Freak Scene #72: Dawn Watch Embrace 'Living Tradition' With Folk LP
Plus, Easthampton band the Urojets return with a wide-ranging collection of cover tunes
A Guide to Music in Western Mass. (and sometimes Connecticut)
This week in Freak Scene, the Northampton folk duo Dawn Watch take a traditional approach on a live set recorded at the Smith College music library. Also, after releasing a pair of albums last year, Easthampton’s Jeff Lloyd — the musician behind the Urojets — breaks a bout of writer’s block with a batch of covers.
Laurie Tupper and Micah Walter deliver just what the title promises on Songs from the Living Tradition, their first release as Dawn Watch. The album is a recording of a performance the Northampton duo gave at Josten Performing Arts Library on the Smith campus as part of a series called JostenLive!
They sprinkle in originals among songs that sometimes date back hundreds of years: one of them, “King Willie’s Lady” (often cited as just “Willie’s Lady”), was first transcribed in 1783, and has been recorded by the English folk singer Martin Carthy and Anaïs Mitchell, among others. Dawn Watch make it their own, with Tupper singing the song a cappella in her high voice.
Dawn Watch begin the album with “Down to the River to Pray,” an African-American spiritual first published in 1867. Walter sings the lead in a clear tenor as Tupper harmonizes (apparently with members of the audience, too). They’re a little tentative at first — it is the opening song, after all — but the pair has locked in by the next track, “I Can See the Troubled Times.” It’s an original song that Tupper wrote during the California wildfires in 2020, and the duo harmonizes on repeating lyrics over Walter’s high lonesome banjo accompaniment.
Tupper’s originals are enough of a piece with the traditional songs that it’s clear how deeply she has immersed herself in folk music as she employs Biblical and naturalistic imagery that she pairs with repetition. It takes on a gospel tinge on “I Can See Those Mountains Lord,” an a cappella song with gorgeous vocal harmonies. The repetition is less effective on “Machines,” a solo meditation on modernization that tries to straddle the line between earnest and whimsical without doing justice to either. She fares better on the album closer “Lament on Route 47,” a sardonic take on the relationship between out-of-state drivers and the speed limit.
Though Tupper sings well on the songs she performs by herself, the way she and Walter sing together is the greater draw here, and his banjo lends extra depth to the tracks that include it. Ultimately, the only real drawback to Songs from the Living Tradition is the occasionally iffy audio quality that can leave some of the vocals sounding muffled. That’s an issue of technology, though, and not ability, and the album is a promising debut from a duo with an abundance of talent.
The Urojets Beat Writer’s Block With Cover Tunes
Sometimes hearing a favorite song can help shake you out of a funk. Jeff Lloyd, who makes music as the Urojets, was feeling low enough last year that it took more than one. “Inspired by my deep depression and unbreakable writers block,” Lloyd writes on Bandcamp, he started tinkering with songs he liked that were easy to play, and emerged with you all like covers don't you?...don't you? It’s a 19-track collection of songs written by other artists, including Patti Smith, Neil Young, Galaxie 500, Neutral Milk Hotel, Yo La Tengo, Hank Williams and Silver Jews, represented here by three tunes.
Under the moniker “Tal Vez,” Lloyd recorded everything himself, in what he calls the “Urojet style”: lo-fi and slightly ramshackle, but never tentative. Sometimes, in fact, the Urojets’ version is fairly different than the original. On “Hey, Good Lookin’,” for example, Lloyd transforms Williams’ 1951 country classic from an unsubtle come-on into a wistful appeal for companionship, with chugging fuzz-tone guitars and multi-tracked vocals that are just a little out of sync. Lloyd keeps Neutral Milk Hotel’s melody on “Two-Headed Boy,” but switches up the urgent acoustic guitar in favor of a more sprawling, chaotic arrangement that surrounds his guitar with blatty bass and a drum track that includes tambourine and a shaker.
In Lloyd’s hands, the Velvet Underground deep cut “Foggy Notion,” an outtake on the 45th-anniversary version of the band’s 1969 album The Velvet Underground, becomes a noisy, garage-rock rave-up packed with scabrous guitar and vocals that overload the microphone. It’s an exhilarating indication that cutting loose can be cathartic. “And I am writing originals again,” Lloyd says by email, “so it worked.”
Upcoming Concerts
The Tallest Man on Earth returns to Western Mass. Oct. 8 with a show at the Academy of Music in Northampton (tickets).
The Iron Horse hosts Luke Bower Sept. 4 (tickets), the great singer and songwriter Alejandro Escovedo Sept. 13 (tickets), "Americana-pop" band Copilot Sept. 24 (tickets) and country singer Kelsey Waldon Nov. 5 (tickets).
Coming to the Drake in Amherst: Nashville rockers the Cordovas Aug. 16 (tickets), Colombia cumbia group Romperayo playing their first-ever U.S. show Aug. 21 (tickets via Secret Planet), R&B singer Lady Wray Oct. 4 (tickets), indie-rockers Willis Oct. 11 (tickets) and the Lemonheads Nov. 25 (tickets).
Bombyx presents the traditional Celtic and Quebecois trio Cécilia Feb. 12 (tickets).
The Lemonheads also play the Warehouse at FTC in Fairfield Nov. 20 (tickets), a few days after the latest incarnation of Black Flag is there Nov. 14 (tickets). The Jayhawks are also there, on Nov. 21 (tickets).
Kelsey Waldon also comes to StageOne at FTC Nov. 1 (tickets). With an engrossing new album on the way, Kathleen Edwards plays Sept. 19 (tickets) and Yasmin Williams is there Oct. 4 (tickets).
The Space in Hamden hosts Baths Sept. 9 (tickets), Lady Wray Oct. 3 (tickets) and the venerable prog-metal trio King's X Oct. 16 (tickets).
That’s it for now, but 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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