Pete Ashton’s Blog

Continuing the genre dance, GDFAF #8 was Anti-Folk. What the hell is Anti-Folk, you might well be asking. At least everyone I’ve spoken to about this gig responded in that way. I guess it’s like Alt-Country in that it’s an appallingly stupid name for music done by young urban people in the style of old countryside people. You start off with “real” folk music done by genuine musicians with buckets of authenticity. This then gets watered down and blandified into something tedious which the young punks reject wholesale, but then someone stumbles upon the old recordings and realizes there’s something to this whole folk thing and gives it a go, but they can’t call what they’re doing “folk” because folk sucks, so they call it anti-folk and eventually everyone gets used to it, the young punks get older and everything goes full circle. Oh, the wacky world of neologisms. What can you do…

So it was back to the Jug for the third time this fortnight so far. The first two were local band nights with sparse crowds mainly made up of friends of the groups but this was different, two bands from the States playing as part of their UK tour and the gig was pretty much sold out. The venue room at the Jug is relatively thin so if you actually want to see anything you’ve got to be near the front. Thankfully I’d come armed with a bunch of mates and, given the fears of a sell out, we’d got there nice and early so were able to secure a good pitch. There were also some of those lovely people who insist of sitting down at gigs and while this isn’t the most efficient use of floor space it does mean more people can get a good view lending a slightly bohemian atmosphere to the occasion.

First up were Schwervon, a girlfriend-boyfriend duo with Major Matt Mason on guitar with Nan Turner on drums and both of them singing. Yes, “White Stripes”, but ignore that shit. They looked strikingly normal, which seems a little odd as a lot of the bands I’ve been seeing have looked like they just walked off the street and picked up some instruments (occasionally they sounded like that too) but there was something refreshingly unpretentious about Schwervon. They could quite easily be your mates, which isn’t to say they didn’t have their quirks. Mason didn’t shuffle so much as very carefully move around the stage as if he might break something or (as chum Jez put it) had once had a really bad altercation with a guitar lead and didn’t want to repeat the experience, but still managed understated flourishes - at one stage he gently bent one leg behind him to emphasize a particularly notable riff which had the same effect as if he’d started swinging from the speaker stacks.

Their music was a very loud variation on the guitar/percussion thing with both of them taking lead vocals with the occasional conversational duet. Mason’s vocal style had that slightly nasal wine similar in some ways to Stephen Malkmus while Turner’s took me a long time to pin down, quite powerful with an attractive crack, it reminded me vaguely of Kim Deal or Kristen Hersh, but those are kludgy comparisons. Another stupid thing to say would be that most of their songs started off like Roadrunner by The Modern Lovers, but it did cross my mind a couple of times. Above all they had their own thing going on and it was good, if a little subdued compared to what followed. (mp3 clips here)

This was the third time I’d seen Jeffrey Lewis play at the Jug (reports here and here) and the sixth time he’d played there and he’s certainly built up a large following in that time. As I said, the room was packed to the gills and pretty much everyone knew his stuff inside out, which always surprises me, partly because I have this irrational sense that Lewis is mine and nobody else knows about him (patent nonsense of course but I’m sure you’ve had this feeling about a band) but also because, outside of his gigs, I never seem to hear anything about him, online or off. I wouldn’t be surprised if his success is purely down to word of mouth and that everyone at that gig can trace their being there back to someone who was at one of the earlier gigs (if you get me).

If you’re not familiar with Jeffrey Lewis he has two modes, quiet solo songs of maudlin but good humoured self depreciation and loud full-on punk rock. This was more of a punk gig since he was with his full band - his equally talented brother Jack and their drummer David Beauchamp - playing a mix of new songs and old favourites. What really struck me was how tight they’ve become over the years, developing a real stage persona, and there was much less chatting than I’d expected - just a solid plough through the tunes. Of note was the live performance of “The History of Punk on New York’s Lower East Side 1950-1975″, a nine minute lecture in rhyme with snippets of the songs discussed pastiched by the band until “the whole thing moves over to England, England steals all the credit, that’s how it goes”. He also did a couple of his live videos, standing on a table and turning the pages of his sketch book as he sung. These are always a highlight and I’m delighted to say the “History of Communism”, a work in progress that gets longer with each tour, has reached the Russian Revolution. In fact it now spans two books and threatens to eventually take over the whole set.

Lewis kept having to tune his incredibly beaten up guitar between songs and apologised, explaining that it was about to fall apart. Completely covered in stickers the front was peeling off, held on by many strips of duct tape. As it peeled the strings slacked so he had to tighten them which made it peel even more. He’d considered borrowing a different guitar but decided it would be cool to see if it exploded in the middle of set, but it didn’t. Maybe the audience at one of the other gigs will have that pleasure.

This was a slightly different gig in the GDFAF scheme of things as I was not really discovering anything new. Schwervon, being from the same New York scene as Lewis, slotted in nicely and I just sat back and enjoyed myself with all the other fans. The gig was a success, playing right to the end without an encore (which is always tricky - the audience have got more music for their buck but they still feel a bit cheated when the band don’t do that going off and coming back on again thing) and everyone went away very happy.

This review took a long time to write, so sorry if you were hoping to read it over breakfast. Partly I was unsure how to write about Lewis in what’s become the GDFAF style but I’m also starting to feel the strain, exhaustion-wise. It doesn’t help that I’m somewhat aware that I’m being watched having been told in person that people are enjoying this little series. It started in a vacuum and now the pressure is on.

Still, we must persevere. Off to the Hare and Hounds in a bit. I phoned them yesterday to see if they had any live music tonight and they do but the guy on the phone didn’t have the diary on him so I’m going in completely blind.