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| Lake Street Dive |
Lake Street Dive played a club date here in Omaha a couple of months back, and despite the early buzz about them, I foolishly allowed myself to be distracted and missed their performance. I will not allow that error to happen again. Many of my musician friends were in attendance that evening. These are not people who are easily prone to superlatives, so I was pleasantly surprised by the enthusiastic reviews that I saw online the following day, although they did make me regret missing the show. This comment sums up all of them rather neatly: "Rachael Price is my current favorite singer. Lake Street Dive is proof that new, fun, intelligent Pop music is not dead."
Lake Street Dive have been performing since 2004, after meeting as fellow students at the New England Conservatory in Boston. The band was hand picked by Minneapolis trumpet/guitar player Mike Olson, and named after an actual neighborhood of seedy bars in his hometown. Vocalist Rachael Price came from outside Nashville, Tennessee. Bassist Bridget Kearney is an Iowa native, while drummer Mike Calabrese called Philadelphia home. "I wasn't only impressed with their musicianship." says Olson. "They were also a lot of fun just to hang out with. The first four years of rehearsals were more like glorified dinner parties". It's worth noting that Price also has a career as a jazz vocalist, performing with musicians such as Joshua Redman and T.S. Monk. She's also released her own solo albums that include interpretations of standards like "Skylark" and "Serenade In Blue." There's a mood to that music that Lake Street Dive occasionally captures in song, such as Bridget Kearney's composition, "Better Than."
It took a casually made video featuring the band gathered around a single mic, performing a cover of The Jackson 5’s "I Want You Back", that was shot on a Brighton, Massachusetts street corner to grab the public’s attention. The video quickly racked up over 2 million YouTube views. But while "I Want You Back" was spreading like wildfire on the Internet, the band had little idea of what was happening. They were ensconced at Great North Sound Society, a recording studio located in an 18th century farmhouse in Parsonsfield, Maine, two hours from Boston; a location so remote, cell phone reception was spotty at best and web access was non-existent. That's the perfect environment to get some recording work done, as there's little else to do.
Here's "I Want You Back", shot prior to the release of their 2012 EP, "Fun Machine".
What followed next, happened very quickly. T-Bone Burnett tapped them to perform at the "Another Day, Another Time" concert at New York's Town Hall, featuring music inspired by, and from, the Coen Brothers' film, "Inside Llewyn Davis". The concert was taped for Showtime. The New Yorker wrote of their performance: "I can't imagine that Lake Street Dive, a quartet led by an amazing young singer, Rachael Price, won't be getting some air time soon." Rolling Stone called the band "unexpected showstoppers". And just like that, Lake Street Dive went from playing for a small, but devoted following, to selling out venues and planning an initial European tour, with dates on several late-night TV shows in the offering.
The new album, "Bad Self Portraits", which was released by the Northampton, Massachusetts indie label, Signature Sounds Recording, is the follow-up to their self-titled debut and EP of covers. This recording is a microcosm of Lake Street Dive’s evolution from a weird Alt-Country/Jazz group to a Pop-Soul juggernaut. The music showcases 60's influences like Brill Building girl groups ("Stop Your Crying"), British Invasion Rock ("Bobby Tanqueray"), horn-driven Stax R&B ("You Go Down Smooth"), Motown soul ("Use Me Up") and even a Gospel Blues track ("What About Me") that tips a hat to The Band.
All four members of Lake Street Dive take part in the writing. The title track is a wry commentary on how those selfie iPhone photos are just a cover for loneliness, but it could also refer to the rest of the album; each song being a Polaroid glimpse of a band that is constantly evolving. "Nothing we do is set in stone." says Olson about the band’s recording process in the studio, adding that they are, first and foremost, a live outfit. "Songs change when we start to play them for people. That determines the stylistic direction more than anything else. When we record a song, it’s just a snapshot of where it was at that moment, and the song continues to grow as we perform it."
As things are happening rapidly for Lake Street Dive these days, the nine years that they spent focusing on their musical development has left them with one constant to strive for. "We are named in homage to dive bar bands." says Calabrese, "We were, are and always will be, a dive bar band. Whether we're playing for 10 people or 10,000, we want them to have that feeling." In some parts of the country, that's called not getting above your raising, and more often than not, that's a real good thing to keep in your pocket.
On the Kool Kovers Facebook page, I've recently posted videos of Lake Street Dive covering both George Michael's "Faith", and Paul McCartney's Wings hit, "Let Me Roll It". So as a turnabout of sorts, today you get to hear one of Lake Street Dive's original tunes. Here they are, rockin' the house on Conan with "Stop Your Cryin'". What a big sound!
Lake Street Dive have been performing since 2004, after meeting as fellow students at the New England Conservatory in Boston. The band was hand picked by Minneapolis trumpet/guitar player Mike Olson, and named after an actual neighborhood of seedy bars in his hometown. Vocalist Rachael Price came from outside Nashville, Tennessee. Bassist Bridget Kearney is an Iowa native, while drummer Mike Calabrese called Philadelphia home. "I wasn't only impressed with their musicianship." says Olson. "They were also a lot of fun just to hang out with. The first four years of rehearsals were more like glorified dinner parties". It's worth noting that Price also has a career as a jazz vocalist, performing with musicians such as Joshua Redman and T.S. Monk. She's also released her own solo albums that include interpretations of standards like "Skylark" and "Serenade In Blue." There's a mood to that music that Lake Street Dive occasionally captures in song, such as Bridget Kearney's composition, "Better Than."
It took a casually made video featuring the band gathered around a single mic, performing a cover of The Jackson 5’s "I Want You Back", that was shot on a Brighton, Massachusetts street corner to grab the public’s attention. The video quickly racked up over 2 million YouTube views. But while "I Want You Back" was spreading like wildfire on the Internet, the band had little idea of what was happening. They were ensconced at Great North Sound Society, a recording studio located in an 18th century farmhouse in Parsonsfield, Maine, two hours from Boston; a location so remote, cell phone reception was spotty at best and web access was non-existent. That's the perfect environment to get some recording work done, as there's little else to do.
Here's "I Want You Back", shot prior to the release of their 2012 EP, "Fun Machine".
What followed next, happened very quickly. T-Bone Burnett tapped them to perform at the "Another Day, Another Time" concert at New York's Town Hall, featuring music inspired by, and from, the Coen Brothers' film, "Inside Llewyn Davis". The concert was taped for Showtime. The New Yorker wrote of their performance: "I can't imagine that Lake Street Dive, a quartet led by an amazing young singer, Rachael Price, won't be getting some air time soon." Rolling Stone called the band "unexpected showstoppers". And just like that, Lake Street Dive went from playing for a small, but devoted following, to selling out venues and planning an initial European tour, with dates on several late-night TV shows in the offering.
All four members of Lake Street Dive take part in the writing. The title track is a wry commentary on how those selfie iPhone photos are just a cover for loneliness, but it could also refer to the rest of the album; each song being a Polaroid glimpse of a band that is constantly evolving. "Nothing we do is set in stone." says Olson about the band’s recording process in the studio, adding that they are, first and foremost, a live outfit. "Songs change when we start to play them for people. That determines the stylistic direction more than anything else. When we record a song, it’s just a snapshot of where it was at that moment, and the song continues to grow as we perform it."
As things are happening rapidly for Lake Street Dive these days, the nine years that they spent focusing on their musical development has left them with one constant to strive for. "We are named in homage to dive bar bands." says Calabrese, "We were, are and always will be, a dive bar band. Whether we're playing for 10 people or 10,000, we want them to have that feeling." In some parts of the country, that's called not getting above your raising, and more often than not, that's a real good thing to keep in your pocket.
On the Kool Kovers Facebook page, I've recently posted videos of Lake Street Dive covering both George Michael's "Faith", and Paul McCartney's Wings hit, "Let Me Roll It". So as a turnabout of sorts, today you get to hear one of Lake Street Dive's original tunes. Here they are, rockin' the house on Conan with "Stop Your Cryin'". What a big sound!
You can, and should, buy music from Lake Street Dive at their Online Store. Yes, they're on iTunes and Amazon, but it's so much better to support independent musicians by buying direct from them. "Bad Self Portraits" is available on both CD and vinyl, as is their fine, full-length debut album from 2010, and of course, the "Fun Machine" EP that features 4 cover tunes on it. The very cool vinyl edition of the debut album combines it with "Fun Machine" in a 2 record set! All vinyl albums come with a digital download code. So spread the word about this amazing band, and above all, do not screw up like I did and miss them when they do a show in your city.
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