album review: Anton Mink

Anton Mink
Outside the Lines
ROSE ISLAND



Two decades ago, as Riot Grrl threatened to influence a generation, those creatures once known as major labels sent in their own army of harmless suburbanites to distract the teeming masses — Letters to Cleo, No Doubt, etc. — to create a new New Wave for a new generation more concerned with whom Julianna Hatfield was dating than what social change might be possible under the post-Reagan/Bush political climate. This you-go-girl! scene — a minute before the Spice Girls finally took down the guitar bands on the radio — typically led to bands playing in the background of a club scene in an Alicia Silverstone or Drew Barrymore comedy and little more; best for a collegiate audience looking for kegger background music, this weirdly funky pop/rock wasn’t meant to last long, like that Bud Light at that kegger, but oddly enough, here it is again.

c. 2011 LEO Weekly

Justice is served by King’s Daughters & Sons

When WFPK DJ Matt Anthony called King’s Daughters & Sons a Louisville music version of the comic book “Justice League,” he got it right. To call the band a “supergroup” would also be fair, though their combined fame as members of Rachel’s, Shipping News and other bands is notably less than that of the Traveling Wilburys or Chickenfoot.

The new band began with singer-songwriter Joe Manning, a popular local fixture and LEO columnist. Manning wanted to expand his music beyond what the solo format allowed, and to incorporate more surprising influences — the subtle beauty of the Louisville-bred The For Carnation, the gothic pleasures of Nick Cave, as well as the ultimate solo record, Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska.

Manning and guitarist/singer Mike Heineman, writing together, wanted to explore fictional narratives — worlds of ghosts, sirens, murder ballads and other themes not found easily in rock music today. What they found was a style that combined the literary and musical traditions of the American South and the British Isles.

Manning also wanted some of their favorite musicians to join them.

“I initially said no,” Rachel Grimes remembers.

“Oh, did you?” says Manning, surprised, as they laugh.

“I think I said I’d think about it, and took two or three months.”

Heineman clarifies, “I think it was a year of just dudes” before Grimes’ love for the songs overtook her reluctance to join another band.

“We’re so excited to finally have this record coming out,” Grimes says. The title of the Nov. 22 release, If Then Not When, came from a scrambled line she had uttered in comical frustration about the four year-plus haul from their first show to their first album.

“It had been on my mind for a long time, and it’s worked out pretty much exactly how I envisioned it,” Manning says.

It was Grimes’ career path that led them to an unexpected home on a Scottish label. On a solo European tour last year, the pianist met Alun Woodward, former leader of the band The Delgados and co-founder of the influential indie label Chemikal Underground. After he sent her some of their records, she sent him her band’s album.

“At the very last moment, right when we were getting ready to self-release it, we finally set ourselves a date,” explains Manning. “We said, ‘In 30 days, we’re going to decide what we’re going to do with the record,’ and in that 30 days, (Chemikal Underground) said, ‘Yes, we’d love to put your record out!’”

The more traveled members have seen enough of the music business to keep their expectations low. Grimes, bassist Todd Cook and drummer Kyle Crabtree were all personally affected by the 2009 closure of their longtime mutual label home, Chicago’s Touch and Go Records, which occurred shortly after King’s Daughters & Sons recording sessions had begun with producer Kevin Ratterman.

Despite all the obvious problems within their industry, the group members have fans scattered all over, from Louisville to Tokyo. So why did it take so long to get to this point? In the end, probably because what distinguishes them from most new bands — their relative maturity and civility — stopped them from doing anything too rock ’n’ roll cliché.

“This has always been a 100-percent democratic group,” Manning says. “Which means it’s taken a long time to do things.”

Neither the band nor their label are concerned with launching long tours, or acting as though the business of music is currently financially rewarding. The members, who have all seen each other grow up in Louisville bands since the ’90s, have plenty of new songs in progress and are having fun playing together. Still, Manning can already appreciate what they have achieved together.

“If nothing ever happened again, I would like to have a record that I would like to listen to. And I would like to listen to this record.”

King’s Daughters & Sons with Seluah
Friday, Nov. 18
21c Museum Hotel
700 W. Main St.
www.kingsdaughtersandsons.com
$10; 8 p.m.

c. 2011 LEO Weekly

Bassekou Kouyate’s African blues

Veteran string-picker Bassekou Kouyate has made some valuable friends — Taj Mahal, Bonnie Raitt, Eric Clapton, Ali Farka Touré — who have helped him expand his audience beyond Africa. His band’s most recent album, I Speak Fula, was released in 2009 by Sub Pop imprint Next Ambiance.

LEO: How did you learn to play the ngoni?

Bassekou Kouyate: I was brought up in a large family of active griots, traditional musicians who were sought out not just in our village but throughout the area of Ségou and in the capital, Bamako — even sometimes in neighboring countries, for social negotiations and entertainment. My father and uncles, just like their father, were skilled ngoni players. The ngoni is the signature instrument of male griots and, until recently, no other people played the instrument.

Following our family tradition, I was not actually taught until I was 8 years old. My father Moustafa was my teacher, and I was lucky because he was famous as a ngoni player. In addition, my maternal grandfather, Bazoumana Sissoko, was the most famous griot in Mali, but I didn’t get to know him well until I came to Bamako at the age of 16. By that time, he was blind, but he recognized that I was a serious player and was very fond of me. He could recognize me by feeling my hands.

LEO: The ngoni is said to be similar to the banjo, which is used often in American folk music. Do you listen to any banjo music from this part of the globe?

BK: I first heard banjo music when I came to the U.S., to a meeting in Tennessee about the protection of traditional blues music, and met up with well-known banjo players. It was there that I heard American music for the first time; we had no radio or TV, and all I knew was the music I made with other Malian players, who mostly played modern instruments — guitar, flute, drum sets — and with my family, who played traditional Malian instruments.

Since then, I’ve learned to listen to the banjo, which fascinates me because it is so obviously a descendant of the ngoni that was made in my grandfather’s time out of a round calabash with wood and gut strings, instead of the elongated hollowed-out wood base we use now. The U.S. player I’ve listened to most recently is Béla Fleck, with whom we went on tour in 2009. He is the most amazing musician and one of the people who is quickest to pick up on material brought to him by other musicians.

LEO: What can Malian music offer music fans in the United States?

BK: First, it is an opportunity to listen to your roots. When I first heard the blues, I thought it was Bambara music from my home area in Mali, and Americans will be able to hear the same similarities. Next, it shows how traditional music can be developed in a modern form, but Americans know all about that already — we can just show how it works for Malians of our tradition. There is a variety of traditions in Mali, from the Mandé, the Sorai, the Wassoulou, the Tuareg, the Bwa and many more. And above all, what our Malian music can offer music fans in the U.S. is that it will make them want to dance.

For an extended interview, go here.

Bassekou Kouyate & Ngoni Ba
Thursday, Nov. 17
Clifton Center
2117 Payne St. • 896-8480
www.subpop.com/artists/bassekou_kouyate_and_ngoni_ba
$20; 7:30 p.m.

c. 2011 LEO Weekly

Super fun

For a good time, call Supertruck — or, better yet, go see them live when they celebrate the release of their new self-titled album. LEO asked bandleader Daniel Sturdevant about their long road to stardom.

LEO: How did the album come together?

Daniel Sturdevant: My brother Nate joined — we’d cycled through a few drummers before that. This album has three different drummers on it ... It’s been a work in progress for the last two years, really.

LEO: Did you have to block off times around people’s jobs and real lives?

DS: Yeah, yeah, definitely. But it’s been a continuous source of fun, and frustration (laughs), as it always is. Now that we’ve got Nate in the band, it’s been a lot easier. Before, we always had to go around somebody’s schedule, but I can lean on my brother, and my girlfriend Natalie (Hartman, bassist) is home base, so it’s a pretty tiny group. We started out as Jordan (Humbert), the singer, and me — just acoustic guitars, singer-songwriters ... Over time, we built it up to a rock ’n’ roll band; that’s what we enjoy doing.

LEO: How far do you want to take this band?

DS: That’s a good question. As far as I can go. I’m looking forward to getting this out, people hearing it.

LEO: How do you see Supertruck’s role in the Louisville music scene?

DS: I don’t like to see it as just a good time, drink up kind of rock ’n’ roll band, but there is that aspect of it. But at the same time, people can get caught up in that. People seem to enjoy themselves at our shows. People might not say that it’s visually stunning (laughs) or the most intricate musicianship they’ve ever heard, but they usually say they had a good time. We try to bring that excitement, bring the fun. It’s definitely a big part of why we do it. Not to say that we don’t practice — I take my guitar work very seriously, and I’m always trying to better it. I’m never fully satisfied.

Supertruck plays at the Monkey Wrench on Saturday, Nov. 26. For more info, go to www.supertruckmusic.com.