Gregory McIntosh

You actually probably know Greg... ...but do you really know him?

"I've been hiding, essentially," said singer/songwriter Gregory McIntosh.

You've seen him sing and play guitar and perform with Great Lakes Myth Society...or maybe Johnny Headband, or maybe the Victrolas... (or, most recently, with Drunken Barn Dance). "I've been playing solo shows around the Ypsi/Arbor area for several years, but they've been very informal and infrequent affairs; mostly at house shows and such..."

So, forgive me as I indulge a bit of sensationalizing circumstantial meddling of narrative... Michigan ears might get the chance, someday soon, to hear Gregory McIntosh's first "solo album..." To unpack a musical chronicling of this long-time bander's heart and soul.

And this story starts two years ago, finding McIntosh: "in a horrible headspace..." where he "eventually stopped working on the songs, threw away all the mixes I'd taken home and stopped working on music for a while..."

At that point, Great Lakes Myth Society had agreed to go on a hiatus. "I started playing with those guys in 1997," McIntosh said. "That's 13 of my 33 years on this planet."

So, understandably, the feelings surrounding McIntosh's eventual full-departure from the band are "complex..." The progress, McIntosh felt, of the band, had slowed to such a pace, at that point in 09, that "I didn't feel like I could dedicate the time to maintaining it while working with Drunken Barn Dance, or also with Matt Jones & the Reconstruction...and then the solo thing, too!"

Great Lakes Myth Society, in the meantime, have recently re-energized and are working on their third album.

"I love those guys," McIntosh assured, "and I wouldn't be surprised if we worked together in the future."

So McIntosh, perhaps as some form of catharsis, started fleshing out his own songs with Jim Roll at Backseat Studios... ...only to eventually pull back and throw away his own mixes.

It wasn't until Spring 2010 that he felt renewed inspiration to bring more songs out, leading him to start recording with Geoff Michael at Big Sky Recordings. "Geoff and I have known each other for a long time - he's responsible for all the amazing engineering on the GLMS material - and we know how each other works in the studio, so we're very natural around each other in an environment that can, naturally, magnify insecurities."

But in the midst of those sessions, McIntosh lost his day job and had to pull out of the studio, leading him to resort to the humbler environment of his home, with a lo-fi 8-track recorder.

Fatefully, though, he wound up helping Roll out with recording at Backseat. One day, Roll played back some songs that McIntosh had originally laid down, two years ago... "Since I had thrown away everything, previously, everything sounded fresh to me." He was inspired by how good the songs had turned out and decided...to, now, follow through...

And make that foretold solo album^.... only now, it's not so much a solo album. Roll, his long time friend (and current band mate in Drunken Barn Dance) is helping, along with the instrumental contributions of singer/songwriter Molly Jean Schoen (on bass) and singer/songwriter Matt Jones (on drums). Ryan Howard (who also plays guitar in Drunken Barn Dance) is present on some of these McIntosh ballads, as well...

Greg McIntosh - The Absentee from Kevin Eder on Vimeo.

He's got a band now... but no name yet. And, he's almost got an album now... with no title yet...

The songs, in terms of sound, mood or texture, have been uniquely influenced by each studio. Roll's set up is spacious, with "lots of room mics on the drums" and bass running through the B-15 amp; guitars are bigger, noisier and looser than his usual strumming with GLMS or Jones. But there's still softer, folk-ish-inflected elements like horn arrangements, piano and pedal steel. Big Sky, meanwhile, is tighter, smaller and clearer sounding.

McIntosh had been listening to lots of Al Green and Wilson Pickett during this period and though the songs themselves are "far from soul numbers, we did cop the tight, close mic'd drms and really work on keeping the guitars reigned in."

Currently, working and recording at Backseat, McIntosh is helping Schoen finish her own solo album. "Molly and I have a great, super-relaxed and mutually supportive working relationship. Since it's so easy to build anxiety and insecurity in the studio, what with constantly evaluating one's own performance, it's really nice to have that kind of balance."

Same with Roll. "I've known Jim since 1998; we're both built in the same way, especially when it

comes to our psychoses. We crack each other up constantly and we both are really empathetic and earnest people...He's got a knack for getting anyone who walks in the door at Backseat to feel immediately relaxed, which is, of course, the best way to capture a great performance."

Reflecting back on all the other songwriters he's collaborated with and who has had considerable impact, "Jamie and Tim Monger..." came to mind first. "We're, all three of us, very different songwriters, but both of those guys have a gift that they've honed and they've taught me a lot."

Also, there's his dual-band-mate, Matt Jones: "One of the great songwriters out there, local or otherwise." Playing in the Reconstruction has showed McIntosh, "how fucking hard he works at it."

With Drunken Barn Dance, "Scott Sellwood has taught me a lot about letting go of my perfectionist inclinations." With DBD, the ethos/mission is: "three takes to get the song right, with everyone playing live in the same room. If the band doesn't get it in three takes, the song is thrown away, no matter what..."

NEXT:

"There's still so much to be done..." McIntosh said, of the album and securing any future for this band or these songs. "Touring is the most likely option, but Jim and I have some pretty curious ideas about the future of Backseat and it's growth." (A 2nd studio is currently being set up next door).

"Ypsilanti," he surmised, of his own personal musical "hub...is a very tight-knit-group of players and friends all fighting to make the community grow, and I don't mean just the musical community, but the community-at-large." He nodded with endearments and gratitude to "Bee Mayhew's (Beezy's Cafe) presence and support, as well as Andy Garris' incredible enthusiasm to create and sustain a healthy music scene that's becoming more and more, as much of a destination as it is a way of life for those of us living here..."

Urgh!

A collective of inspired local musicians have organized a Detroit answer to a famous/infamous cult concert film from 1982 - but, whereas the original Urgh! A Music War was an in-the-moment documentary of punk's curious, raucous, explosive evoloution into new-wave...

....Detroit's-Urgh! will aim to capture the as-of-yet amorphous but-still altogether rousing energy ricocheting between 18 of it's resident bands, be they rock, electro, punk, dance or in most cases all four at the same time...

"...with a team of Detroit artists directed by acclaimed experimental filmmaker, Brandon Walley, this bombastic night will be captured and filmed in multi-camera HD, 16mm and Super 8. Audience members will also be encouraged to shoot video clips from their smart phones with various takes to be used throughout the DVD."

But the actual completion the actual release of said film, of said-DVD, cannot happen without you. And I don't mean just showing up.

I know that we here in Detroit are notorious for being a bit skimpy when it comes to forking over dough for cover charges exceeding $6... (We're often justified, with comparatively modest day jobs and back-breaking gas prices, but still!!!) We can't fall prey to complacency - and we can't wait around for another Derek Burbidge, or an Ondi Timoner or a D.A. Pennebaker to just come swooping in to glorify us...

Visit the Urgh-Detroit kickstarter and invest... As is inherent to the Kickstarter system, there are rewards to be reaped from your contribution.

Detroit's Urgh goes down June 11th at PJ's Lager House.

Now then....

Originally, there was a screening of the 1982 Urgh! scheduled at the Burton Theatre, for Thursday May 19 - but the independent venue recently closed its doors due to a landlord dispute - thus, it has been tentatively moved to the Russell Industrial Center. Stay tuned for more info - here.

Johnny Headband - Interview (May 13 @ Belmont with Lasers & Fast & Shit)

“You don’t wanna alienate people,” Johnny Headband singer/keyboardist Chad Thompson says, talking with his hands, “but you also wanna say: ‘Let us…show you…what else we can do!”

This is not the same Johnny Headband story you may have heard.

It’s a golden shackle for a band to be commonly known for something. For this Detroit quartet, the boilerplate perception often gets tangled to their live show’s sleek, oddball exuberance. Chad points, “We can still do that.” But, then, he points with his other hand, “but we’ll do this also, and then,” he joins his 10 fingertips, “we’ll combine them and we’ll be stronger!”

The this he refers to, is the pure punch of inspirado soaked into the sonic pages of their forthcoming LP, Who Cooks For You: a propulsive, ebullient and anthemic odyssey that utilized the ambiance of an unassuming cabin’s airy, high ceiling's resonance-boosting architectural layout.

“We went up there, got lost in it and made an album,” Chad said. “I wanted something that made you wanna move, and feel good, and go out into the sun and feel like things are possible. These songs, they’re visual. They’re all on sonic landscapes.”

Johnny Headband Listening Party #1 from JHeadband on Vimeo.

~
What's sometimes overlooked is Headband's dazzling space rock/disco hybrid extravaganzas are presented atop tightly wound performances; exuberant, yes, but more so exacting; they’re each of them girded by years of experience and notable diligence to the craft.

Not to mention their penchant for interweaving earthy (acoustic) elements throughout their recording’s soaring synth and pedal-plumed aural landscapes; as well as Chad’s recent whim of exploring subtle inflections of “weather channel smooth jazz” onto substantial funk!

Yes, they only sporadically appear on the Detroit scene, but that doesn’t connote sporadic activity or wavering dedication. As bassist Keith Thompson puts it: “You gotta leave the pilot light on, even when the oven heat’s not on. We keep our pilot light on because we’re gonna turn it up at some point. So far—we’re ramping it back up.”

Johnny Headband have always been inspiring. They were daring without being reckless. Their songs had a bit of a winked, funk-flaring vibe to them that mutated dancey/dorky new-wave onto epic-reaching atmospheric prog-rock. Their live show was boisterous and baffling, utterly dignifying a pastiche of otherwise kitschy UFO aesthetics with a dynamic display of musicality and keen eyes towards presentation. It was agile improv, harmonious chaos.

Now, with their 2^nd LP wrapped and ready for a summer release, Johnny Headband can be inspiring in a new way; leading by example of how to stay a band in the 21^st century.

Who Cooks implicitly documents their resolve to keep the light on in the face of various obstacles: with no ostensible music business, with Keith tied to demanding yearly touring/recording schedule of his tenure in Electric Six, with their guitarist, guitarist Pan!c currently doubling on drums for Detroit-based electronica/pop quartet Lettercamp, with their drummer, RGS (Rob Saunders) situated way out in Kalamazoo with a day job of his own and with their singer and head songwriter, Chad, negotiating his freelancing-way through the commercial video production world). This is a new story:

This one’s a story of dedication (…beyond the brotherly kind shared by Chad and Keith) and also a story of inspiration (…the fleeting kind conjured only in certain secluded scenario. In this case, the inside of a quaint, roomy cabin up north near a bomb site).

(2^nd “ladder” photo: Trever Long)

Who Cooks for You. “It’s nine tunes,” Chad says, nodding, “like Dark Side of the Moon. We went up north to make it and we disconnected. We disconnected from…technology, from people, from everything.”

“When you’re here,” Keith chimes in from his standing position in Chad’s living room in Ferndale, “you can walk to the coffee shop, or to places to hear music. You can walk and go get sushi. You can walk your dog. Everywhere you look, there’s people. When you seclude yourself, you remove all these things from the equation.”

“We didn’t even have phone reception,” Chad nods.

Chad and JH drummer RGS set up camp in a roomy, decently equipped cabin up in Grayling, last July. Two days into the excursion, guitarist Pan!c joined their base up in the unassuming but idyllic woods near Grayling, MI, near the babble of the AuSable river and yet also not far from more imposing babble of a bomb-testing Military Installation. (No literal explosions made it onto the recordings though).

Up there, in the woods, in the magic cabin, the team marched along to the rhythmic engine of RGS, they survived the harsh whims of the potentially wild outdoors thanks to their in-band Eagle Scout, Pan!c, they got their shit together fast and efficiently with the motivational force of Keith (honed by the all-too-rigorous yearly touring-and-recording schedules from working in The Electric Six) and they were inspired by the enthusiasm and the songwriting vision of Chad.

“We set up a studio, and everything revolved around that; the album process was the priority,” said Keith, who arrived on Day 4.

“We just disconnected from any preconceived notion of what we should do or shouldn't’t do,” Chad said.

In autumn 09, having then just added Pan!c, Johnny Headband released a declarative, fuzz-fired EP, Phase 3 – what Chad now considers “a sonic transition. But, (Who Cooks) has more heart and soul into it.”

“We’re taking Phase 3’s transitory ideas and,” he starts talking with his hands again, like he’s holding an invisible beach ball to his nose, “…taking some new sonic palettes.” He looks at his outstretched hands, “You gotta do this when you say ‘sonic palettes,’ cuz it’s an elevation! It’s an expansion upon what has already happened –to another dimension. Not necessarily better, not worse. Just, more! Not reigning in,…expanding!”

Audiences, whether smitten or bewildered, tend to be drawn to their live show’s dynamics. But if any listener digs deeper, they’d learn what the Thompson siblings learned early on; it takes a lot of work to be the life of the party.

“We are having fun,” Keith assures after regaling all the finger to the bone work that goes into their rehearsing, recording, and live flow, “but to get to fun, to get to that point, in anything, is really a festival of horrible events and difficult things in your life.”

“But, come on,” said Chad, “we started in music a long long time ago.”

“We’re used to a military/factory-based approach to performing,” said Keith. Whether it was school band teachers from their home near Flint equating their rehearsals to car assemblages, or Chad’s exhaustive hours spent woodshedding (and years later, instructing) for Michigan State’s drumline.

Rehearsing “every day, all day, all the time,” said Keith, “is all we know. We’re still doing that, that’s what was instilled in us.”

“It takes a lot of energy,” Keith said, to attain a balance: reentering the Headband headspace after months of enduring becoming a “perpetual zombie” throughout those blurring tour nights with Electric Six and still push oneself to step it up and hone the craft.

"Our energy and our commitment," Keith said, "is going to go up; it’s not always gonna be the same, how we feel about it might always stay consistent, but the amount of time and resources and energies you allocate to it cannot stay the same…for any band.”

“So far,” he looks at his brother, while the final demos sit stored in the laptop on Chad’s coffee table, freshly mixed, “we’re ramping it back up.”

They play some songs. A chorus melodiously swells and soars and Chad throws his arms out, “This is like: you’re outside! You’re outside riding bikes! This is what the cabin sounded like…” The songs utilize the ambiance of that unassuming cabin, with its freshly tuned upright piano.

Who Cooks blends weird Weather Channel smooth jazz trips into hip/hop beats (if they were only played by John Bonham). Atmospheric guitars fuzzily soar over chiming organs and a sonorous upright piano. They interweave the organic elements characteristic to Michigan’s northern woods: ““the outdoor space and the wind and the river and the forest…” The cabin had its own spirit.

“This is not little stuff,” Chad says, recalling the songs they forged last summer and the tranquil invigoration of working inside that cabin. “We got to exist, disconnected, within that bubble, for as long as we could, and just create…until it was time to come home.”

“I think we're a band defined by our live-show,” Chad said, “what we look like what we sound like and what people feel and enjoy together...in-that-environment.” A memorable or remarkable live show is one thing, Chad said, and the band’s appreciative to have something people gravitate toward. “But we’re still gonna try to make our recordings a separate entity that is its own experience. And we’re going to elevate the recording to the level of our live show.”

“You just keep trying to progress and grow and get better,” Chad surmised. He continues to flourish his own freelance commercial video production (as Health + Fitness) while overseeing defacto Headband HQ –a.k.a.—his fully equipped studio basement.

“And…just to stay a band! Stay Joh-ny-Head-Band! I’ve just wanted to be in Johnny Headband, I don’t wanna be in anything else.”

Johnny Headband – May 13 – with Lasers & Fast & Shit, @ The Belmont, 10215 Joseph Campau, with DJ JCV -

Make it 'till you... (Single Barrel and the Prussia Passion Project) - tUnE-yArDs May 11 @ Crofoot

There's no sure fire answer, yet, as to how a band makes it in the music industry, post-Internet-reformation...

I like to think that no one really makes it, these days, and no one will 'make it' for a while to come. And I don't mean that to sound apathetic or jaded; indeed, I think the perceptual shift should be 'making it'...

There was a telling quote from the Fleet Foxes' Robin Pecknold, inside his recent Spin Cover Story Interview ~ "Our first album did ten times the sales that I'm even comfortable with," Pecknold said. (...which was more than 400,000 copies, not even a 'Gold' record by RIAA standards).

And then he subtle slips "I have zero aspirations beyond anything we've already accomplished."

That's damned telling of the new music world mindset.

Because by post reformation standards, Fleet Foxes have 'made it.'

Whatever it takes, however one gets there... Single Barrel Detroit is doing all it can to help Prussia make something. Make it somewhere, maybe?

But at the very least, they're 'making' four films together: a tour documentary captured on a band-traded flip-phone camera; a traditional "Single Barrel performance" set somewhere in Detroit; an elaborate, professionally produced Music Video...and a subsequent "making-of" said-music-video.

Listen...to the song that will eventually be put to film ->here.

"It's more of a passion-project" said Single Barrel producer and co-founder Jared Groth. "This was an opportunity to create something of serious quality for (Prussia)."

Single Barrel recently wrapped up a Kickstarter campaign raising funds to get this grassroots/DIY production off the ground. The SB team put up considerable funds, themselves; with the collective already being a pro-bono enterprise (98% of the time, at least). Director of Photography Mike Berlucchi pulled some favors and got an adroit crew together, and the Kickstarter helped nab a RED digital camera to give this Detroit based quintet of scrawny, shaggy souls "a cinematic presence."

There were other contributors and eventual collaborators for this forthcoming music video - but it might reveal too much as to the overall aesthetic, if not certain plot-details, of the somewhat still 'top secret' music video. Needless to say, Groth was heartened and humbled by the willingness and enthusiasm brought by various members of the community, whether they be in music, in video production, or just open-minded/door-opening home owners (for one strikingly elegant set, rich with character).

Single Barrel Detroit is a collective of videographers, photographers, writers, designers and various other visionaries aiming to document Detroit's artistic and geographic architectural layout. People and places. The focus was "to preserve, as filmmakers and observers, what is in Detroit, what's left, buildings that are on the brink of being razed, and all sorts of really cool things that are here today and may be gone tomorrow...and hopefully will come back again."

To present Detroit's unique, fading locales, "with live music bouncing off the walls," Groth said. "to see how music interacts with those locations, or how the musicians interact with the locations."

They were careful not to tell just one side of one story, and particularly to work against the typical frames of Detroit, i.e. sensationalizing, or even masochistically romanticizing, the blight.

Last year, they filmed national (or, outside-of-Michigan) bands, that toured through, like Peelander-Z and Holly Golightly. But the web site mostly focused on Detroit music. "The hope is someone will come to (Single Barrel)'s site looking for a Holly Golightly video but stumble pon all the great music that's born from here..."

And, again, maybe there isn't a sure-fire answer to how one makes it. Or, even, just how one breaks through...and gets attention.

But a video can be a start. And that's something at which Single Barrel has more-than-proven it's adroitness.

Fancy pants sites like Pitchfork and Stereogum or whoever else is purring out the blog buzz, often feed on dynamic videos or even just bands that have share-able media packages.

This was a "personal project" for Groth, along with his co-producer and SB co-founder Andy Martin (as well as assistant producer Candace O'Leary), as "we've watched (Prussia) grow up over the last few years..." SB was born out of the production crew that hosted Phonotropic Friday night performances in the Vernor's Lounge at the Crofoot...for which Prussia was one of the earliest and seminal featured performers.

"They're in the moment," Groth said, "and they're sitting on an amazing album." Their Poor English still sits in a curious holding pattern, awaiting a proper "drop."

"We believe in them! We believe in their musicality and we believe they deserve attention for that. When (Poor English) drops, they're gonna get it. But we just wanted to do our part to make sure they had something visually that stood up to the album that they created."

SB's crew and contributors...just like any other band, just like Prussia, are balancing their creative passion, with their day jobs. SB shoots are "fun and free and nobody gets paid for it but what they get out of it in terms of enjoyment and experience and the ability to step outside the box and try new things...where as in their normal jobs, they couldn't do that. I think that's our payment."

SB...like any other band...just like Prussia... is making it.

The rock star died. Nobody's gonna go to the tippy-top like Green Day or Kanye West... We might have some Fleet Foxes or some Odd Future's here and there... But there's no shooting-star tail to hitch a ride on anymore....

....now, we make it together.

SB and Prussia...and many others...

Single Barrel continues to create unique mini-documentaries and music videos at a steady pace. Groth, meanwhile, will be moving to Seattle this summer, but is committed to continuing his creative collaboration with Martin and O'Leary.


That said... my favorite album of the year, right now, is WHOKIL by tUnE-yArDs...
that's germane, because:

Prussia - is playing with tUnE-yArDs - MAY 11 - @ The Crofoot in Pontiac -w/Buke & Gass

Gardens - Gardens

I always dug that special sort of twang characteristic to a Gardens song... There was a tinny shimmering guitar melodiously screaming a steady strum through the whole clattering, distortion-heavy affair.

Howling...with a groove.

One wasn't sure if this was the new psychedelic punk or the new lo-fi pop or some transmogrified sort of garage blues...

Whatever it is, it's Detroit's commendable answer to similar rollickin', gracefully-grimed rock n roll tumblers such as Black Lips or Times New Viking or Thee Oh Sees... Fire, fuzz, but a balanced kind of blown-out-ness so as not to ever lose the melody.

And now...they've got a proper full length debut, bolstered by the board work of Chris Koltay (one renowned for his recent work on the surreal/super-charged Akron/Family album). Gardens is out, May 10 - on Alive Naturalsound Records.

Info

More videos

When I go in my mind

Throwback Session - Passalacqua from throwback media on Vimeo.

Passalacqua Interview

Their EP

Mister

Blaksmith (CMY)

Throwback Media

..."maybe that's why I'm speaking at pace that I won't slow down...no matter what you say..."

Unreal last night. Simply unreal.*

*quoted from wall-to-wall Facebook comment --Mister, re: Sparklefest
~
A strange and beguiling and slow surge of ebullience settled throughout him, coaxing an inspired kind of agreeance to the dank, spilled-out circumstance and thus calming and coiling the barroom rabble into a lovely, lulling whir of deluded, if just fleeting, enlightenment...
...
Lady Gaga is on the television in the next room. She looks like a toxic snow flake, numb if also nimble and her eyes are distant as she struts slowly across the stage in an arena thousands of miles away from us, captured on camera from a night a dozen weeks ago... All of the people in that audience are somewhere else now, trying to relax.

And I'm wondering what's real...

And I'm wondering, having written the first^ of the above paragraphs at midnight, on my cell phone, after imbibing in a crowd of head-bobbing sardined souls tacitly radiating their own respective appreciation, if not mere enamoration, with the creative energies clinging to the worn rubber boot of Detroit - whether I'll look back at myself, in 20 years, and just see a blur of exertive nights with ear piercing amps and eye straining luminance, a blur of drifting if not dancing through the disintegrating hours of the morning and having trouble then remembering exactly what you shouted to the band when they got off stage or exactly which of their songs you dug the most...

Will it seem like a heaven? Or a weird kind of hell?
What, or how, will you remember...

But you do remember how endearing SelfSays was, to the crowd. You remember how invigorating, if even frightening, it was to watch Sheefy writhe on the linoleum or do mid-air pivots off of pilars as he sings "fuck you,"... or how fast and how head-spinning-ly articulate Mister is, with his delivery and cadence... or Jelly Roll Joel's uncanny finger-picked psychedelic guitar shreads... you'll remember how incredibly fast (and passionately) the Kodak's drummer was... how primally valiant Woodman were, working their way through a blownout sound system...

You'll remember some, if not all...but...

The energy, to be vague... stays constant, through each night, each year. And you'll remember that more than anything else.

To go into the oven of Northend and look at said-energy right in its yellow-eyed, fang-bared face, ...would make a lot of things, a televised Gaga concert -included, feel less real, or hollow.

Some will have others "let loose" for them...and they'll watch the splendor, the theatre, the escapism...of Gaga or whatever else.

Others seek other outlets for letting loose... And that's where we get something like Sparklefest...

Or Scrummage, for that matter.

Or whatever else is happening next weekend, or next Monday night, in the next available crevice of Detroit.

More music... that's inevitable... enjoy your saturdayz and mint juleps

Legendary Creatures - Bonfires - (Rock Lobster on 5/12 + EP Release on 5/20)

"I was just trying to get a band together...

"...It was just Matt and I at first and no one seemed like they really wanted to do it... Everybody's in a million bands, already, everybody I know. And, I've been going to shows with these people since I was 14...So, it was just my time to do it, I guess."

Sarah Vaughn is the lead singer of Legendary Creatures. She is a humble, unassuming soul with a voice both demure and dazzling, if just dreamily wispy. Curious that such a pretty thing would not have cooed its way into our ears had it not first shined within the daunting atmosphere of a dimly lit, beer-spilt alleyway, exterior to a house party in downtown Detroit...

Curious, if not lucky.

And lucky she had the dedication to dig an entire bonfire pit with just a rusty soup spoon, in her backyard...

...Because that facilitated the a vertiable nursery in which the Legendary Creatures could forge their chemistry by means of impromptu rehearsals at the ashy edges of a constant 5-foot-high flame: twanging out tinny mandolins and sawing out wistful purs of violins while they serenaded the summer stars for nights' on end...

Meet the band that initially blew up on message boards... albeit for Magic the Gathering sites...

Meet the band that is neither country nor folk.

Meet Sarah - and Matt Luke. Meet Jesse Ramsey. Meet Andrew Davis. Meet Nathaniel Burgundy.

Their new EP is called Bonfires and it comes out May 20th, tied to a celebratory concert preceeding that evening at the Magic Stick. They'll be joined by "legendary" experimental chameleon collective His Name is Alive (whose chieftain, Warn Defever, produced Bonfires and is simultaneously celebrating the 20th anniversary of HNIA).

"I never wanted it, personally, to be a country or folk band," singer/songwriter/guitarist Matt Luke says, with a shrug. "It was just me on acoustic guitar with Sarah, at first, so obviously you're gonna get tagged with folk. But that was just for (the first) two or three shows."

Luke and Vaughn, who are cousins, filled a Monday evening's slot back in January 2010, at Club Bart's. Luke had been developing a band with his sister, Katie, but the latter sibling quickly decided it was not for her.

Thankfully, Katie had just heard demos that Vaughn had recorded with Detroit's sagely engineer, Defever. It was Defever who prodded the slightly inebriated Vaughn to belt out a song ("Dream a Little Dream") inside the alleyway, as he'd overheard her, that night, proclaiming her heretofore untapped or unnoticed singing abilities, standing within earshot to her amidst the red plastic cup and cigarette-smoke swathed atmosphere of a Gories' show after party.

Sarah can sing - Katie clued her brother in - get her to join the band...

In the audience at said-first-show for the Legendary Creatures (...the name comes from the first-thing-out-of-her-mouth response of Luke's 8-year-old daughter, Chloe), was bassist/keyboardist Nathaniel Burgundy (who also plays with Computer Perfection and Robin Goodfellow). Burgundy was the first exterior player to be invited to join, but he somehow wound up being the final addition.

So... Enter Jesse Ramsey, a whimsically multi-instrumentalist ("I've never taken a lesson for any instrument" ...(he also performs in Macrame Tiger and takes on guitar, bass, mandolin and can even handle drums)... "so I think I've played them all incorrectly. If I took a lesson now, they'd smack my hands, probably..."

Ramsey's foray into the Creatures was dual pronged.

Luke was appreciative of Ramsey's impromptu display of his newly acquired mandolin skills when he ripped through a rendition of Rod Stewart's "Maggie May," --inside the cavernous and caustic millieu of an artist's co-op, at 5 a.m., after an all-night-party.

But Ramsey had also just moved into Vaughn's new Ferndale house (the same setting for the forthcoming formative bonfire pit). Ramsey came in, bringing his still freshly enthused mandolin magic and the band marched forth with the temporary tenure of Sarah's-brother, Dave ("who winds up playing in 8 bands, at almost any time...")

Enter Davis. Davis is a recording engineer who also performs in bands whenever the window presents itself (having recently provided "freaky synths" to atmospheric/anthemic rock group The Summer Pledge, but also having drummed in progressive experimental punk-tinged groups like Big Black Cloud). Davis had just started dating Vaughn (then, in early '10) - and the two danced and skirted through several conversations - LC needed a drummer...and Davis "wanted to start drumming again..."

"Oh? Andrew wants to drum for us?" Luke recalls with a wink, indulging the cliched response of the precariousness of a girlfriend bringing the boyfriend into the band.

But the answer was: "Let's give it a shot!"

"Even though it was such a stylistic departure from anything else I'd done," recalls Davis, who records bands at Rochambeau Studios, "it just seemed like something that had a lot of potential, where I'd automatically resonated with who was making the music."

What started out as a shuffling waltz of acoustic guitars, -subtle, but glowing atmospherics from the evocative mandolin and Vaughn's crystalline coo interweaving with Luke's own disarmingly high-registering lilt, --would be shaped (in a "ridiculously democratic" manner) by the unique ears and equally unique musical inclinations of Davis, Ramsey -and eventually, Burgundy - each of whom have displayed notable adroitness (in other bands) at blending elements of spaced-out ambience or even more guttural noise-teases into pop formats.

In any case - They put out a demo last year, recorded in Burgundy's basement. But as the summer of 2010 started to simmer, they set to playing and rehearsing...and just invariably venting-out-their-musical-muses, at the side of that bonfire, in Vaughn's backyard.

Ramsey pulled his van into the adjacent empty lot and set up camp. The band spent a whole week around that bonfire, sleeping outdoors in the surreal suburbs, keeping the pit lit, modestly, all through the night and all through the day.

Sarah's spoon dug the pit. The fire acted like the band's beating heart.

Now that the blood was flowing and the song's were developing a healthy pink glow, complete with their own left-field-folk idiosyncracies, they went into Rochambeau to record a proper debut.

"It was the best recording experience I'd ever had," Luke said. Defever helmed the boards for the most part, collaborating with the commendably apt Davis, who pared back his own recording role so that he could focus as himself, more so, as a musician.

"You don't really know what Warn's thinking," Ramsey says, smiling after Luke finished remarking how the HNIA-originator displays both elements of a psychologist and a wizard. "Mysterious" and "engimatic" were words used, but mostly, each member felt as though he'd masterfully coaxed out great takes with astoundingly smooth manner.

"I think the recordings provided a really interesting opportunity to hear everything objectively," Davis said. "We could fully explore and actualize some of these textures and some of the more... 'atmospheric'...for lack of a better term... I think of this as a mildly psychedelic vibe, with, just, sort of washy..."

"Dreamy...psychedelic...mellow..." Burgundy nods to him.

"Within such a traditional song structure," Davis said, tacitly nodding to the somewhat folk or straight-rock song skeletons that Vaughn/Luke initially present to the band, "it becomes an exploration in tones and sounds that really stimulates me. I've been really excited to have an active part in mixing it and making it come to life."

Folk never had this much mystically fuzzed texture; plaintive and pastoral, but made piquant by spacier tones and atmospheric elements.

The substantial momentum of the band, and particularly the chemistry, lends creedance to the strength of the songs. Or at least to the circumstances of the song's formation...

...which started with an alleyway serenade...

and a spoon.

HNIA's 20th anniversary show --5/20 @ the Magic Stick - as well as Legendary Creatures' release show for the Bonfires EP!!!! The fantastic new band, Golden, opens the show...

Legendary Creatures spin records, Thursday, May 12th, at Sakana Sushi Bar (Ferndale) as part of their "Rock Lobster" weekly series.

Fan Funded: Timothy Monger, Small Houses, Match By Match get kickstarted; also: Bad Indians, Man The Hunter, Gun Lake

This month's rock column from Ann Arbor's Current!

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Timothy Monger~interview/album update

Who needs major labels? …Yes, the empowering DIY call rang out, thus liberating and inspiring working class passionates everywhere. But now the latest “indie movement” legitimizes itself when compatriots of the music community put their money-where-their-hearts-are, so to speak, by helping each other via modest donations made through the online creative project funding platform, Kickstarter (with which artists retain ownership and can incentivize donations by offering unique recompenses, like Ann Arbor folk duo Match By Match’s hand-knitted scarves, or singer/songwriter Timothy Monger promising to cover any song of your choosing and even share a bracing run through the rustic trails of Michigan).

“Without a label,” Monger said, “I knew it was going to be tough to raise the money…” for mastering his forthcoming New Britton Sound (the 7-year-awaited follow up to the shimmering baroque-pop debut, Summer Cherry Ghosts). But those years were spent getting out of debt, thus Monger didn’t want to go back in so soon. “It took me a while to get the nerve to go the route (of ‘fan-funding’ sites like Kickstarter),” Monger said. “I recorded most of (Britton) myself over the last three years and kept it very close to my chest. Asking for money in such a public way was scary…” He did his best to rally friends, fans and supporters but still was afraid he wouldn’t meet the goal (Kickstarter sets limits for pledge drives and if “time runs out,” backers are reimbursed). Monger had 30 days…and his funding goal was met in 24 hours!

Monger said Britton’s songs “are all very personal in one way or another and quite a bit darker in subject and tone than Cherry. I worked with some great people on the recordings but much of it was just me in a small farmhouse in rural Michigan, working on my craft.” Future: Britton out in June, amidst steady regional/national gigging, than work on the third Great Lakes Myth Society album and more songs with live band, Timothy Monger State Park.

Here's Tim - courtesy of Mostly Midwest's Bridgehouse Sessions:

Timothy Monger : Bridgehouse Session Pt. 1 from Mostly Midwest on Vimeo.

The heatstring-pluck and wring of Jeremy Quentin’s wanderlust indie/folk project Small Houses met and exceeded its goal (to fund release of his 2^nd LP North) by just $11…but still, the aid is utilized and the sentiment is spurring – Quentin played April 30^th with Monger to celebrate North by releasing its preface, the Just Before the North EP. Head out to Lansing (Scene Metrospace) on 5/14 to catch Small Houses on tour, but he’ll be back 6/5 for the Taste of Ann Arbor Festival.

Debonair folk duo Match by Match are going big for their debut, hoping Kickstarter friends can become “extended family” by funding an ambitious, multifaceted release, with a booklet of original artwork supplementing their forthcoming American Crowbar release (inspired by the origins of neuroscience by way of a tragic, curious true character who survived a railroad spike through the skull). Find MxM’s facebook and follow their blog documenting the album’s recording (by The renowned Roll, known as Jim at Backseat Recordings). At press-time, they were nearing their $3,000 goal, with an April 16 deadline.

Fast Wrap Up: Check out the atmospheric Americana elegance of Gun Lake –(gunlake.bandcamp.com); as alluded to in this column’s October interview, they’ve released their debut LP, Balfour. Bad Indians blew my mind and continue their guerilla-style basement chronicled cassettes: “…recordings can be treated as, almost, an effect of its own; brining something new to songs.” (News @badindians.bandcamp.com) Finally, don’t know about you, but I’m watching Man The Hunter closely, with their 7” out (Ginkgo) just in time for spring – manthehunter.bandcamp.com

Friday=Robin Goodfellow @ Ferndale Library; Sunday=Super F*cked @ Sparklefest

First Stop Fridays @ Ferndale Public Library, featuring this:

Sparklefest, Saturday and Sunday, all day at Northend Stuios, featuring this: