Seasick

A while back, some magazine or another used (coined?) a phrase that went something like "weird old American music." I think I'm paraphrasing a bit, but the intent is there. The article that spun out of the phrase was a survey of some of the odder, or grainier, musicians working the fringes, ostensibly with some adherence to traditional American music. I can't remember all the folks they wrote of, but I think Iron and Wine's Sam Beam was one of the features, if that gives you some idea of where they were headed.

The current musical/recorded landscape is rife with artists who might conceivably fall under the "old weird America" tag, marching boldly onward towards a dusty end in a digital Library of Congress, archived and catalouged, eventually forgotten or resigned to footnote as we move on toward the next big thing.

Some of these artists I liken to Howard Finster, a true "outsider" artist, following a muse (god) with sincerity and a touch of naivete. Others I would be more inclined to compare to, continuing the visual arts thread, Kiki Smith. These would be artists whose main function is to ape, sometimes with irony, a cultural style for which they have no actual connection outside of apprectiation. The Kiki Smith's are ultimately damned by such generic benchmarks as too much education, location (particularly if residing in a city), and charges of inauthnticity. Which is fair enough in some instances, but not so fair in others. Whatever.

I've always been more interested in the Finsters, if I may call them that. We've had some good ones discovered, revitalized, or dug up over the last decade or so: Cast King, Tom House, Bill Fox, Fern Jones, plus a bunch of others that fail the top of my head. And Jandek continues to mystify and delight.

I recently picked up the new album by Seasick Steve, "Doghouse Music". Wanted to see what all the fuss was about, particularly from our friends across the pond in Europe, where he's become a sort of cause celebre amongst "those in the know".

According to the press release, Seasick Steve is "a real American, trainhopping, jailbirding, cowboying, carnival working, migrant farm picking, occassional tramping, near-fatal heart attack surving old hobo." Sounds promising.

How authentic that description is I couldn't say for certain. The clattering, hypnotic music he makes, on stringed guitar-like mutations of his own creation, is quite swell, owing a debt to the type of blues musicians Fat Possum once released. Apparently it was doing gigs in support of R.L. Burnside that convinced Seasick Steve to adopt music as a profession, of sorts, rather than as a way of making a quick buck. One might argue that those are the same thing. No matter.

What you get is lowdown and cracked Blues, the kind wandering out in the wilderness too long, sun-burnt and dust-caked, mumbling. Transient movement and the loss of something unexplainable merge with death and madness in song subject, and Steve's voice, a meditative aged whiskey capable of wounded wolf howling, takes one to very dark places. Song titles include "Cut My Wings", "Save Me", "Hobo Low", and "The Dead Song".

Seasick Steve's guitar playing is another matter altogether. Never flashy, this aint no BB King Blues, his skill is in the trance-like understatement, a menacing and slow groove, accentuating the darkness around it while taking you on a journey through the blackest of woods. His instruments of his own making: "The Three Stringed Trance Wonder", "The One Stringed Diddly-Bo", and "The Mississippi Drum Machine". That oughta give you some idea where you're headed when you slap on the headphones, ready to take a journey into the lost America of Seasick Steve.

It's a striking album, from a man with demons. Give an old hobo a dime.