songs:illinois

Blasts from the past are fine as long as your memory holds and in my case that’s a very weak link in my armor. So I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised when I was contacted by someone I didn’t really know in another life and that I’d all but forgotten. The good side of this equation was that I didn’t have any bad feelings arise when the lead singer of The Jones Street Boys emailed me and said remember when… Anyway our paths barely crossed about 7 years ago and it’s too bad we didn’t become chums cause I could have said I knew him when.

That’s because the Jones Street Boys are creating a little bit of a stir in NYC. Here’s what two influential people had to say so far:

“Listening is like running down a mountain on a switchback trail, the sound of surprise generating its own momentum. There’s a punk glee inside the bluegrass craft–and a punk vehemence inside the bluegrass smile.”
–Greil Marcus

“For a band of Brooklynites, the Jones Street Boys kick up a pretty good hillbilly stomp on Overcome (Smith Street). They play their catchy originals with virtuostic mandolin jams and honky-tonk piano fillers, and top them with off-kilter, good-time harmonies.”
–Time Out New York

Hey, I can’t top Greil Marcus, but I will add that I can’t resist a song that starts out with mandolin, then adds harmonica, then stand up bass, and then a chorus of “Last cigarette, last beer, last call, last year. Last time I swore I was over you.” Overcome is the debut record on the lads own small label, buy it here through Amazon.

Last Time

“Last Time” video from the band’s record release party

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 4th, 2007 at 8:20 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.