SnowGhost Music

Have you ever wondered about the expression ‘tooting your own horn,’ as in, “not to toot my own horn, but I play a mean saxophone”? While blowing smoke up someone’s skirt makes far less sense as a means of complimentary admiration, tooting your own horn seems like a perfectly fine thing to do, especially if you play a mean saxophone. If you’ve got a nice horn, you should probably be tooting it. What, are we supposed to let other people toot our horns for us? Or maybe this expression refers to the bugles or trumpets used to announce arrivals or decrees, like in the days of olde or those tiny horns that clowns use to get your attention and abuse it. Maybe it refers to car horns, like when a station wagon full of girls drives by me while I’m simultaneously jogging and flexing and they toot their horn in deep appreciation. Whatever the source of the expression, I see nothing wrong with tooting my own horn, so please excuse me as I do so now as I detail the great success of our CMJ showcase.

To be fair, I will also toot the lovely horns of Daytrotter and Take The Handle, as we could not have done our show without them. Not to mention everybody at the Glasslands Gallery did a fine job, providing us with a relaxed and hospitable atmosphere. And of course the bands were great to. From Laura Gibson’s mellow but striking opening to The End of The World’s triumphant conclusion, all of the artists played great sets. The audience was great too, especially the ones who didn’t seem to mind getting occasionally bumped or obstructed by camera-wielding SnowGhosters. I guess I’m just going to toot everybody’s horns, since clearly we all deserve a good blow.

The Glasslands Gallery is certainly not your average venue. When we first walked in, I thought that we might have invaded someone’s expansive storage loft that had been shut for years. But as I moseyed around and we began to set things up, I understood that we had picked a pretty cool and appropriate space for our showcase. The sound system was just right (thanks Tom!), the lighting set the scene nicely, and there always seemed like there was just enough room for everyone to be cozy, especially while the winds and rain made the outside world a little unaccommodating. In fact, other than the lousy weather and a few wrinkles in the schedule, the whole thing went off as smoothly as a Barry White song, and while this was largely due to our own professionalism and can-do attitude, it had a lot to do with some great music as well.

Playing a solo set, especially when opening up a lineup of pretty powerful bands, is never an easy thing to do. Laura Gibson did it just fine. Her dexterous finger picking on nylon stings and her occasional boot stomping provided the perfect accompaniment to her gorgeous and timeless voice. Wye Oak came on next, and any first-time listeners can probably understand why these guys are on Merge and getting a lot of attention. Andy and Jen make more dynamic and atmospheric depth as a duo than most bands can muster with 4 or 5 people. How all of that awesome sound can fit inside of a Honda minivan is a testament to talent and creativity.

Bad Veins kept the duo vibe going, incorporating the help of an old reel to reel for additional support tracks. Their brief set was warm and abrasive at the same time, and their imaginative use of megaphones and telephones kept things interesting. Cut off your Hands doubled the band size, and practically doubled the energy in the room as well. There’s always something to be said about an energetic frontman, especially when he can sing and move well, not to mention beat the crap out of a floor tom. These boys from New Zealand look young, but they rocked like seasoned pros. If I wasn’t holding a very expensive camera, I surely would have opted for a bit of pogo dancing.

I almost pogoed to Luke Temple’s new band too. Playing their first public show, Luke’s band (whose name is still mostly undetermined) showed no signs of jitters. Having been around Luke and instruments, I know how versatile he is. So the fact that his latest band sounded different than any other music I’d heard him play before was not at all surprising. As much as I like his solo work, it was great to see Luke completely rock out with a bunch of new songs that were immediately likable and practically danceable. Another nice surprise to me was that there was more to The End of the World than I had previously thought. Even though I totally enjoyed their SnowGhost session as a duo of Stefan and Ben, I enjoyed them even more as a foursome, even if they didn’t play Section House after my gentle suggestions. Next time I will bring bribe money.

All in all, I enjoyed every waking moment of our showcase, and I was fully impressed with just about everything that happened. We even managed to get it all in and out on time and respectfully close out our bar tab. It was a fleeting musical romance, so much so that now I’m literally counting the days until I get to hear the results of our DSD recording efforts. I’m hoping the video turns out excellent as well, despite the fact that a significant portion of the filming was handled by myself. To all of you who came or played, thanks again. And for the rest of you, there’s always next year…