we began the night by arriving a little late, about half way through marissa nadler’s set. her ethereal ruminations, voiced both confidently and hypnotically and drawing immediate comparisons to hope sandoval of mazzy star, were buoyed by her delicate finger-picking playing and the impressive vocal accompaniment of her friend, orion rigel dommisse. rounding out the set with the poe poem “annabel lee”, pablo neruda’s “no hay olvido” and leonard cohen’s “famous blue raincoat,” nadler’s work evidenced itself as more gothic-romantic, imaginative, and intimately solitary than what might be deemed
comfortable for those weened on the more generally-known coffeehouse version of folk.
let me give a few words about the warhol’s concert space itself. for one, it’s small – maybe 10 rows of 10 fairly comfortable cloth-strap seats, with a little bit of standing room in the back. the acoustics were resonant and the sound tech had everything sounding clear and crisp. the crowd was an interesting mix, ranging from a few older couples, a teenage daughter and her father, some hippies, some art kids, a few indie scenesters, and even an unclassifiable, “normal” person here and there. we even managed to share a few words with ms nadler, who sat at the end of our row between sets, and she indicated she was excited to be playing a sunday night set at this weekend’s terrastock festival.
the espers followed and feature six members spanning across bass, two acoustic guitars, an electric guitar, a stripped down brush-and-mallet drum kit, and cello as well as an omnichord, flute, and a few other odds and ends. theirs is a blend of traditional folk and 60’s psych held together with heavy touches of darkest-forest mysticism. while i’m not familiar enough with their music to provide individual titles, the band was able to reproduce the near-pagan, earth-toned harmonies that make up their recorded output. i found myself considering the band to be a logical nexus between the post-rock of godspeed you black emperor, the dusty post-orchestral masterpieces of rachel’s, and the field-ritual music of the jewelled antler collective. admittedly, i don’t see any of those camps taking the time to poke fun at a cross-state rival, as was the case with the philadelphia-based band on their first trip to pittsburgh – but the total silence emanating from the home crowd upon greg weeks’ comments was more than enough to keep his on-stage banter brief for the remainder of the night.
although i like to consider myself a fairly knowledgeable follower of whatever the new wave of folk is currently being called (new weird, freakfolk, psych folk, free folk, etc) this was my first time experiencing it in a live setting, and overall, the biggest impression i came away from the night with was with the different lines that were drawn by both acts squarely through my preconceptions of folk music. gone are the days when folk music was a sonic divider between political parties – this is a brand that has returned to reflect an older day when the greater question was “do you go into the woods at night . . . and why.”
greg weeks’ hat was the closest thing to arlo guthrie this night was going to feature. instead, the loneliness of nadler’s personas is that of the coastal plains widow. the gliding vocals and acoustic picking of espers’ meg baird alongside the cello work of helen espvall and guitar work of brooke sietinsons are the soundtracks to green ceremonies that fall in opposition to the judeo-christian wholesomeness often attributed to folk – yet again, are more rooted in the true nature of the music in the first place.
again though, there are lines at play here even beyond the music itself. this is not music to excitedly dance to and in fact one could be hard-pressed to elicit even an occassional sway. it might be music to relax or even sleep to – but what rest would come from dreams soundtracked by these lullabies? these artists are creating a dark forest for the mind to wander and be lost in in a time when the real world can be far more frightening than what hides in the shadows of our imagination. both nadler and the espers managed to create an other-worldly presence through their words and instruments. this in turn provided the audience an opportunity to look at the leering, creeping trees that, for a few hours at least, comprise the forest we each fnd ourselves trapped in when we venture out past dark. when it was all over, we were quietly thankful that the emotionally-exhausting experience was over . . . and a little more aware of the delight we’d found in our darkness.
