Don't miss this group at the Fuzzy Cactus, https://fuzzycactusrva.com/, this Saturday, 3/7!
I’ve read JK Rowling’s novel, The Casual Vacancy, so that’s probably where my self-consciousness came from when I was falling for Don Fredrick. Rowling's character is having more of a mid-life crisis and the band she loves is more comparable to the Jonas brothers, but here I am, a busy mom taking time when everything is all about my son, to follow a developing rock band. At times, I’ve felt kind of incompatible with the whole scene - wanting to make friends but being self-conscious of boundaries. In my dream world, I was getting some major self-inflicted Avril Lavigne Sk8r Boi kickback. In my real world, I've often felt like I'm living in several separate real-worlds. Thinking of bringing some unity into my life, I tried and sometimes failed to get old and new friends to go out to these shows with me to catch up and enjoy the music. When I failed, I assumed my friends, like me, are busy and have their own commitments. In busy college-times, I was usually arriving alone at the Friday-night coffee shop shows anyway, but as much as I'd like them to be, Don Fredrick's venues don't feel like my neighborhood. But to heck with it. Still listening at home, blogging has been a great outlet for me to share my passions. (Dancing is good too.) This is my fifth or sixth all-the-way-through listen to Don Fredrick’s DIY release, Lombo, which came out in Richmond on March 31, 2018. This time, I’m in the McDonalds parking lot with my 5-year-old son while we eat lunch the day before Leap Day, 2020. Since the band was discovered to me, I’ve been sharing these tunes with family and friends and think the album is a standout as piece of work in its class, an amazing accomplishment, and a beautiful statement about a person’s relationship with art and the world around them. Call me most annoying fan, wannabe band mom, wannabe/reluctant groupie. I have no idea what to do with my life, and whatever that goes for, like all my good friends in the world, this album has been an inspiration, and I urge you to give it a listen. The reviews from my suburb around the city of Richmond (the city is where all this rockin’ is going down) are thus: My mom listened to all of cover-art track/single “Hot Soup.” She’s offset by anything coming from me in the form of negativity but warmed to the first bold verse that’s brimming with creative imagery. “There’s a bull runnin’ through my yard / Past the tulips, past the ferns. / Knocked the wheelbarrow off its side / Ten pictures like that / Somewhere in my mind.” The lyrics are poetic. I’m getting an allusion to William Carlos Williams, and recall his technique of bringing a single object into focus for consideration and investing special significance in it with simple style. We could say ten things about his short poem about a wheelbarrow, or not. (A teacher of mine suggested that, viewed from the right angle, the wheelbarrow would look like a cross if it were a silhouette.) In our world of Instagram, a photo, said to be worth a thousand words, substitutes many of our daily conversations. At play in Lombo are the tangible - photos residing in a drawer in nostalgic love song “Rug,” and more elusive imagery, like the bull running, of significance in the speaker’s own mind. This provocative image makes me suggest that the group is reflecting on their chosen name. Something refreshing, unique and creative is often-times just what I need to pull me out of a rut, and a great album has the cool power of taking you to that place again and again. As it becomes more and more familiar, it continues to offer new ideas for wonderment or puzzling. Another neighbor and guitarist tuning in called the album pleasant, which we can all use a little more of these days, probably. Through my connection with the band, I’ve become familiar with a scene of on-the-make musicians. Don Fredrick, DIY, creative, classifies themselves in a unique sub-genre: hammock rock. They collaborate with a kindred group, now called Crystal Flowers, support the sounds of femme-rocker sounding She, rock out to Deau Eyes and Spooky Cool, open for the more seasoned Southern rock groups, Giles McConkey, Lord Nelson, or for another busy group in the city, Plastic Nancy. They are enthusiastic about the new album from bluegrass/folk artists, Muther Goose. Pleasant indeed. Following them around to the bar/venues of Richmond has been a pleasure. They are usually on a bill with at least two other performing groups. I’ve featured them on my blog several times, and sometimes feature an individual’s performance. Their first self-titled release was catchy and laid back, and on Lombo they are delving into an edgier, darker genre, investigating themes of self-consciousness and paranoia and driven-ness on tracks like Stay Back and Zoom. On the dark side of love and service in Chester. They are tuning in to bands that excite, like The War on Drugs, whose howling organ reminds me of Pigpen and Janis drinking bourbon over the hill out on the edge of the Haight-Ashbury scene, and a guitar lead, wavering, a lonely soundwave in cold space, or stars, arranging themselves in a lens that explodes silently backwards like an eyeball on a collapsing atom, like bacteria, life blooming busily in a petri dish. But Don Fredrick. You’ve got strengths coming from all sides. My favorite Instagram post ever was of keyboardist Sammy Snider spacing out in the direction of the surface of the pool table. Standing in front of a giant abstract painting in the band’s front room, wearing a black beanie and an oversized yellow-ochre scarf, he totally brought out the subtlest background brushstrokes of the painting. The guys share a large row house and built a studio in the basement and they state: “Sammy has been frozen in this position planning our set since last week. Please come to our show – we miss being able to go into this room!” I love that the band loves someone maybe a little like me, who gets so into something that they kinda space out, frozen, totally hung-up on it and a little bit obsessed, and weirdly staring? Maybe we all get that way sometimes. Sounds like they were all hunkered down in preparations for their performance that week. They seem like a dedicated group, and Snider and the other band members hang together, and play great collaborative music. They apparently have the patience for bringing forth even Sammy’s vision. Another anecdote: Pat Bowdring, it’s like he’s a drum track – that’s what everyone says. I feel like I’m always hanging around in line for something with him. Whether it’s in a dim bathroom hallway, talking up first concerts (and I, secretly speculating about what was probably a pretty darn good black eye last week,) oh yep, it’s always the bathroom. The other time it was watching him scam off all the girlfriends. Somehow, he smiled his way up several spots in the long line and ended up with someone’s green apple Dum Dum to boot! We were miffed when the door closed behind him and we realized what had happened, but then again, his act was on next. I think, as a fan, I indulge myself to believe that all the boys are a little cheeky, or, as my dad would say, they’re a-holes. Oh, and inventive, which is good, right guys? But when I finally read the lyrics for the favorite party song from another great DIY album I love, Twin Fantasy by Car Seat Headrest, I realized that the song literally talks about “getting horny.” I could never understand the words whenever we were listening live, but I think that when you put it all out on the line, people can feel it, and they respond. It’s an important ingredient in the recipe. And here we have it: Lombo. Hot Soup. Excellent DIY garage rock happening right now in Richmond, Virginia. Each time I’ve encountered the group, something new about them stands out. Dancing, participating, tuning in, and breaking out of my own groove for a little while. I love what I hear and think you will too.
It’s a well-rounded, beautiful album that makes a positive statement about love, loss, and living life in a rock band. Compelling lyrics (Nearly got myself killed...) keep me guessing, and good humor carries this album to the very top of my playlist. |
AuthorWe are Kieran and Michelle, two 32-year-old William & Mary grads living in Virginia. Archives
March 2024
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