Sounding Out: Ivan and Alyosha

On the right hand side of this web page there is a list of ‘Labels’ that describe music. Honestly, I don’t like having it there. I think that labeling and categorizing artists and music is really doing them and their music an injustice. From my perspective, it is hard to be open to music and art when we approach it with preconceived ideas and expectations of what it should be and sound like. It was with this notion in the back of my mind that I sat down to talk with Tim Wilson, Ryan Carbary, and Jesse CarMichael of Ivan and Alyosha at Neptune Coffee, in the Greenwood neighborhood of Seattle.

Ivan and Alyosha have a great new EP, Fathers Be Kind, which was released this past week. The EP is receiving a lot of positive attention both locally and nationally. I, for one, flat out love this EP. I think that Tim, Ryan, Pete Wilson (Tim’s brother), Tim Kim, and Jesse have written a collection of really special songs here.

by José Mandojana

With beautiful vocal harmonies and influences that range from Roy Orbison and early Beatles to traditional Hymns and gospel music, Ivan and Alyosha write and sing songs that celebrate family, friends, and their faith. For them, their music is simply an extension of who they are and what they believe. But as Fathers Be Kind receives more attention, they now find themselves trying to keep their music from being categorized and labeled as religious or secular depending on the song and/or the audience. For them, they don’t really understand why there needs to be any distinction. It’s all just music to them.

“I recently heard someone refer to our band’s sound as gospel-tinged, folk-pop.” Tim said. “I would never have thought that people would have associated that with us. Maybe its because of the harmonies or because of some of the subject matter….I don’t really know.” Tim added that whether it is with a pop song or a hymn, singing is a spiritual experience for them either way. “It is just how we live our lives.”

As Tim was speaking I was thinking about my wife’s family. I told Tim, Ryan, and Jesse that when I married into my wife’s family, I entered a world of music that was different from what I experienced growing up. Inevitably, at her family’s gatherings, everyone breaks out into song. The songs can be jazz standards, country songs, or traditional hymns…all with beautiful harmonizing. There is no distinction made between what songs are ‘religious’ and what are ‘secular.’ All the music is just part of who they are and their life experiences.

Tim responded to this by saying that he understood and could totally relate. “The harmonies just come out naturally and that is what we do when we are out on the road. At 3am driving to the next town, we too sing old country songs and hymns and we are all doing harmonies as best as possible…sometimes it is rough," he said laughing. "Sometimes it is great.”

Glorify   

Everyone in the band grew up playing instruments and singing in church, Tim explained, with the exception of Ryan. Ryan jumped in and said that while he did not go to church growing up, it was the old hymns and lots of harmonies in the music that drew him in as he got older. “I remember Pedro The Lion doing an old hymn and I remember thinking ‘what is this?’ I had never heard anything like it before.”

About the hymns, Tim added, “there is a certain richness to the history, both musically and lyrically.” But Tim said that it is only now that he is starting to realize just how much traditional gospel music, going back 50 and 60 years, has influenced his writing. “I don’t know if it is just buried in my subconscious and it just comes out naturally, but it’s kind of funny when you do something three, four times a week, every week for 30 years…it’s just kind of burned into me.”

With just one of the their many musical influences being church music, the band tried, for a while, to get as far away from that association as possible. But Tim said that as their audience has grown, they have come to see that some people are interested in the musical style and their beliefs, and many others just like their music and don’t really care what they believe in. Then Tim said, “I think that it has alienated some people, but it has attracted an equal amount or more.” Ultimately, they don’t really care what people think about what they believe in or choose to sing about. “We live under that umbrella of our faith, encompassing everything that we do, so it is just natural that we are going to write about the things that we believe in.“

Tim said that they have come to realized that whether it is him singing about what he believes in or someone else singing about what he or she believes in, say political ideology, the idea of an artist getting one’s point across and changing minds is the same. Ryan said, “Everyone has a world view and everyone is singing about it.” Tim added, “I don’t think that what we are doing is anything different (from other artists).”

The problem, he acknowledged, is that an artist singing about his spiritual life is not perceived the same way as an artist singing about his political views.  For many, there is a unfavorable association...and this was not always the case. Tim said that he felt that there has been a ‘commercialization’ of the church over the past 30 years by the ‘Christian American Culture’ that has done a lot of harm, especially musically. “We don’t want to be associated with that. But it is hard to get away from it. People are like, oh, yeah you’re a Christian band, I get it. And my response is ‘no’ were not and you don’t get it.”

Tim and Ryan both talked about the longstanding tradition of religion being a part of music. “People forget, because we are so secularized as a society now, the influence of religion on art, in general, over thousands of years...I think we are just an extension of that tradition, in a way. When people ask us about Christian rock, it is not even a thought in our minds."

From my perspective, regardless of how Ivan and Alyosha’s music is categorized….or not (hopefully), it is just plain old good. I told them that beyond the lyrics and music, I thought the new EP really advanced the sound of the band. 

Sonically, Tim said, we wanted it to sound as good as possible. He then smiled and said, "I heard someone call it ‘mid-fi’ where their first album was pretty ‘low-fi.’ With that he started to laugh. “But we were trying to do ‘hi-fi’ on the new album.” He then said in a more serious tone that they were limited to some extent with the equipment that they have. “For the most part, when we go into the studio we are just trying to get the best sound and performance that we can.”

Tim and Ryan said that they try to be perfectionists in the recording studio. If something does not sound just right, if someone is off pitch, they do another take. That can make for a lot of do-overs, especially with at least 12 tracks of just vocals on most songs (at least two for each of them). Ryan smiled and said, “It’s depressing because there is a playlist count on each track showing how many takes we're doing.” 

With Fathers Be Kind now complete and the band set to leave on a two month cross-country tour, I asked them if they get as much pure joy out of performing as they do from just singing and creating music together? Ryan said that he loves creating songs and putting them together. Playing in front of people and entertaining is just different. “Going out and playing and performing is something that we are still learning how to do. We have to create a different kind of connection with the music than when we are just playing for ourselves.”

Tim went on to say that, for the most part, what they try to do at shows is simply have fun. “I think that people respond to that more than us trying to look cool. We try to just play our balls off and forget that there is this odd thing going on where people are standing there watching.” Ultimately, Ivan and Alyosha hope that they create a special environment where their audience connects with the music as much as they do and everyone can let loose and have a great time. Because, in the end, it is all just art and expression.

Living For Someone   

Ivan and Alyosha start touring next week. You can check out their schedule here. 

Sounding Out: Apex Manor

A bit has been written about Ross Flournoy, the driving force behind Apex Manor and the band's debut album The Year Of Magical Drinking, and the 'writer’s block' that he had after his last band, The Broken West split up. As someone who writes, I sometimes sit down and just can’t seem to get started. I can’t really put my figure on the reason why I can’t, and trying to figure it out only makes things worse. So I was curious to talk with Flournoy and see if his inability to write could simply be chalked up to 'writer’s block’ or whether it was something more. More importantly, I wanted to know how he got himself back to a creative place as an artist.

“My creative period ended when the band broke up and then I was adrift. I think that maybe in some ways I was more crippled by the uncertainty of the future than it was necessarily suffering from quote un quote writer’s block. It was very strange.”

Flournoy and The Broken West had a great, well received, debut album. The band was mounting a strong following and they were excited about the future. But their follow up album was not received as well by critics or their fans and show attendance was hit or miss on tour. Ultimately, Flournoy said, the band felt kind of demoralized by it all. “Our first record was pretty well received across the board and with our second record it was a lot more contentious. A few people really liked it and a lot of people were kind of pissed off that we had a different sound than the first record. So I think that the rigors of touring coupled with the fact that the second record seemed to have died...it just made it hard to sustain the morale in the band and things just snowballed and eventually we said let’s got our separate ways.”

Flournoy said that before the band started touring he had a really romantic idea that the band would be together for a long time. “As I looked around at other bands that would break up, I would think well that’s so silly. How come they couldn’t keep it together? But of course that ended up happening to us.”

While the band’s record label, Merge and others in their professional circle understood and supported their decision to fold the band, they also gave them words of encouragement to keep going. I asked Flournoy how one responds to such words when the band was at a place where they just could not go on. “It’s frustrating that’s for sure. And it was sad......you have people who have been in the business for a long time saying that you are poised to break through and you think well why can’t we keep it together and make that happen. But, I was also relieved and excited to be able to do something on my own.”

Flournoy said that prior to the band breaking up he felt like he was being very creative, writing quite a bit at home. “For me writing songs is the most satisfying thing that I do in my life and it is exciting when I’m on sort of a roll like that. And then after the band broke up I really started to feel rudderless.” He said that he knew that he wanted to keep making records and writing songs but that he did not know how he was going to do that. “It wasn’t clear. I think that I got to a place where I did not know what was going to happen so I was paralyzed by fear. May be that does qualify as writers block. I don’t know….it was tough.”

I had read that Flournoy started writing again when Carrie Brownstein from NPR’s Monitor Mix blog challenged her listeners to write, record, and submit a song in a weekend. Flournoy responded by writing Under The Gun. I asked Flournoy whether turning the corner creatively was as simple as responding to a blog challenge or whether there was something else going on in himself at the time.

“I think that it was probably both of those things. Danny who was sort of my partner in the Broken West had this metaphor that as a songwriter, sometimes the well runs dry and when it does, you just have to wait for it to fill back up.”

Flournoy said that after being in a place where he was feeling low and wasn’t writing any songs for a period of time, his well had been replenished and he was ready to spring back into action. “Without sounding conceited, I really loved the song that I wrote for the challenge and the way it turned out. It really got me fired up again.” He said that he finally had these ideas that he was excited about. “I thought, well ok, if I can write something like this then I feel like I am on a roll again. It re-energized my batteries and got me juiced again.”

Under The Gun   

I asked Flournoy if his song writing was different when he started back up from what he had done in the past. He said that he felt more confidence as a lyricist. “I think that for a long time I didn’t think that I was very good at it…and I am not saying that I am good at it now…but I just didn’t feel like it was my strong suit. With this group of songs, I really feel, for the first time, that I’m communicating something that…while not necessarily always apparent to listener…is a true reflection of what I was feeling and going through.”

I asked him if he feels more vulnerable writing songs that are more personal regardless of whether or not the listener recognized it. “Oh yeah, for sure. And definitely on this record every song deals with something that I was going through and I remember feeling, at the time that I was writing them and recording them, that I was very excited that I was revealing myself. And then I remember very clearly….after the record had been mastered and turned into Merge (records)……thinking oh shit what have I done….if people really started paying attention to the lyrics, they are going to learn more about me that I would really like!” But he said, in hindsight, he was glad that he did it.

I could sense the vulnerability Flournoy felt in putting these lyrics ‘out there.’ I asked him if there was one song on the album that digs down a bit deeper and reveals more about the place that he was at after The Broken West broke up. He said that song would be Southern Decline. “It really is about finding comfort in getting drunk.….About being drunk and not being able to stop being drunk.”

What intrigued me about this song, and many others on The Year Of Magical Drinking is that at its musical heart, it is a pop song. I asked Flournoy how he reconciles the difference between the up tempo-ness of the song and the lyrics. “I think that in general, as a song writer and a music fan, I have been drawn to stuff that varies buoyant music with a darker lyrical tone. I have just always liked that juxtaposition.”

Southern Decline   

In talking specifically about Southern Decline, Flournoy said that he liked the lyrical honesty and the sense of exuberance and excitement in the music, which was how he felt when he was recording it. “After The Broken West break up, and what I went through, and then Merge wanting to do this record, I felt excited.” He said that the contest had given him the courage to send a new bunch of demos to Merge and see what they had to say. “That process was all so terrifying because they could have said ‘no this is not what we are interested in.’ I did not know if I would get the change to make another record again.”

But Flournoy did get the chance to make his album and the results are really great from my perspective. Flournoy can write a catchy melody as well as anyone and the songs on The Year of Magical Drinking crackle with life and energy. I asked him if he felt a new lease on life now. He said that he felt liberated and wanted to do what came naturally to him. “In so much there being a guiding principal for the record it was ‘I’m going to write the songs that I enjoy and that I wanted to hear whether they are too poppy or not.”

This response got me thinking. What if Apex Manor’s debut album follows a similar arc to that of The Broken West’s first album? What would Flournoy do the second time around?  Would he feel beholden to anyone? Fans? Critics? I asked him about his conviction to do what he wants artistically. What happens if he gets a creative itch that he feels needs to be scratched that takes the sound of a second album in a different direction from the first….again. Would he do it knowing how things turned out for The Broken West?

“I would be lying if I said that I haven’t thought about that. Would I be scared having going through what I did with The Broken West? Definitely. Maybe the band might not have even broken up if we had made a second album that sounded like the first one.” He said that the idea of history repeating itself is terrifying. But he said “At the end of the day, it’s got to be something that I am going to be happy with. And then I will have to live with that, whatever the consequences might be.” Which he finishes off with a happy, yet nervous chuckle.

Holy Roller   

Apex Manor Will be out on the road in support of The Year of Magical Drinking in February and March. You can check out their tour schedule here. For those here in Seattle, they will be at the Tractor Tavern this coming Friday, Feb. 4th.

ANGUS & JULIA STONE, DOWN THE WAY

Last week I chose Hold On as one of my song picks of the week. After another week with the album, I really wanted to give the Stones some more visibility here. Angus and Julia Stone are a brother and sister who have been writing and recording since 2006. Down The Way, their sophomore album, was huge hit in their home country of Australia, ultimately capturing the Album of the Year award and Single of the Year award at the Australian Record Industry Awards in 2010. Down The Way is a charming album with beautiful and subtle vocals and music. This is a wonderful album and I highly recommend a listen.
Hold On   

Sounding Out: Jonathan Byrd

I loved reading Jonathan Byrd’s bio. Open, honest, and descriptive, Byrd left no personal rock unturned. Upon finishing my read, I wondered whether Byrd was really such an open book about his life and music. Turns out after talking with Byrd, that he would not know how to close his book if he tried…and that is a good thing. It is what makes his music so good.

“I was nineteen when I went into the Navy. I took almost a year off after high school, and just worked at a grocery store and messed around town. And then went in. At that point I hated school. I realized that I was not a school guy. I knew I wanted to do something…and I sure didn’t want to go to college.“

I asked Byrd why the Navy. He told me that he had live in Europe with his family for a time when he was younger. His dad had been a preacher at a church in West Germany at the time. He said, “I wanted to go back overseas somewhere as an adult under my own auspices and explore the world a little bit. And the services allowed me to do all of that. It wasn’t really my place. The military is not really into creative people that much. But it was a cool extreme testing experience for me.” Ultimately he said, “I needed to see the world and live a life so that I could write the songs that I write.”

The Ballad of Larry   

Later in our conversation, Byrd talked openly about his childhood, his dad’s alcoholism and the empty relationship that he and his father shared. “We lived in the same house, but I did not really have a relationship with him. But he didn’t have a good relationship with his own dad, and he never learned how to have a good relationship with his son. He was 57 when he died. So we ran out of time.” Byrd said that his dad never got old enough to need him. “I think that I would have learned a lot more about him if I ever had to take care of him,” Byrd said. “We got to know each other a little bit and have some better times together towards the end of his life. That was what inspired my song Father’s Day. That day was the last time that I saw him. It was a blessing to me to have that final memory of him be so positive.”

Father's Day   

Byrd did not write the songs that he now writes when he got out of the Navy. Those songs would not come for many years. “Everyday I played my guitar regardless of what I was doing, but I didn’t even know how to do it for a living…I really did not know what my focus would be if I DID do it and I did not have a direction for it….it just wasn’t something that I thought about until I was 28 or 29.”

The turning point for Byrd came when he went back home to North Carolina. He said, “I discovered, very slowly, this really great scene of acoustic music. There is a lot of bluegrass here. And around where I live, there is a lot of old time, which is pre-bluegrass string band music.”  The scene that he discovered he went on to say, “was a bunch of folks that were really into old time, had all the old records, and learned the old tunes…and they got together on the weekends and at festivals and just had a good time playing this music.”

This Byrd said, was the turning point. “There are people who have really good tone and technique. And they can make records that are interesting to listen to. But really, the thing is to be there with everybody playing. That’s the deal. I find the same is true with Irish music. I listen to Irish music on recordings. Most of the music is really polished and perfected, but the thing to do is to go over there and sit in a pub with 12 people playing these tunes….i think that it is amazing and so magical that way….it is so much more than what a record can be.”

So Byrd sat in the circles and played. And quietly he began writing his own songs. And every once in a while he would throw one of his own into the circle. Byrd explained, “Jack Hardy once said, in the early 60’s before Bob Dylan came along and really changed everything for song writers, the thing to do was to play a bunch of old folk songs, slip one of your own songs in there once in a while and hope that nobody noticed. And that was kind of what I was doing….I was trying to write these songs that were so much in the genre that I would play them for people and they would say wow, where did you get that song. This got me really fired up to write more songs.” From that point on, Byrd had his musical focus and direction.

While Byrd’s first four albums mixed folk, bluegrass, and country music, Cackalack, Byrd’s latest album, takes him back to those music sessions that first inspired him. I told Byrd that in listening to his new album, there is a different kind of energy to it from his prior recordings. He said that he wanted to make an album about North Carolina and its music. “I wanted to get everyone in a room, around some mikes, and play this music, and get that feeling of everybody having a good time in playing music together.”

Chicken Wire   


Byrd is a wonderful songwriter. And I find the songs that hit closest to his heart are among his best. I asked Byrd about his approach to his song writing. He said that he processes things on a subconscious level.

“I am not a conceptual writer. What I mean by that is…..the guy in Nashville will say I have a title for a song…something with a clever twist in it….then they create a story to fit around the title, then they create some music that feels right for the song and they work their way from a conceptual place into a place that has some kind of feeling.  I really go the other way. I am a musician first, a guitar play first really. So when I am writing, I’m usually practicing my guitar and I stumble upon something that sounds good to me…..it starts with a feeling, which is what music is, its just a pure emotion, its all heart.” Byrd continued, “But eventually in the process some words will jump out of me, maybe remind me of someone that I use to know or a story that I heard or whatever has been in the back of my mind processing.”

At the age of 40, Byrd is the musician that he wants to be, writing the songs that he wants to write. Byrd says that he is glad for these past ten years. He said that it took a long time to figure out who he was. “I think that my dad did not know who he was…and I think that he passed that on to me a little bit. It took me until I was almost 30 before I started playing music for a living even though I was playing music every single day of my life since I was 14. It is just good to now know who I am and have spent ten years doing something that I enjoy doing and just figure my own head out.” Byrd has definitely figured out his own head and it comes across in every song that he writes and plays.

Jonathan hits the road in support of his new album in February. If you can, try to catch his show if he is in your neck of he woods. 

DESTROYER, KAPUTT

I have been waiting with great anticipation for months for the release of Destroyer's latest album Kaputt. And I will say that this 9th album from Vancouver, BC native Daniel Bejar was well worth the wait. Uncompromising, Bejar is one of those artists that seems to change musical direction with each new release. On Kaputt, Bejar creates dreamy-ambient pop songs that pay tribute to the sounds and sensibilities of the Brian Eno and Bryan Ferry at their best. I love the inclusion of the trumpet, sax, and flute on many of these songs. This is one of those albums that I know will stay in my listening rotation for a very long time to come.
Kaputt          

                                                       Chinatown     

IRON AND WINE, KISS EACH OTHER CLEAN

 

The Shepard's dog, Iron and Wine's last album, threw me for a bit of a loop. I was so accustom to hearing the lone guitar and voice of Sam Beam that I was unprepared for the expansion of his sound. Turned out to be a wonderful album and I appreciated his musical progression. On Kiss Each Other Clean, Beam has morphed Iron and Wine into an 8 piece band and has never sounded better. On The Shepard's Dog, Beam used various instruments and sounds to accent his song writing. On Kiss Each Other Clean, the instrumentation feels more naturally integrated into these songs. Beam's voice also has grown over the years, singing with more power and range here. As always, Beam's words, observations, and stories telling take center stage. Beam gives
                                                        the listener a lot to chew on and in the end this is my favorite aspect
                                                        to him as an artist.
                                                        Rabbit Will Run         

                                                        Tree By The River