Dar Williams at the Bell House Brooklyn

Dar Williams is one of the most prolific folk singers in the American popular/folk market. A longtime favorite of mine, she never takes the easy road and has been rewarded for it with loyal followers and ardent supporters. Williams has taken a long and tumultuous journey for her turn in the spotlight. In early November 2011 I was fortunate enough to be able to interview her and we spoke at great length about many things. She told me of the choices she has made, the road less traveled, her devotion to and from her fans, and even her struggles with depression.

But on this night after Christmas 2011, out in what appeared to be some of the less traveled spaces in Brooklyn, there was nothing but positive energy in the room. For those loyal enough to cross over 4th Avenue and head out to this vacant industrial area, you were rewarded. The Bell House was the space and Dar was here to spread her gospel according to her acoustic strumming. By the time Williams hit the stage the energy had reached its own organically mellow vibe.

The setup of the room we were in at The Bell House really took me back to my mid-90's ska infatuation as these shows were always invariably in stone floored former warehouse spaces. The Bell House had a small stage elevated maybe four feet with microphones, musical instruments, floor spotlights, and tangled cords. The connection with the audience and the performers was immediate though; audience could quite literally reach out and touch the performers from the floor.

That said the seating at The Bell House was not really any seating at all. Audience stood and before things got going in a large section of the floor simply sat around in cross-legged clusters of 2-10.

I stood off to one side and took in the whole of the space. Audience formed an ever-growing semicircle around the front of the stage. At the apex of Williams set there were maybe 250-300 people in the crowd. Above the stage there was cross paneled frontage, crossing wood beams which ran the length of the room, and a buffalo image on a six foot semi-circle. On the other end of the space from where I was sitting there was a bar. Towards the rear of the room there was also an elevated portion which had a few tables and chairs. Hanging above were two ghostly chandeliers which cast their glow on the crowd.

The evening started out energetically enough with Pearl and the Beard. They were a trio of two girls on standup bass and a snare and tom-tom drum and a guy with a beard who played acoustic and electric guitar. All three musicians also sang.

I had never heard these three perform before and while their energy started off toe tapping enough; they quickly reached back towards indulgent world music melodrama. I felt like I was listening to 8 ½ Souvenirs meets Fleet Foxes.

A couple of their songs involved an accordion player/violinist. One song in particular with the accordion was memorable. The standup bass player began doing some kind of a slap technique which punctuated the bleak waxing and waning of the accordionist.

If I were going out to see Pearl and the Beard, I may have been satisfied with their set (they also came on later and played with Dar) though for an opening act who didn't even begin their set for a full 10 minutes later than the shows scheduled starting time, their set was two or three songs too long.

When Dar finally came out onstage, she looked great. She was dressed in black leggings, black boots, and a short sleeved blouse peppered with sparkly glitter. She hustled onstage and seemed almost out of breath. She began the set with 5 boroughs favorite "Spring Street."

She right away began telling the stories that we all love her for. Her cadence was rhythmic and breathy and familiar. Before the second song she spoke of her own "very folkie songs which come back to this world." She then gave a particularly tender and poignant reading of "The Beauty of the Rain."

For those who have seen Dar before (which was most everyone at The Bell House) her command of the room was a controlled chaos which was very admirable. Rather than dictating from her bully pulpit her set seemed more like a conversation. While she did have an open notebook with what was presumably her set list, she seemed satisfied to let the audiences sway have their say.

Before bringing out Pearl and the Beard she spoke about her choice to sign with an indie label (Razor and Tie), her connection with her husband, her alumnus Wesleyan (and how 100% of her graduating class moved to Brooklyn), and her decision to write her forthcoming album based on Greek mythology.

Some more tunes from her set included "The Easy Way, "Buzzer," old-favorite "The Babysitters Here," and her newest song "Crystal Creek."

Unfortunately for me I don't live in Brooklyn so the pressing need to wake up tomorrow prevented me from enjoying all of what Dar had to offer tonight. But the whole of the evening was a satisfying enough engagement and was an enjoyable end-cap to an exhausting Christmas weekend. The Bell House is a space which I will definitely return to. Stay tuned for whatever's next from our favorite flummoxed folkie; check out her Facebook page for all the latest news that's fit to print.


https://www.facebook.com/DarWilliamsOfficial

http://voices.yahoo.com/on-record-dar-williams-10400339.html?cat=33

https://www.facebook.com/thebellhouseny

https://www.facebook.com/PearlandtheBeard

Roesy's Masks

Roesy's Masks

by Jesse Schmitt

I don’t know where my head has been these last years. I’m very impressed how so-so musical acts can get all this play, everywhere; and for the last four years or more this amazing singer, songwriter, and guitar player has been lurking in the shadows. Alas, this is the way for the American music industry (“Can I get a what-what”) but never fear as the world stage continues not to let us down.

From the Irish artist known as Roesy comes the 2006 release “Colour Me Colourful.” When I first heard this record I was flummoxed with a mixture of restrained jubilation and anticipatory depression as I felt I’d already missed something huge. The fact is that Roesy is still around and for any fans of off-the-mainstream, acoustic pop, his soft spoken excellence will sweep you off your feet and take you off and away.

Roesy’s image, standing in a purple chef’s jacket holding his guitar on the blacktop backdrop which is colored in psychedelic Rastafarian paints; I was taken back to the late 1980’s. To the uninformed eye, you’d think that this poor guy stumbled onto the photo shoot at a Milli Vanilli sound stage. It seems as though that this photo shoot is where his album title came from. Further research would reveal that Roesy actually has an impressive art resume as well. But on this record, the art is in the music and the Colours are certainly there in the songs and in the musician.

Roesy’s sound seems a strange amalgam of every one of my favorite musicians of the last fifty years. It’s a little bit hard to describe. He’s European; Irish, so, there you go; there are definite vocal similarities with Crowded House; but there are also hints of Cat Stevens, those Gallagher brothers, and, on first listen, I kept going back to Thom Yorke. Maybe it was the Euro lilt; though it seemed to be much more. Roesy’s songs are nothing like Radiohead. They’re more like Radiohead doing lullaby’s. Or Jazz. There is a definite homage to some of the American jazz greats; Duke, Louis; but there’s a free form about the music which reminded me of Mingus, Coltrane, Cobham. I hear the Eagles, I hear Steely Dan, I hear Paul Simon and I hear none of them. This is a sound which washed over me with its simplistically beautiful originality.

Colour Me Colourful starts out with fingers snapping, wind blowing, jazzy electric piano, soft saxophone, hypnotic harmonies and this lead singer who has the commanding presence of Leonard Cohen. “Shape shift me, walk with me, stay a while; trying to shake the devil down.”

As one door closes, a second opens wide and you feel like you’re listening to The Counting Crows or some other lively pop band. His plaintive cry on “One of the Same,” reminds me or Adam Durnitz which made me feel as though this is some mix CD. I was vexed until Roesy broke out in this songs chorus, “And I said baby we’re all one in the same; together in joy, together in pain.” And there he is again; this large voice which opens up and calls out “nobody’s got it stitched or got it all sewn.”

It kept going on and on like that; I was repeatedly challenged every time the track changed. I had to listen to this record twice just to be sure I heard it all right. From the hypnotic conspirator of “Get to the Ocean;” to the gentle strumming of “Home It Has Flown;” or the aggressive beat of “Propellor” to the gentle finale of “Don’t Be Afraid;” you are never sure what it is that you’re listening to.

And that’s okay. As music gets more and more the same old stuff just rehashed in uninteresting and dull ways, it’s really encouraging to hear an artist who is able to take what’s come before him and honor the sound without raping it. Roesy is hopeful which seems to be congruent of the mood of many in my circles. It’s not sugar-coated however; Roesy’s a realist as well. Listen closely to the lyrics, as he sings on the finale track, and you’ll know too; “In these modern days, a troubled mind is all the rage, oh please when you fall low, know that I will hear you, know that I won’t judge you.”

In a music industry that’s just reeling and stifled and groping and feeling, Roesy is an artist who brings promise for a brighter tomorrow.

Monster Island Re-Issue 2001's "Dream Tiger"

Taking Control of Their Destiny; In Re-Release

By Jesse Schmitt

There is not really all that much written about the band Monster Island and in this narrow and growing narrower by the heartbeat music climate, that is just too bad. Just to listen to the lyrics on their re-release from 2001, “Dream Tiger” and I’m immediately taken back to a very familiar place; a place we’ve all been before; a place of shame, insecurity, misdirected rage, curious indignation, sought approval, and the ultimate disappointment that these actions are never forthcoming.

This album sounds to me, in my guesstimation, as a freshman effort from a sophomore band. We all remember the pain and humiliation of being just on the cusp of something much greater; this thing called “adult life” and the constant frustration when we’d always just come up short.

This is what this album sounds like to me; a picture in a frame of a person we once were years before. This picture may be embarrassing to look at today, but if you’d closely examine it, you might see some greater hints of the person you’d come to be. The slight turn in your head and the angle at which the brim of your cap was cocked; the way your head turned away with disinterest yet your body lunged forward in yearning and need says so much about the person you have become. Or the laser stare which cuts through the camera lens and had taken you from your Junior Prom all the way to the bright lights of Hollywood; just as you’d always imagined. Maybe not in the way you’d imagined but the tests of time are present.

So listening to this album which features strange sounds and haunting vocals I was immediately taken back to my grandmothers porch. The initial cling and clang of instruments and the hypnotic hum of an organ made me feel as though I were on the back porch with Grandma, whiling away the early summer days of my youth as the wind chimes tinkled in the still air. This is the way for this band all throughout.The idea that this outfit somehow “needs” to keep their instruments going throughout an entire song seems not the point to these musicians as they play when they want to. This says a great deal about this band as well. We are always struck between our own impression of ourselves cast against the prejudices and preconceptions allotted to how the rest of the world looks at us; this seems to be the same for Monster Island.

The lyrics go back and forth and sometimes meet in between. There is the flighty and airy vocals of Cary Loren who sounds as though she may just be a small girl skipping rope. The male singer (Matthew Smith) sings with darker, more direct, more aggressive intonations but seems similarly caught in the trap of this new to testosterone manner about which he sings. Erika Hoffman also sings and plays violin and harmonium; Warn Defever plays the drums, shakuhachi, and rocks out on the toy piano.

Music is artistry and I like to think of all the music in the world the same way many people view gallery art. Unfortunately music has gotten so commercialized and our tastes are all so fickle that it seems just when something good comes along; something worthwhile and revolutionary, huge money interests are right there to exploit whatever uniqueness was once there and they craft and groom the musician, sucking all the talent right from their bones until they are but a shell.

Monster Island say that they use a variety of influences in their sound including “oud, sitar, tanpura, harmonium, shakuhachi, djembe, gamelan, guitars, bass, cello, flute, drums, Chinese organ, water harp, mini-moog, and gongs.” These musical influences go right along with their lyrical content of “artist and literary biographies, social protest, ecology, apocalyptic verse, long narrations, regional histories, spiritualism, conspiracy theory, Zen, UFOs, Japanese monsters, Haiku death poems and Voodoo.”

This all makes for an interesting listen. So if you are fed up with the standard fare which is offered for you on commercial radio and you want to hear something real and something raw then you should check out Monster Island.