Friday Link Session

  • The Kickstarter for Danny Says, the documentary about Danny Fields mentioned here a few weeks ago, has 15 days left as of this posting.
  • Fiachna Ó Braonáin of Hothouse Flowers has been cultivating a television and radio career the past few years, and he’s currently hosting a great weekly program on Irish radio station 100-102 Today FM called Poetic Champions Compose. Each program focuses on a classic Irish album and includes interview clips and background stories as well as music. Featured artists include the Pogues, the Boomtown Rats, Thin Lizzy, My Bloody Valentine, and more. You can listen via the web every Sunday through December 2, and past programs are being posted to the site.
  • The Dad Horse Experience recorded a Daytrotter session! I’m so excited to see one of my favorite NTSIB discoveries getting coverage in the wider world.
  • Check out a great NPR Tiny Desk Concert from Dirty Three. Beautiful sounds! Warren Ellis standing on someone’s desk! Thanks to friend and guest blogger Brucini at the Black Keys Fan Lounge for bringing it to my attention.

Johnny and the Applestompers/The Misery Jackals/The Dad Horse Experience at Now That’s Class, Cleveland, OH, 9.6.12

 

Johnny and the Applestompers

 

Many fledgling bands find that audiences respond better to their cover songs than their originals. While, sure, part of the reason for that is that people are creatures of habit who love what is familiar, another part of it is that bands in their early stages are also more comfortable with what is familiar, finding it easier to let loose on a song they’ve been listening to for years than one they wrote in the garage last week. Johnny and the Applestompers, whose singer appears to be mostly comprised of sticks and who have the gamest bass player I’ve ever seen, are one of those rare young bands who rock their originals even more confidently than their covers. While they covered everyone from Merle Haggard to Gus Cannon’s Jug Stompers, it was their originals, based firmly in Americana traditions, about drinking whiskey and pretty girls not giving them the time of day that were the most compelling.

 

 

The Misery Jackals

 

I’m going to admit right now that the Misery Jackals just aren’t my thing, but I have no problem giving them props for being a tight, hard-working band who seem like they’d fit right in with the Farmageddon Records crew. And I don’t think it’s irrelevant to add that they seem like genuinely good people. I spent some time talking with bass player Doghouse Tim, and he is such a down-to-earth, hard-working guy who genuinely and deeply loves playing in this band that he made me want to support them no matter how I felt about their music. For me, that’s what all of this is all about: people doing what they love just because they love it.

 

 

The Dad Horse Experience

 

It’s been a couple of years since German one-man band the Dad Horse Experience touched down on American soil, but judging from his grand showing at this year’s Muddy Roots Festival, he’s gained a respectable following here, and I hope it means it will be less than a couple of more years before we see him again.

When I first wrote about Dad Horse here, I noted how odd it can be for an American listener to hear this clearly American-influenced blues-folk-gospel coming out with a German accent. But what brings the listener back is the fact that this is clearly no gimmick, not a joke. Dad comes from a place of real love for artists like Washington Phillips, the Carter Family, and Hank Williams, and he pours that love back into his own music and his performance. While effortlessly playing banjo or mandolin, manning his bass pedals, and sometimes throwing in a little kazoo on top of it all, Dad sang, hollered, and bleated right from the heart throughout his set.

Between offerings like the Carter Family’s “Can the Circle Be Unbroken (By and By)” and originals like “Dead Dog on a Highway”, “Through the Hole”, “The Party”, and “Gates of Heaven”, Dad spoke to the crowd evincing a presence somewhere between friendly stranger and itinerant preacher, sharing stories and scenarios that sometimes seemed to be told with a wink and a knowing nod. And while sing-a-longs are generally cloying and uncomfortable experiences, the audience joining in strongly with Dad on the chorus of “Lord Must Fix My Soul” was a highlight of the night.

An aside: Now That’s Class has one of the best sound set-ups around. The acoustics are great, and the sound isn’t mixed for a point somewhere 20 feet behind the back wall like other venues. This is fantastic when a band is playing. But it is the opposite of fantastic when audience members forget they are in a public space and not their own living rooms. Places like Now That’s Class have two whole rooms you can be in, so if you absolutely must carry on that long conversation rightnowcan’twaitaminutelonger, show your fellow patrons a measure of common decency and take that conversation to the room where someone is not trying to perform so it won’t matter that everyone in the room can hear every, single word of your conversation. Also, asking a German performer if he is a “kraut rocker” does not make you clever and special; it just makes you obnoxious.

The Dad Horse Experience in Cleveland Tonight

 

It’s not often the surprising and enchanting Dad Horse gets to tour the United States, but he’s on our soil right now, preaching the kellergospel. Here’s a clip from his recent stop at the Muddy Roots Festival.

 

“Through the Hole” – The Dad Horse Experience

 

He will appearing tonight at Now That’s Class tonight, and it promises to be an interesting experience. There’s no telling how long it will be before he makes it back this way, so don’t miss it.

 

“Kingdom It Will Come” – The Dad Horse Experience

 

Thursday, September 6, 9 PM
The Dad Horse Experience
The Misery Jackals
Johnny and the Applestompers

$5

Now That’s Class

If you’re too far away to catch this gig, Dad has a bunch more American stops coming up with more being added all the time. Keep tabs at the tour page.

Sep.07: THE BRASS RAIL, Fort Wayne, IN
Sep.08: TIP TOP DELUXE, Grand Rapids, MI
Sep.09: WANDER INN, Mishawaka, IN
Sep.10: REGGIES, Chicago, IL
Sep.11: OUTLAW RADIO CHICAGO, living room session
Sep.12: TBA, Le Claire, IA
Sep.13: THE DUSTBOWL, Madison, WI
Sep.14: WISE GUYS, Mason City, IA
Sep.15: WILD TYMES, Saint Paul, MN
Sep.16: FLOWER SHOP, Sauk Rapids, MN
Sep.17: NORTH STAR BAR, Rochester, MN
Sep.18: ROZZ-TOX, Rock Island, IL
Sep.19: NEW HAMPSHIRE BAR, Quincy, IL
Sep.21: THE CRACK FOX, St. Louis, MO
Sep.22: NEW DAISY THEATER, Memphis, TN

 

The Dad Horse Experience Official Website

The Dad Horse Experience @ Facebook

 

The Dad Horse Experience: Live in Melbourne

 

Today, we are happy to share the good news of a live album from our favorite German gospel artist. To be honest, he’s the only German gospel artist I’ve listened to.

…are there other German gospel artists?

Anyway, regular readers may already know that the Dad Horse Experience is not your typical gospel act. (Indeed, I don’t think Dad Horse Ottn – who usually makes up the whole of the Dad Horse Experience – is your typical anything.) As 2011 shed its old clothes and became 2012, Dad Horse took his unique “kellergospel” – intended to bring light to the dark cellars of the world instead of being played in the already-illuminated churches – to Australia. He gathered up Australian musicians Renato Vacirca (drums) and Anto Macaroni (guitar, harmonica), dubbed the outfit “The Dad Horse Experience XXL”, and set out to make friends and converts in the land of “the people who walk upside down”.

 

I am Falling (live in Melbourne) by The Dad Horse Experience

 

And it was a success. Such a success that they recorded two sets, one at the Old Bar and one at the Retreat Hotel, and now offer the cream of those sets on a 12″ vinyl, Live in Melbourne. The 10-track LP is accompanied by a more expansive 21-track CD, including renditions of the hymn “Will the Circle Be Unbroken?” and Hank Williams’ “Lost Highway”, and the set can be purchased at the Dad Horse Experience website (those outside the European Union may find this currency converter handy for figuring cost).

If you’re not already sold, Dad Horse is offering “The Merchandise Song” – a tale familiar to touring musicians – in return for subscribing to his newsletter (from which you can unsubscribe at any time). Get it here.

 

The Dad Horse Experience Official Website

The Dad Horse Experience @ Facebook

 

The Dad Horse Experience: Dead Babies Singing in the Sky

 

“Like a dead dog on the highway…” sang an unmistakeably German voice. It was the kind of lisping German accent that my American ears associate with camp villains in bad movies. Then in came the banjo.

What?

“Like a dead dog, I’m hanging around,” the German voice continued singing over the quaint banjo melody. “Won’t you stop and pick me up? Dig me a deep hole in the ground.”

I was, to put it kindly, perplexed. What in the world was this? In my head, my conditioned American thoughts, banjo and heavy German accents did not belong together. But I kept listening, fascinated, compelled to find out what this was all about. And as unprepared as I was for the initial track, I was yet again thrown off balance by what the second track brought.

 

Kingdom It Will Come / THE DAD HORSE EXPERIENCE by dadhorse

 

Oh yes, there was definitely something worth investigating here. By the end of the album, I was smitten.

Dead Dog on a Highway is the second long player from the Dad Horse Experience, which consists mostly of a man who goes by the name Dad Horse Ottn. He sings while accompanying himself on banjo, keeping the rhythm on bass pedals and throwing in some occasional kazoo1, playing what he has dubbed keller (German for “cellar”) gospel. Keller gospel draws from an amazing range of influences from the simple and perfect country of Hank Williams, the gathered folk of the Carter Family and the outsider gospel of Washington Phillips to punk to polka. And it’s all filtered through one possibly deranged, definitely unique man who apparently didn’t begin playing music until he was 40.

Dead Dog on a Highway is a wunderkammer of an album that contains more treasures and obscure delights than I have the time and space to limn here. You’ll certainly find entertainment here and things to make you smile. You might also find a moment or two of fright. And perhaps, if you’re paying enough attention, you’ll find a song, a moment, that speaks directly to you.

You can get a download of the absolutely-worth-the-price-of-your-email-address “Tella Me, Lord” here at the Dad Horse website.

Dead Dog on a Highway is available from CD Baby, Amazon (US), Amazon (DE), iTunes and Flight 13.

 

The Dad Horse Experience Official Website

Dad Horse plays for Jesco White

 

1Kazoo is making a serious comeback, people. The Carolina Chocolate Drops and Daniel Knox have also made liberal use of the humble instrument.