Greg is putting this series of interviews together in preparation for his panel at SXSW this year.  It’s an interesting read, & there are definitely more than a few takes on the music industry & where it’s headed.  Greg describes the subject of his panel as this: “Just how important are music blogs to the industry today, is that prominence growing or fading, and how will new technologies and strategies impact the marketing mix in the coming year? Join prominent music bloggers, record label and PR firm executives to discuss the state of the industry and what’s around the corner.”

To get your own fix of the discussion without actually attending the festival, go here to read the various interviews he did in preparation.  We look forward to hearing how everything went down in Austin.  Minneapolis represent!

You and Jeff met hosting a graveyard jazz radio show- What were some of the records you bonded over?

Jeff made most of the picks, because I don’t know much about jazz. He’s obsessed with jazz bass, so there was a lot of that on the show. Mingus, Christian McBride, and the best of them all Ray Brown.

You and Jeff went through several different bandmates before Jocie joined- how did she come in to the picture and how did you know it would work?

Yea, when we got serious about the band, we started as a trio with a blues song writer named Dan Lefkowitz from Virginia. He split after a year leaving us as only a duo. That’s when we started learning lot’s of different instruments so we wouldn’t be a bass and guitar songwriter duo. We wanted to have beautiful and deliberate textures for all the songs. Jocie first came along because we asked her to play clarinet on a track of our first record. But she started showing up to shows with her clarinet and we’d invite her to sit in. Before we knew it, she was picking up all sorts of instruments that were on the stage and playing fluently. She’s so very talented.

Unlike many band names “The Low Anthem” feels like a deliberate statement. How did you choose that name?

Not deliberate at all. In fact it was given to us by a childhood friend of mine who played ever so briefly with us in the early days of the band. It wasn’t until years later that we learned the name came from an Ayn Rand book called Anthem. It’s an awful book. Really boring. But what’s in a name anyhow?

The band holed up on Block Island to make Oh My God, Charlie Darwin. What was it about that place and experience that was integral to the record?

It was an eerie ghost town. Empty. All the summer shops and bars closed except one market. We didn’t see a soul. The quiet and the emptiness sank into the sound. It was also a pressure cooker. To be in such intense isolation together during that time.

When you are working together, how songs form? Who brings lyrics, melodies? How much give and take is there?

I write the songs for the most part. Jeff is a big help and also writes some of the songs. Once they’re written though arrangement is a trial and error with all hands on deck. Nothing comes out the way I expect going in. Everybody brings ideas. We try them all until we find something that excites us.

The acronym “OMG,CD” contains obvious contemporary slang, which has a dissonance with the more anachronistic music contained therein- was that a consideration in titling?

No, those are just the initials. That’s all. We didn’t want to name [the song] “OMG,CD”, “Oh My God…” because then that would be the title track, which wouldn’t have made sense. Maybe it’s funny I don’t know. We don’t use a lot of internet slang.

Why choose the Tom Waits tune “Home I’ll Never Be” to cover? Are there other cover songs that have worked their way into your repertoire?

We love that song. Have you heard the two versions on Orphans: Bastards? Amazing. Most covers that we’ll play are traditional or old songs, and mostly about whiskey. Cigarettes and Whiskey. “Sally Where’d You Get Your Liquor From”, “Moonshiner”, “Rye Whiskey”, “Yes I Guess They Ought To Name A Drink After You”, “Beefstakes” and so on.

Given the theory of punctuated evolution, and as somebody in it, how do you explain the emergence/resurgence of Americana and folk music like yourselves, the Avetts, Bon Iver, Megafaun etc.?

Hey, I don’t know if there’s any one reason, but music that comes from the old traditions will always be around. It’s real, it’s simple.

Nonesuch is one of my personal favorite record labels, but you were selling well before you joined. What was the reasoning to have OMG,CD picked up there and how do you want that relationship to develop?

It’s a great label and one of very few we were interested in. Like you say, we were doing well before they came into the picture. But we like the team there a lot and we trusted them truly. They’re music lovers full on and they make a point not to meddle with their artists’ work. They’re also focused on the long term. None of the McHype thing that you see so often. It’s a very nice situation.

I hear you are a baseball fan- Who do you like now that spring training has started?

I’m a Baltimore [Orioles] fan through and through. It’s pretty depressing these days, but we’ve got good young arms this year and Markakis, Jones, Weiters and Roberts are solid. We might have a fighting shot this year at breaking .500. It’s been 11 years now if I recall correctly.

Would you grow a mustache to complement Jeff’s?

I’ve been working on one, but I’ll always been in his whispy shadow.

]]> http://www.cakein15.com/2010/03/04/photo-recap-free-energy-with-foreign-born-at-the-7th-street-entry/feed/ 0 http://www.cakein15.com/2010/03/03/sxsw-sendoff-for-minneapolis-music/ http://www.cakein15.com/2010/03/03/sxsw-sendoff-for-minneapolis-music/#comments Wed, 03 Mar 2010 17:38:58 +0000 staciaann http://www.cakein15.com/?p=2578

This Saturday another show takes over both the Entry & Mainroom at First Avenue.  It’s a awesomely affordable way to see the hand-picked bands representing Minneapolis who are showcasing at SXSW in Austin, Texas.  Also, there are donuts for $1!

There are two parts to this insane $5 deal – the Mainroom boasts six heavy-hitters in the local music scene: Jeremy Messersmith, Lookbook, City on the Make, Peter Wolf Crier, The Pines, & Romantica.  The Entry hosts the semi-finalists of Vita.mn’s Best of Local Bands contest where you’ll get to see newbies Bight Club, Hunting Club & Joey Ryan & the Inks!  Whoever wins that faceoff in the Entry will play again in the Mainroom at 9:15pm.

The whole she-bang is hosted by two of our favorite people, The Current’s Mary Lucia & Vita.mn’s Christian-Philippe Quilici.  There’s an afterparty in the Entry following the whole thing with The Moongoons!  There is no better bang for your buck this weekend.  Hope to see you there!

Also, Jagjaguwar will be releasing the much-hyped Eau Claire/MSP yacht-rocking supergroup GAYNGS record Relayted this spring, so look for that for your prom flashbacks and summertime deck shoe wearing.

The benefit show will also feature a raffle and silent auction. Items for both are being added daily, and currently include signed guitars from Mason Jennings and Queens of the Stone Age and soooo much more. The painters from Cloud Cult, Connie Minowa & Scott West will be holding an amazing show of their “off-stage” art in the VIP room during the event.

When/Where: Friday, Feb 26 at First Avenue and 7th Street Entry
Tickets: $16 in advance and $20 at the door
Doors: 7pm
Music: 7:30pm

A portion of the ticket sales will benefit The American Red Cross for relief in Haiti.

This concert, a rebirth of sorts, is a fundraiser for the Electric Fetus which was badly damaged in the August 2009 tornado. The store had extensive structural damage and not only went into debt to pay for the repairs but also lost 40 percent of its floor space for more than three months.

The Electric Fetus is Reborn!

Visit www.electricfetus.com for updated information and to check on ticket availability.

Photo by Eric Melzer

Opening tonight, step right up, step right up! At the fabulous Southern Theatre, The Minneapolis New Breed, wonder of all wonders, three young companies, three provocative and sexy groups all on one joint bill for the first time ever! Not to be missed! SuperGroup will live up to their name! Mad King Thomas will issue dance edicts from fringes of taste! And Lamb Lays with Lion? Well, leave it to Lightsey Darst at mnartists.org to give an outsiders view of that: “I can’t tell whether Lamb Lays with Lion vs. Katie Mitchell’s The Seagull is a train wreck or a stroke of genius; I can’t even tell where the performances stop or start.” Which, ladies and gentlemen, is your life in motion! Opens tonight and runs through Sunday, $18 cheap!

***UPDATE 2/26***
Jay Gabler over at TC Daily Planet takes a look at all the action and proclaims himself right, and Staciaann shoots it all for Vita.mn. Three more shows, so take it all in with a tank full of gas and a head full of weird.

Leah Redding and Meredith Cain-Nielsen, photo by Ty Sassaman

Some nights just line up really nicely to stay pretty much in a two-block radius and tonight has that on the West Bank. El Perro Del Mar at the Cedar Cultural Center is a great place to be, chased down with Alec Ounsworth at the 400 Bar to slake your musical thirst. But before any of that goes down, get over to the Bedlam Theatre at 6:30 to catch Tonya and Nancy: The Opera. You read it right, and if you think that the ice dancing costumes on NBC are are good as it ridiculously gets, then you ain’t seen nothing yet. This 2006 chamber opera has been getting some under-the-radar traction in art galleries and now Scotty Reynolds of of the Mixed Precipitation company is giving it a twirl, or a triple salchow or a lead pipe special, or what have you. Any which way, it promises to be a well sung spectacle full of intrigue and drama and is a great way to follow up on Mixed Precitpitation’s summer project, Orpheus & Euridyce: A Picnic Operetta. You can read a great interview about that project via the Heavy Table blog here, and unlike Orpheus’s multi-show run, Tonya and Nancy is only being performed tonight at Bedlam and Thursday at Camp Bar in St. Paul, so skate hard. and get down get a front-row seat of the action.

Also going on tonight, at the 501 Club not too far down from the road from the West Bank is the l’etoile-sponsored celebration New Kidney On The Block, the re-emergence party for Chris Strouth and his new kidney, “William the Conqueror”, selflessly donated by theatre-staple and good-guy-par-excellence Scott Pakudaitis. It’s a feel-good story for the ages, at least for our age, with the two men connecting over Twitter when Strouth posted that he needed a new kidney and it is good to see humanity winning out over mass distraction and apathy. We’re just waiting for the movie with Billy Bob Thornton as Strouth and Phillip Seymour Hoffman as Pakudaitis. With a raft of great DJs at the event, a good time for a good reason should be had by all.