Tag: my morning jacket

TRACK OF THE WEEK + INTERVIEW: Elli Perry “Without You”

I saw Elli Perry for the first time in 2010 or 2011 (back when Brooklyn seemed to be at the height of its chillwave/synth-pop ’80s revival), wailing her lungs out with an acoustic guitar. I was too insecure and intimated to start a band, feeling surrounded by pretentious dudes who only listened to whatever had the Pitchfork stamp of approval. My pretty artist boyfriend-at-the-time brought me to this small loft party where Perry may have just have spontaneously picked up the guitar and I couldn’t be more thankful. Her authenticity and powerful voice filled me with a feeling of relief that there were inspiring women in Bushwick who could express themselves at any time, without inhibition. Her new intimate and bluesy number “Without You,” from her EP Totality, captures this magic totally. Her performance encompasses a swaggering attitude that reflects her spontaneity and freedom balanced with a sweet vulnerability.

Perry has long since left Brooklyn and currently lives in an RV in the southwest with her husband, allowing her to tour the country non-stop. Totality was recorded while camping out in her friend’s living room in Collins, CO inside of a blanket fort with one microphone. The EP as a whole is a prime example of how much power she can harness in her vocal performance alone by utilizing such a minimal set up. Totality comes on the heels of her second record, which included members of Deer Tick and My Morning Jacket as collaborators. We had a chance to chat with Elli Perry about her nomadic lifestyle and what happens when you accidentally cross the Mexican border without a passport.

AF: Can you give me a brief synopsis of all the places you’ve been to and important experiences that have happened since the last time I saw you in Brooklyn?

EP: I moved out of Brooklyn in the spring of 2011. Since then, I’ve lived in New Orleans, in an adobe geodesic dome on a mesa outside of Taos NM, in Fort Worth TX, on an island off the south coast of Georgia, in a small stone cottage in the French countryside, in a wallless shack on the Nicoya Peninsula in Costa Rica, for one very long year in Nashville, and in more Walmart parking lots, public lands, and random driveways than I can count since moving into our RV in February of 2017. Some of the moments and experiences that stand out from those years and places are dancing in Mardi Gras super parades with the carnival krewe I was a part of while living in New Orleans; getting a crash course in self-sufficiency while learning how to homestead, grow my own food, maintain a composting toilet, and other such things that come along with living off grid; getting a divorce; touring 200 days a year for multiple years on end out of my beat up Nissan Cube; lying on the floor of a bistro in the 10th arrondissement of Paris the day after the 2015 terrorist attacks, during the midst of what was thought to be a second attack (but was fortunately a false alarm); recording to tape for the first time while I was tracking my last LP Little Thieves in Nashville; meeting my husband, who I married during the total solar eclipse in August of last year; renovating our RV together; experiencing the kind of confidence and peace that comes from knowing you are making art you truly believe in; and adopting our dog, who is the weirdest creature in the world and my best friend.

AF: 2017 looks like it was an incredibly momentous year for you! How have your performances, creativity, and songwriting evolved over the year?

EP: 2017 was as humbling as it was momentous for me. I had taken several years off from touring and releasing much music, as I had gone through a dark season in my personal life, and needed a lot of time to write and release my last record. By the time it came out and I was back on the road promoting it, I had changed so much that I kind of had to relearn how to be a performer and how to tour. I had gotten sober during those years, which really blew the doors open on my creative output. I can’t overstate the impact sobriety has had on both the quality and quantity of my artwork. But I also had to figure out how to get on stage and then talk to people afterwards without a drink in my hand. That was a challenge, as someone who deals with social anxiety, and who is also front and center by herself all the time – I don’t tour with a band, so there’s no one else who can help be my buffer or take up some of that interactive slack with the audience. I’m also touring with my home, husband, and dog with me now, which is about as different as can be from road-dogging it out of a car and living in motels or sleeping on air mattresses in the living rooms of strangers. But once I started to work out the kinks of those new logistical elements, it ended up being one of the most powerful creative periods I’ve ever experienced. Releasing a record that I had spent so much time on cleared up vast stretches of mental real estate for other creative work. I’ve grown a lot as a writer, and my writing process has changed significantly. I’m also a visual artist, which was something I concentrated on a lot last year. I painted all of the artwork for my last album packaging, and collaborated with my husband on the artwork for this EP (he’s a photographer, so we spend a lot of time working on projects together). I decided to make Totality about halfway through last year, and was chomping at the bit to get into the studio by the time I was able to actually plop down and record it somewhere. I’m about halfway through writing my next LP, which I plan to record later this year. Suffice it to say, 2017 left me with a lot of inspiration and drive.

AF: How did you come to the decision to move into an RV? How did you find your RV, does it have a name and what is your favorite RV-related story that’s happened so far?

EP: I started thinking about buying an RV after establishing the release date for Little Thieves. I didn’t want to be away from my husband for months on end, we didn’t like where we were living nor did we want to keep paying an exorbitant rent to be there, and I knew I wanted to tour differently than I had before. As you know well, road life burns you the fuck out. I just didn’t want to go through that again. The idea of being able to cook my own dinners and crawl into my own bed after shows sounded very appealing. I started obsessively scouring online sales listings, and finally found our rig in Savannah, Georgia, about an hour from where my parents live. It is named “The Turtle.” We gutted and renovated it ourselves – that was a story and experience in and of itself. Apart from that, my favorite RV story is no doubt when my husband accidentally drove us into Mexico without passports, and we were detained by Border Control while they searched the RV with dogs for nearly an hour. They were so convinced that two people who look like we do, who “accidentally” crossed the border were packing something illegal. We weren’t. Stress and subsequent hilarity ensued.

AF: After creating a super-polished full length record and a more bare-bones EP, which recording experience did you enjoy more and what do you think you would like to do next production wise?

EP: I loved both recording experiences equally. For all their differences, they share two significant commonalities. First, they’re both projects I was immensely proud of, and material that I really needed to get out of my head/heart and into the world. Second, and probably most importantly, both were collaborations with my friends. The musicians who played on these two records are folks who I admire to no end, and they also happen to be people I love. You can’t ask for much more than that when bringing a record to life. I will say that from a technical perspective, I far prefer analog recording to digital. For the next record, I hope to marry the two experiences by bringing together collaborators from both projects. Adam Landry, who produced Little Thieves, is such an amazing friend, and is my guitar guru. Bryan Gibson, who played cello on Totality and mixed the EP, is one of my oldest musical mates. We’ve been playing together since I was a teenager. Getting those two in the same room together would be a dream. The next record will be full band again. But I’ll probably follow it with another stripped down EP for the hell of it. I don’t want to have to choose one approach or the other. And I certainly don’t want to ever go three years without releasing a record again! That shit is for the birds.

Listen to the full Track of The Week Playlist below…

 

 

NEWS ROUNDUP: Politics & PJ Harvey

  • Listen to PJ Harvey’s “Guilty”

    “Guilty” was recorded at the same time as Harvey’s latest album, The Hope Six Demolition Project. It’s a political shuffle that tackles subject as a corrupt judicial system and drones. Check it out:

  • Let’s Get Political

    Breaking news: The world sucks, guys. Here’s a brief roundup of musical responses to the tragedies of the past few weeks:

    My Morning Jacket: “Magic Bullet” – The lightly funky song was posted on Soundcloud on Monday with a long message condemning gun violence, which reads in part: “It does not matter your race/creed/sexual orientation we are all filled with the same beautiful blood- a mix of old and new generations… past present and future…we are all in there somewhere…in the blood lines together…all of humanity.”

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    https://soundcloud.com/my-morning-jacket/magicbullet

    “23 Ways To Die” – Alicia Keys organized celebrities and artists such as Beyoncé, Chance The Rapper, Rihanna, Common, Chris Rock and Taraji P. Henson for “23 Ways You Could Be Killed If You Are Black In America.” The video, which premiered on Mic.com, opens with a sparse piano track. The powerful video shows clips of those mentioned before, and others, stating the reasons Black people have been killed by police in America; simple things like wearing a hoody, failing to signal a lane change, and walking towards or away from the police.  Watch it here.

    Wahsa: “Justice” – The experimental Brooklyn band shared the song “Justice” on Facebook Sunday, with the following message: “A year ago, Max Mellman approached several artists and I in support of the Baltimore riots to compose songs around field recordings taken during the protests. Although the songs were never released, I feel now is a more relevant time than ever to share in support of those whose lives have been lost. My thoughts and prayers are with you.” The ambient track features the sounds of chanting in the background, and becomes suddenly intense at the end as the voices chant “justice.”

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    https://soundcloud.com/washamusic/justice

 

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LIVE REVIEW: Spanish Gold @ Mercury Lounge

SpanishGold

Some nights, there is absolutely nothing better than heading to a small concert venue in one of your favorite neighborhoods and being blown away by a band you’ve never heard before. This is what happened at Mercury Lounge on June 3rd at Spanish Gold’s gig.

Spanish Gold is made up of the joined forces of guitarist and singer Dante Schwebel (of Hacienda), guitarist Adrian Quesada (formerly Grupo Fantasma) and My Morning Jacket’s drummer Patrick Hallahan. The band’s debut album South of Nowhere is a wonderful example of funky and soulful rock n’ roll with an old-school feel. Schwebel has described the album as “watching a random hour of MTV programming circa 1986-1996” as it has elements of rock, R&B, soul and pop.

Their recent show had me and the intimate crowd engaged the entire time, which is not something easy to pull off.  The thing is, these are all extremely talented musicians who know what they’re doing, and the results are in the music. The album is an exploration of life in South Texas, which is where the band members grew up – most specifically near the Mexican border. When you hear the songs you start imagining a hot day in Laredo, driving in an old Cadillac convertible, smoking American Spirits and drinking tequila.

The show was fun too. Northern Faces, whose EP Southern Faces was released last year, opened for them and did just what any good opening band should do: get the audience excited. The Albany, NY based band is somewhat similar to Spanish Gold in the sense that it also has that true rock and roll sound. And it’s always refreshing to witness a band in its earlier stages because you know they’re truly giving it their all.

Spanish Gold came onstage and it was hard to know where to focus your attention. Schwebel’s voice made it hard to look away from him, but then I’d hear Quesada’s guitar tunes and he’d have my attention, until a drum solo from Hallahan would steal the show. From behind her keyboard, the lovely Silva Belle provided back-up vocals with a little help from Alysse Gafkjen. Though they were difficult to hear in the mix, they had some pretty great dance moves that added to the overall performance. Highlight of the show? When they performed a cover of Bell Bill Devoe’s “Poison;” at that point the audience just lost it.

After an hour and half of a solid performance from beginning to end, I can easily say that Spanish Gold knows how to deliver. These guys may have their individual kick ass projects, but when they are together as Spanish Gold, some really great rock n’ roll happens.

Check out the band performing their single “Out on the Street” on David Letterman:

FLASHBACK FRIDAY: My Morning Jacket

My Morning Jacket
From humble Kentucky beginnings to performing on Saturday Night Live, cartooned appearances on American Dad, and alongside Bob Dylan on a nationwide-tour, My Morning Jacket has made it somewhere, to say the least. Their penchant for blues and folk-tinged rock captured my ears from the first time I heard them. I was sitting in Spanish class in 9th grade, out of sight of my teacher, of course. The album I was surreptitiously listening to It Still Moves, which has been out 10 years this September. Talk about feeling old. I broke the CD a long time ago, but the digital copy will always exist; Indeed, it has stood the test of time.

When I say that this is probably my favorite album of all time, it’s probably my favorite album of all time. I mean, one look at the album cover and you have a hard time saying “no” to listening to it. The songs still carry weight as if hearing them for the first time all over again. From the tropical flavored opener “Magheeta” to the magnificently somnolent (in the best way) closer “One In The Same”, to the ubiquitous track seven snoozer, there’s no “bad song”. Oh, and the fact that their usual recording spot is in a grain silo is pretty badass, to boot. Lead singer and guitar player Jim James’ arresting lyrics always fit the bill. The band would not be what it is without his reverbed crooning, adding celestial atmosphere to their songs. “Golden” captures the feelings this album elicits perfectly: barreling down a long road, going who knows where, with someone you love by your side.

Halfway through the album, their hazy, listening on a Sunday afternoon vibe, begins to crescendo into their showpiece, “One Big Holiday”. The furious tapping on the high hat at the beginning communicates to the listener exactly what’s about to go down. The music, replete with blaring guitar solos off the Richter, speaks for itself, as lyrics are minimal. Following this, the album immediately dives into the comedown track, “I Will Sing You Songs”. A song regarding a relationship nearing its’ inevitable end set to a beautiful dream-like arrangement. One of my favorite parts on the album is in the middle of “Run Thru”. Slow to rise, it takes a complete 180 with a synth heavy interlude complete with Iron Maiden style riffs. Imagine watching bread bake in the oven then a guitar rips out of the bread and blows your mind. A weird occurrence, but that’s exactly what it would be like.

The ethereal beauty of their double tracked vocals, especially on the end of “Steam Engine”, is so melodic and makes an imprint on your mind whether you like it or not. It becomes their trademark by the end of the album, and you want to hear more. It Still Moves is a sleeper, groundbreaking album: something you wouldn’t expect to move music forward. Without My Morning Jacket, I doubt the whole folk and blues-rock movement would’ve taken a turn for the better. Festivals such as Austin City Limits and Bonaroo are breeding grounds for bands of this sort, but My Morning Jacket gave them a confident voice by doing what they did.

Watch “One Big Holiday” performed at Bonaroo. They may have now traded in their T-shirts for suits, but when you get down to it, this is what My Morning Jacket is all about.

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