkband rags of yore, singing about Dillinger and World's Fairs and sounding like a bunch of parlour-hopping con artists, we like!!


Laura Jorgensen
Friday May 27
Indie Roots Stage, 5pm

Frankly, she had us at "Accordion-Playing Story Weaver." But Laura Jorgensen's music has totally intrigued us. She's from Seattle, and her debut album is a fully orchestrated blend of Beirut-style vocal and trumpet lines, with dense lyricism and a nod to cinematic indie folk artists like Joanna Newsom. Wow, where'd she come from? Listen to her now on Bandcamp. And check out this great video of her deftly covering Fleet Foxes' "Tiger Mountain Peasant Song" with just her accordion. Has Robin Pecknold seen this? 
 

Harald Haugaard Trio
Scandinavian Dance
Saturday, May 28
Center House Court, 7:50pm

If you love Ballard's Americana performance alley, be sure to stop by this dance to pay homage to Seattle's deep Scandinavian roots. Harald Haugaard is a fiery fiddler from Denmark who's been to Folklife a few times before. He plays rare tunes from Danish islands, learned from old fiddlers in the back country. This is a great chance to see Scandinavian dancing in the hands of a master fiddler. Check out this video of Haugaard at Folklife a few years ago:

Vince Mtz. & The Great Blue Yonder
Monday, May 30
Indie Roots Stage, 12:20pm (just before Hearth's showcase)

Vince Martinez and Ben Gilmer are becoming fast friends. And that's great news, because they're both killer Americana bandleaders in Seattle. Martinez is perhaps a bit less country than Gilmer, but instead taps into a sweet undercurrent of clear indie waters. We haven't had the chance yet to see him live, but can attest to the fact that he's a real nice guy and his new album with The Great Blue Yonder does a great job of blending acoustic folk with a slightly tremulous indie voice. It's the kind of music that makes you want to go for a nice long hike in the Cascades, sniffing the flowers along the way and dipping your toes in mountain brooks.

Vince Mtz. & The Great Blue Yonder: Sycamore

 

Hearth Music Artists
 

Many of our artists and friends are playing Folklife this year! Be sure to check out our Personalized Schedule to catch everyone:

Hearth Music's Full Recommended List
 

See you at Folklife!
 

Hearth Music is incredibly proud that the ground-breaking collaboration we helped put together, Mr. Lif & Brass Menazeri, for the 2010 Seattle Folk Festival has inspired these artists to work together long-term. We'd asked Mr. Lif to join us for the Festival, knowing that his particular blend of socially-conscious, hard-hitting lyrics would fit perfectly with any fan of political folk music, especially in the midst of a raging depression and unchecked corporate growth. But we needed a band to put with him... Knowing how amazing brass bands sound with hip-hop beats, we asked if he'd be down to perform with a Balkan brass band, and to our surprise, he was totally enthusiastic about the idea! When we asked around for the best Balkan brass band in the US, all our contacts kept saying: Brass Menazeri. So on a whim, we invited them up and offered the idea to them. Peter Jaques, head of Brass Menazeri, is an old-school hip-hop head, and was thrilled at the chance to work with Lif.

So everyone flew out to Seattle and just a few days before the festival, gathered in an abandoned coffin factory (seriously) for their one rehearsal before the gig. It was a magical moment all around, and after a blow-out show at the Seattle Folk Festival, they headed over to KEXP for a special in studio.

UPDATE: MR. LIF & BRASS MENAZERI MADE THEIR GOAL! CONGRATS!!

Read more about this collaboration

Now they need your help. They're raising money for their first album and started a Kickstarter so fans could help them out. They've got a few days left and they're almost there, so dig deep and support this ground-breaking collaboration.

MR. LIF & BRASS MENAZERI KICKSTARTER PAGE

Have a listen:

Mr. Lif & Brass Menazeri Bandcamp Page

 Also, check out the national press they've been getting for the project:

Interview with Kickstarter Headquarters

San Francisco Weekly Article

As the son of public school teachers, I know for a fact that teachers have ridiculously low pay and are constantly in danger of being laid off. Without teachers unions, we will lose even more of our best and brightest. Stick it to the corporations and bankers that got rich off our tragedy, don't stick it to your common man and woman.

Thanks to Mark Moss of SingOut! Magazine for this great video of John Darnielle (The Mountain Goats).

Power In A Union from JD on Vimeo.

And here's some music from Woody Guthrie, the long-standing hero of the common man/woman.

Woody Guthrie: All You Fascists Bound to Lose

 
And a final word from Ani Difranco, covering the great "Which Side Are You On".

 

Dear Foghorn Stringband,

What a long strange trip it's been! From your origins in the punk, DIY world of Portland's urban old-time community to a major label signing with Nettwerk, you've been the seminal stringband of the past decade and you've inspired countless young musicians (myself included) to pick up fiddles, banjos, guitars, and to hop trains over to Portland for all night picking parties and moonshine square dance raves. What amazes me is that throughout you've been the same band with the same mission: to play the hell out of your favorite country and old-time tunes and songs with no hint of irony. We all projected our own ideas and fantasies on to the band, but you guys were hard as granite. You just played and played, never caring for the music industry or the hipsters' world of indie roots music. And that's always been the key to your music. 

So it's with great pleasure that I can report that the new CD from The Foghorn Trio (Caleb Klauder, Sammy Lind, Nadine Landry) is just as wonderfully vibrant and alive as the past albums from the full band. The album keeps the core of the Stringband, the hard-driving mandolin picking and the dry, dusty voice of Caleb Klauder, and the blazing fiddling and rough-and-tumble singing of Sammy Lind, and adds French Acadian bassist/guitarist Nadine Landry. Nadine also adds her beautiful, sparse singing and her knowledge of French for a few Cajun songs. Recorded at Joel Savoy's studio in Louisiana, it's no wonder the Cajun culture of Down South has rubbed off on the band, in fact, word on the street is that Sammy Lind's picked up the Cajun accordion and joined a band with fiddler Josh Rabie of the Water Tower Bucket Boys. But that's beside the point. The point is that these young traditionalists still have what it takes to spin Portland urbanites around crowded dance halls, to lift the feet of drinking souls in bars across the US and to spin up clouds of dust at outdoor festivals. Cajun accordionist Octa Clark once said "You can't go wrong if you play it right" and it's clear that the Foghorn Trio have taken this mantra to heart.

Thank you Foghorn Stringband for all the years of inspiration. Now that you've got a new CD as The Foghorn Trio, we can focus on the high, holy harmonies and face-blasting fiddle tunes that have always been your trademark. We can focus on the fine old songs, and new songs from Caleb. We can focus on this beautiful music, while you all focus on kicking ass.
 

The Foghorn Trio: Liza Jane  (from Kyle Creed)


The Foghorn Trio: Just A Little (Caleb Klauder)

Earl Scruggs turns 87 today and I thought it might be a good time to present a slightly different perspective on his legacy. Note: This article originally appeared in No Depression.

I used to teach a big class on American Popular Music at the University of Washington, back when I was in the ethnomusicology program. Which is funny, because I know absolutely nothing about popular music. This was proven to me early on when I was found unable to recognize or whistle the song "I've Got You Babe' by Sonny and Cher. Periodically, this issue comes up again in my life, like when I get all excited about this amazing new song I've found by a little-known group called the Jackson Five. But I know folk music. I know bluegrass and old-time and Irish and Inuit throat singing; you name it, I'm into it. So while every one of my 200 students was looking forward to learning about the Beatles or Jay-Z, I was looking forward to teaching about minstrelsy and Appalachian ballads. I wasn't the most popular teacher the class has ever seen.

But my favorite part of teaching that class was introducing Earl Scruggs. See, his music is so omnipresent that we take for granted just how amazing he is and was. There are a number of seminal artists in our history whose music was so explosive, so controversial, so intense that it instantly changed everything. The Original Dixieland Jazz Band (ODJB) are an early example of this. A bunch of nerdy white kids that discovered that they could tear the roof off a dancehall by just racing hell-for-leather through black jass tunes. Bob Dylan's another example. A young punk who figured out that adopting Woody Guthrie's "Fuck the Man" attitude could earn him a helluva lot more followers than Pete Seeger's "Love Everyone" philosophy. In Cajun music, Iry Lejeune sparked a bonfire renaissance of the old roots music by playing his accordion so hard that he nearly destroyed his own recordings. On his early cuts, he plays with a full band, but all you hear is his accordion, racing back and forth like a prison shank. Johnny Cash blew the lid off country music when he sang about killing a man in Reno. Hell, the list goes on, but Earl Scruggs and Bill Monroe hold special places in my heart as cold-blooded purveyors of country punk.

Iry Lejeune tears up a Cajun waltz

While hillbillys all over the South were dressing up as hayseeds and spitting out corny one-liners and wacky skits, Bill Monroe and his bluegrass boys dressed in their Sunday best and brought a cool, bordering on cold, level of respect to the music. Like Wu-Tang, they were nothing to fuck with. They took old-timey roots music (Monroe played many square dances in his youth) and sped it way up, taking the blazing rhythms of Southern dance music and adding fresh ideas like solos (jazz), complex harmonies (Black and White gospel), and all kinds of blue notes and early funk (country blues). Just like punk, they stripped away all the bullshit that was drowning the music, keeping only the hardest elements to put together a new style based on what made the music great in the first place. They built an entire industry from scratch, just because they wanted to do it their own way. And though Monroe gets most of the credit for these changes, Scruggs was the flash point that changed everything.

It's hard to imagine the impact Scruggs' first recordings must have had on Southern musicians. His banjo picking is like a sucker-punch, coming completely by surprise. By adapting a regional style of playing known as three-finger picking (now known as Scruggs-style) and adapting it to his utterly raw sensibilities, he tore apart everyone's conception of his instrument. Imagine Jimi Hendrix if he stood stock still on stage with an eerie smile and just proceeded to tear the hell out of his guitar without any theatrics. If you listen to his Mercury recordings with Lester Flatt, he plays so hard that he distorts the instrument's sound, literally pounding the notes into the grooves of the shellac. And while many players can cop to a rawness and intensity in their music, it's rare that this is coupled with pure virtuosity. In Scruggs early recordings, he completely redefined what the banjo was capable of and took it from its hillbilly hokum roots to a new era of punk attitude and folk virtuosity.

Flatt & Scruggs: Pike County Breakdown (imagine hearing this for the first time)

Scruggs brought balls to bluegrass. Witness this tune 60 years later:

You can read plenty of info elsewhere about Scruggs' later career, and at 60+ years, it is staggering. But I'll share one more anecdote before signing off. I got to see Scruggs play live (first-time) a few years ago at Benaroya Hall in Seattle. It was a special show, as he played with Bela Fleck for their first time together on stage (Abigail Washburn & The Sparrow Quartet opened the show). Scruggs was probably 85 at the time and had put together an ace group of bluegrass superstars, including family members and another banjo player. He sat on a chair for most of the concert just cooly staring into space. Then he'd suddenly stand up, walk to the mic, and rip out a blazing solo before sitting back down. Didn't say much, didn't interact with the band much, just kicked ass and sat back down. The father of country punk or outlaw bluegrass, bringing much-needed attitude to one of America's most maligned instrument, the banjo.

Happy Birthday, Earl Scruggs!

FIND OUT MORE ABOUT EARL SCRUGGS AND HIS LEGACY:
 

Earl's Website

Interview with David Johnston (Yonder Mountain String Band) about Scruggs' influence

YOU MUST BUY Flatt & Scruggs: The Complete Mercury Sessions