The Spring Standards/You Won’t; November 9, 2013; The Frequency

I wish I had seen a lot more shows when the Spring Standards toured with Ha Ha Tonka, because it turns out they are pretty awesome.  A fact I really didn’t appreciate the first time I saw them in Iowa City when I was on tour with the boys, but that I have come to find out the two times I’ve seen the Standards since.  What they do is pretty brilliant.  Not only do they have three lead singers, but they also have three drummers, and they are the same people.  When they started as a trio with a keyboard, bass and guitar, there was no one to play drums, so they effectively split the drum kit between them.  Each person has a drum or two plus a cymbal that they are responsible for.  Of course, this wouldn’t work at all if they weren’t so in sync with each other, but it does work musically, magically.  They take turns singing lead, sweet-voiced Heather and the two boys named James, who will forever be King James and James the Savior to me since those were the names Tonka gave them, and their harmonies are stunning.  Then there’s Noah, who plays guitar, steel guitar, bass and whatever else they need as he jumps around joyously behind the front three.  I do a lot of swooning at Spring Standards shows.

The last time they played Madison the room was sadly empty, tonight was a much better crowd.  Not only bigger, but enthusiastic too.  On that previous visit they moved to the floor to play several songs unplugged.  Despite there being much less empty space tonight, they did it again.  The down side was I couldn’t hear them as well as last time, but it was still a great.  I couldn’t help but think (again) how great they would sound in the basement.  Hopefully that will happen someday.

Their tourmates on this run also drew more than a few fans.  The quirky duo You Won’t were nerdily charming and consistently entertaining.  Their high energy set had many notable moments, including a sprint through the crowd by lead singer Josh Arnoudse to retrieve wind chimes from the merch guy.  It was an unlikely source of percussion and an intriguing sound.  Perhaps the oddest moment in a set filled with interesting quirks found Arnoudse crooning the classic “I Can’t Help Falling in Love with You” through a plastic whistle pipe, all while standing on one foot.  It was a fun moment in a very fun night.

You Won't

The Spring Standards

Ezra Furman/The Current Seas; November 6, 2013; The Dragonfly Lounge

I certainly didn’t expect to be charmed by Ezra Furman when I saw him open for Ha Ha Tonka this summer, but that’s exactly what happened.  The scrawny, awkward singer with a penchant for wearing dresses seemed odd at first, but ended up awing me with his smart, catchy songs over the course of two nights in St Louis and Madison.  It seems obvious to compare him to Elliot Kozel (of the brilliant Sleeping in the Aviary) who also made interesting fashion choices and also struck me as a crazy genius.  His unique voice isn’t for everyone, but he certainly had some fans in the Dragonfly Lounge tonight.  Impressive since I hadn’t seen anything about the show anywhere except on Furman’s website.  Madison’s newest venue is in the basement of the Bellini restaurant, and a friend has dubbed it the Regal Beagle based on its resemblance to the Three’s Company gang’s hangout (I have to take her word for that). 

I was madly in love with the Year of No Returning, his first record sans backing band the Harpoons, released either this year or last depending on where you look, and which I bought back in June, so I was a little sad that he played mostly tunes from his brand new record The Day of the Dog.   But only a little, because the tunes on this record are just as good.  The last time through he was backed very efficiently by only a drummer (the very cool Sam, who actually remembered me), but tonight he was supported by a full band, including keys and sax.  The latter is surprisingly effective, not in a cheesy Huey Lewis sort of way, but in a demanding and demented jazz sort of way.  It propels many of the songs on the record, including the hummable title track and the brilliant “My Zero.” 

My experience with the Dragonfly thus far had been that they have too many bands and never start on time, happily the two band bill started barely a half hour late.  Opener the Current Seas (meant to be read like “currencies” I’m guessing) was a pleasant surprise.  This was their first gig, but the lead singer/guitar player was immediately familiar.  World traveler Brett Newski has been a recognizable face on the Madison music scene for many years, despite having spent the last couple years in Vietnam, and he played a well-received opening set at the house a few months back.  For his newest endeavor he is backed by the rhythm section of a super cool chick bass player Ellie Maybe and Dan Stoffels on drums.  The first time I met Dan, who also does sound at the Frequency, Newski introduced him as Dan Auerbach from the Black Keys- based on the same first name and his remarkable resemblance to him.  Funny thing is the Deadstring Brothers had called him the same thing.  I really enjoyed them, perhaps even more than Newski’s solo stuff, and look forward to seeing them again soon.

As for Furman, I hope to see him again even sooner.  

The Current Seas

 Ezra Furman

Matt the Electrician/Gerald Dowd; November 4, 2013; Kiki’s House of Righteous Music

Over the years I’ve found that it can be really difficult to get people to come to a show on a weeknight, with Mondays and Tuesdays being probably the worst.  Matt the Electrician’s crowd has grown every time he’s played at the house, so I was hoping it could overcome an early weeknight show.  Then I found out the Packers were playing on Monday Night Football, and to make it worse it was against the Bears.  Despite the odds, the basement was still half full for another set of his charming songs.

Gerald Dowd joked that he would love to play anytime I needed a “low draw opener.”  Other than Count This Penny , who nearly sold out the basement all on their own when they opened for Loves It!, the local openers usually don’t draw many people.  I love having my favorite local musicians play, but I’m always surprised more people don’t come to see them.  So the joke was on Dowd, because several people came just because he was on the bill.  And he rewarded them with a set of clever originals with a few well-chosen covers thrown in.  He had come straight from the airport after a weekend gig with Justin Roberts in San Francisco and didn’t have any of his EPs with him.  But if he had, he definitely could have sold a few.  Instant classics like the tear in my beer country weeper “I Didn’t Finish Drinking Last Night” and the infectious “I Do,” with its catchy chorus “I want to say I don’t like to make you cry, but I do,” were the stand-outs in his short set.  Many people know Dowd as the drummer for Robbie Fulks and Chris Mills, and he paid tribute to the latter by playing a “quick Chris Mills song.”  The under a minute “Girl on the Train” is just that, and it was truly great to hear him play it.  It was great just to have him play.

Turns out Matt the Electrician was the perfect show to ask him to open, he’s a big fan and turned around and spent all the money I paid him on Matt’s CDs.  I don’t really blame him, Matt’s songs are always winning and upbeat, not to mention smart and well-written.  He’s also a terrific storyteller and many of his songs have great stories behind them.  Like the one that was written in a haunted house in the UK somewhere during a songwriting workshop.  His writing partner was having relationship trouble, and Matt thought the song they had written about haunting was actually about her soon to be ex boyfriend.  When they met up again years later he found out she was really just writing about ghosts.  He also played several songs on his “banji-lele,” a teeny tiny banjo that I wanted desperately to be called a "man-jo.".  He said that because he sometimes plays the banjo he gets asked to lead banjo workshops.  He advised us that if we wanted to learn to play, stay away from those.  Self-deprecating humor is also one of his endearing traits.  Many of his songs focus heavily on his family, but they avoid sappy and nail the honesty.  One song was written during a “break” from dating the woman who would become his wife.  He said that while they are certainly happy now, things may have been better if they hadn’t gotten back together. 

He doesn’t play any of these songs for sympathy, but just to be honest.  Refreshing.

Gerald Dowd

 Matt the Electrician

M Doughty used to be in Soul Coughing/Sons of Hippies; October 27, 2013; Turner Hall

When a band chooses a name like Sons of Hippies, there are a few things I expect.  The first is that they are actually sons, so I was surprised to see the lead singer was a girl.  With a name like that, I expected they would either be terrible, like so many openers I’ve seen at the nearby Pabst Theater, or totally awesome, like the equally oddly named Donkeys who had opened for the Hold Steady here a few years ago.  Instead they were fine, perfectly listenable but not very memorable.

I don’t remember if I ever saw Soul Coughing during their three record run in the Nineties.  I feel like I must have at one of the many “New Music Festivals” I went to during that time, but I can’t say for sure.  Lead singer M Doughty has arguably become more popular under his own name since then, releasing catchy, but not as dancey, singer-songwriter fare for the hipster crowd.  But he obviously still enjoys playing these songs.  Look no further than the tongue-in-cheek name of the show, billed as “M Doughty used to be in Soul Coughing,” for evidence.  

The songs from El Oso, Irresistible Bliss and Ruby Vroom have held up well, just as insistent and intriguing as they were when I first heard them.  In opening song “This Is Chicago (This Is Not Chicago)” Doughty presents us with the troubling image of a man flying a plane into the Chrysler Building, though his monotone voice belies any emotion.  For the next hour he played all the best from those records, the only notable no-show was “Soundtrack to Mary,” the first song I ever heard from Soul Coughing, appropriately on the Something About Mary soundtrack.  For most of the songs he played guitar, backed by the unlikely duo of an adorably waif-like girl dwarfed by her upright bass and the actor-handsome dude behind the drum kit.  For others he stepped over to play the small box with keys that I don’t have a name for.  He excused the band to play DJ for a short set of songs, cuing up records to provide the whirling backing tracks.

In a night full of familiar favorites, the stand-out track was “Unmarked Helicopters” from the excellent X Files soundtrack, which featured music from the show as well as songs inspired by it.  I still remember hearing Doughty’s paranoid piece in an episode all those years ago.  “They said it was a weather balloon,” the obviously doubting Doughty says.  Totally killer.  Some of the silliest songs from his catalog are the best.  “Circles” with its repeated chant of “I don’t need to walk around circles, walk around in circles, walk around in circles,” does just that in your head.  It’s the repetition that makes these songs so easy to groove to.  “Super Bon Bon” doesn’t have one sensical line in the whole song, but its infectiousness is inescapable.  While I couldn’t possibly have been enjoying it as much as the guy behind us who I am pretty sure was having an orgasm, I was definitely wearing my own satisfied smile.