September 27, 2024

Freak Scene #33: Why Seán McMahon Writes a New Song Every Week

Plus, Dinosaur Jr.'s tribute to Jesse Malin, and a slew of new concert bookings.

A Guide to Music in Western Mass. (and sometimes Connecticut)

This week in Freak Scene, we get an update from Seán McMahon, who released music in Western Mass. as Workman Song. Plus, Dinosaur Jr. recorded a song for a tribute to Jesse Malin, the New York singer working his way back from paralysis.

Western Mass. was where Seán McMahon figured he would someday put down roots. Now here he is living on Martha’s Vineyard, balancing family life with his wife and two — soon to be three — kids with a busy calendar full of gigs around the island and Cape Cod. Also, he’s a substitute pastor. And he’s been putting out a new original song every Friday since August.   

This week’s release, “You Know What I Mean,” is his seventh single so far. It’s a slower jam with an acoustic guitar part that circles around his warm, rumpled voice. On the chorus, a buzzy synthesizer sound rises up, taking the song in an unexpected direction.

“I write too many songs and get hung up about what songs go together for albums, EPs, etc.,” McMahon says by email. “What got me in my head about it was all the folks around me over the years telling me I needed to pick a genre. I could never pick one! It’s all the Beatles to me.” 

He’s also dabbled in outlaw country with “Anywhere But Here,” folktronica-meets-Afropop on “Bang Bang” and glammy synth-pop on “Strangers Strangers.” 

“They’re all wildly different stylistically and that's a bit of the point,” McMahon says. “I’m encouraging my listeners to playlist as they see fit, create their own albums of my work.” 

McMahon says he’s writing as many as three new songs a week and trying to record the basic tracks for at least one. He also has a stockpile of more than 100 songs in various stages of completion. The idea of releasing a song every week came from his work in the ministry, but not in the way you might think. 

“When I was a preacher at the local Baptist church for three years, my job was to write a new sermon and pick new music every week,” says McMahon, who held the pastor job from 2020-23 before stepping down. “If they can handle new content every week in church, why not anywhere else?” 

Valley music fans may remember McMahon from his 413 music projects Tidwell’s Treasure and Workman Song, through which he released albums and EPs for close to a decade starting with his 2006 LP VIIb. He was living in New York by the end of 2016 when his brother, the organist at an Episcopal church on the Vineyard, hired him to be one of two singers for midnight mass on Christmas Eve. He had never met the other singer, Katie Mayhew, but it wasn’t long before they were married. 

“It was love at first sight,” McMahon says.

Though the couple thought about moving to Western Mass., job prospects didn’t pan out, and by early 2018 McMahon had landed a Sunday night residency at the Ritz Café in Oak Bluffs and enough work as a substitute pastor that “we were pretty firmly anchored on the island.”

With a break between the end of the tourist season and the expected arrival in March of his third child, McMahon hopes to take advantage of that window to get as many songs ready as he can. Though he often gigs up to four times a day during the height of tourist season, his recent more intentional focus on original material has been a rewarding pursuit.

“More fans have come out of the woodwork to engage with me since I started this project, and I love the correspondence. It’s like having penpals,” McMahon says. “I’ve learned that the process of creative flow is only satisfying for me when it’s an intentional, structured and therefore manageable part of my life, the center of which is my family and faith.”

Dinosaur Jr. Visit ‘Brooklyn’ for Jesse Malin

I’ve said it before: a yearning heart beats beneath the churning sludge riffs for which Dinosaur Jr. are best known. The Amherst trio taps into that wistful sensibility with an aching cover of “Brooklyn” on Silver Patron Saints: The Songs of Jesse Malin, a tribute album/benefit for the New York singer and songwriter. Malin last year suffered a rare spinal stroke that left him paralyzed from the waist down.

The singer, who played the Iron Horse in the 2000s often enough to be considered an honorary Valley resident (I wrote about him here and here, among other places) has been undergoing intensive physical therapy in New York, as well as stem cell treatment in Buenos Aires. He’s making progress: in a social media update in August, Malin shared video of himself standing with a walker. He’s planning to participate in a pair of benefit shows at the Beacon Theatre in New York Dec. 1-2 that, along with Silver Patron Saints and a Sweet Relief Musicians Fund page, will help defray the monumental cost of his medical treatment.

The album also features contributions from Bruce Springsteen, Lucinda Williams and Elvis Costello, Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong, Susannah Hoffs, the Hold Steady, the Wallflowers, Frank Turner, Tommy Stinson, Spoon, Graham Parker, Low Cut Connie, Alejandro Escovedo and Ian Hunter, among others. The Dec. 1 benefit show will feature Williams, Escovedo, Rickie Lee Jones, Jakob Dylan, Butch Walker, J Mascis and Adam Duritz and David Immurglück of Counting Crows. The lineup Dec. 2 is slated to include many of the same performers, along with Stinson, Willie Nile and Adam Weiner of Low Cut Connie. And it wouldn’t be a huge shock if Springsteen showed up at one or both, either.

Upcoming Concerts

Reminder: Sunday is the farewell concert for Steve Waksman, the Smith College professor who is leaving the Valley for an impressive new gig in the UK. His band Electric Eyes performs with Les Derailleurs and Stock Goblin; more info here.

Joe Pernice returns Oct. 19 when he plays at Abandoned Building Brewery as part of a lineup that includes his Scud Mountain Boys bandmate Stephen Desaulniers, Amy Fairchild, Kay McKinstry and Tom Pappalardo of the Demographic. Admission is free, though there’ll be a tip jar.

Wallace Field, Kimaya Diggs, Emily Haviland and Rachel Sumner perform together Oct. 23 at Hawks & Reed in Greenfield in what they’re calling Lady Hang 2024 (more info here). They’ll do it again Nov. 5 at Club Passim in Cambridge.

The Back Porch Songwriter series continues Oct. 13 at the Shea Theater in Turners Falls with a tribute to the music of Lucinda Williams. Lisa Bastoni, Kris Delmhorst, Mark Erelli, Evelyn Harris of Stompbox Trio, Ali McGuirk and the Deep River Ramblers will perform; tickets and more info here.

It’s listed online as “folk,” which it’s certainly not, but Muahaha Fest happens at the Iron Horse on Halloween, Oct. 31, with local rocker Ian St. George and Northampton doom-metal trio Black Pyramid (tickets here). Jess Williamson is there Nov. 9 (more info here; also, I wrote about her excellent 2020 album Sorceress for Paste).

The wondrous Al Olender returns Nov. 7 to the Parlor Room; there wasn’t a listing online yet when I wrote this Friday morning, but there should be tickets and more info here-ish.

We’re barely a week into autumn, so you’re probably ready to make plans for next summer: the Green River Festival returns June 20-22 at the Franklin County Fairgrounds. There’s no lineup yet, but tickets are already available here.

How about more holiday shows? Roots quartet Mr. Sun performs their interpretation of Duke Ellington’s interpretation of The Nutcracker Dec. 5 at the Iron Horse (tickets). If that sounds too meta-musical, Slambovian Circus of Dreams brings their “Very Slambovian Christmas” show to the Drake in Amherst Dec. 7 (tickets). If you’re looking for more funk in your holiday season, Tower of Power’s Holiday & Hits tour stops Dec. 4 at Infinity Hall in Hartford (tickets).

With an entertaining new album due in a couple weeks, Rubblebucket performs Dec. 13 at the Space Ballroom in Hamden, Conn. Manic Presents/Premier Concerts have details.

American Football bring their 25th anniversary tour to District Music Hall in Norwalk Jan. 31; more info here.

If you were all set to see Foo Fighters at this weekend’s Soundside Music Festival, the band has canceled, leading to a flurry of “Dave Grohl pulled out” jokes on social media. Jack White and Greta Van Fleet will play instead.

Next week: Easthampton’s All Feels release their first album.

Freak Scene is always seeking submissions! You can send music for coverage consideration to erdanton at gmail or reply to this email. Check out these guidelines first.

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