March 11, 2010 8pm
Circus
1227 N. High Street
(614) 421-2998
$10 adv / $12 door
Ages 18+ - under 21 pay $2 Surcharge at the door
Vetiver
http://www.myspace.com/vetiverse
Vetiver are commonly lumped into the nascent “freak folk” movement alongside the likes of Joanna Newsom and Six Organs of Admittance, thanks to leader Andy Cabic’s friendship with scene founder Devendra Banhart. (Besides Banhart’s musical contributions to Vetiver’s first two albums, Cabic co-wrote Banhart’s breakout song “At the Hop,” from 2004’s Rejoicing in the Hands; on the same album, Banhart paid tribute to his friend’s band in the song “When the Sun Shone on Vetiver.”) However, the band’s roots go deeper than Syd Barrett and Linda Perhacs, encompassing the U.K. shoegazer scene and the mid-’90s D.I.Y. indie rock scene. Cabic was part of the latter, forming the Raymond Brake in his native Greensboro, North Carolina in the early ’90s. The Raymond Brake’s noisy, Sonic Youth-influenced take on indie rock was a natural fit with both the Chapel Hill art-punk scene and the influential Washington D.C. indie Simple Machines, which released the band’s debut album Piles of Dirty Winters in 1995. After a handful of EPs and one more album, 1996’s Never Work Ever, the Raymond Brake broke up and Cabic migrated westward, eventually settling in San Francisco. While studying at the San Francisco Art Institute, Cabic met fellow student Banhart and instantly established a close working relationship with the bearded sprite. While playing live gigs with Banhart, Newsom and others, Cabic started writing songs for his new project Vetiver, named for an Asian relative of lemongrass that’s used in perfume making. Adding Banhart on guitar and backing vocals, Jim Gaylord on violin, and Alissa Anderson on cello behind Cabic’s vocals, banjo, and acoustic guitar, Vetiver released its first, self-titled, album on the DiCristina label in 2004. (The album, produced by Thom Monahan of the Pernice Brothers, also included guest spots by Newsom, Mazzy Star’s Hope Sandoval, and former My Bloody Valentine drummer Colm O’Ciosoig.) Vetiver was followed in 2005 by a stopgap odds and sods collection called Between that included two live tracks, plus a new version of a song from Vetiver and a cover of Fleetwood Mac’s “Save Me a Place.” For Vetiver’s second full-length album, 2006’s To Find Me Gone, Cabic finally added a drummer, Otto Hauser, and bassist Kevin Barker to the core trio of himself, Banhart, and Anderson. After the album was released, Cabic introduced a stable, full-time recording and touring lineup of himself, Anderson, Hauser, new guitarist Sanders Trippe, and new bassist Brent Dunne. In 2008 the band released A Thing of the Past, a collection of covers of songs by artists like Michael Hurley, Ronnie Lane and Townes Van Zandt who have influenced Cabic along the way. The band’s next album, 2009’s Tight Knit,was released by new label Sub Pop. - ©1992-2009 All Media Guide, LLC
Moon High
http://myspace.com/moonhighmusic
These Ohioans make utterly transcendent Indie Folk that shimmers with organic grace. The five-piece should be the next favorite band of everyone entranced by the current Indie Folk revolution. Moon High’s self-titled album (recently released in a gorgeously-packaged, handmade second edition, complete with Moonflower seeds) has attracted a lot of attention, largely by word of mouth. The band has been the toast of several music blogs, the modern day equivalent of Alan Freed taking a shine to your record promotion man’s free and loose cash flow. Expect big things. - City Beat
Vug and the Stallions
http://www.myspace.com/vugdemonstrates
At some point over the past few years, those who spend their nights watching rock ‘n’ roll bands in Columbus probably crossed paths with TV Eye.
Unstable but inspired, the teenage trio spun shoegaze-infected psych rock by way of the Byrds and the Jesus and Mary Chain.
Just as they were finding their feet - their ComFest set this year was the sharpest I’ve seen them - singer-guitarist Vug Arakas decided to break up the band and try something new.
Enter Vug and the Stallions. Older, wiser and backed by a rotating cast that often includes members of the Main Street Gospel, Arakas rocks under his own name now.
It’s a smart decision aesthetically; “Vug” is a much more memorable moniker than the borrowed Stooges song title that adorned his old band. More importantly, the switch seems to be panning out for Arakas artistically, too.
That much was clear last Thursday, when the Stallions opened the night at Rumba Cafe. With his brother on drums, the Main Street Gospel’s Tito on bass and MSG’s Barry Dean on lead guitar, Arakas led the group through a set that cashed in on much of the vast potential he’s been showing off all these years.
The quartet covered a lot of ground in just six songs, shifting from slow-burning psych jams to twangy barroom laments to snappy retro pop. A rickety mansion’s worth of ghosts haunted this music, from Crazy Horse to Deer Tick to the Lemonheads, but none were spooky enough to sway Vug’s steady hand.
Barking out rough and tumble tales from behind flopping locks of hair, Arakas was an arresting figure at stage right. Across the floorboards, Dean employed the meat-and-potatoes guitar mastery he’s perfected with the Main Street Gospel, an ingredient just as crucial to this band as his main meal ticket.
Dean’s leads cut through each tune like a laser light show, sometimes blurring with Arakas’ fret work into an eight-miles-high haze.
All this beauty seemed to flow out of their fingers effortlessly. The entire enterprise felt loose and natural - like your neighbors jamming in their basement, only awesome.
Arakas is heading to Akron in January to lay down the first Stallions record. He’d be smart to bring Dean along and capture some of that collaborative magic in the studio. But even without his trusty steeds, the young talent seems set to create something special up there. - Chris DeVille, Columbus Alive