As the Crow Flies
The Old Crow Medicine Show keep an eye on the present while invoking American popular music of the 1920s
by Paul Griffith
The Old Crow Medicine Show
Playing 9 p.m. April 18 at Station Inn
For more information, visit http://www.crowmedicine.com/
With the soundtrack to O Brother, Where Art Thou? winning this year’s coveted Album of the Year Grammy, there’s no denying that roots music is hot. Though it remains to be seen whether hardheaded country radio will reclaim the traditional sound, banjos, dulcimers and fiddles are currently making appearances in nightclubs all over Music City. Of this crop of neo-traditional American bands—which also includes Starlings TN and Central Ave.—recent arrivals The Old Crow Medicine Show might be the most loyal to old-time principles.
The band began life busking on street corners during the summer of 1998, first in upstate New York and later on the Canadian west coast. To connect more deeply with the music that obsessed them, the Medicine Show eventually rambled to the Smoky Mountains of North Carolina, squatting on a mountain farm complete with crops and livestock. A move to Nashville was the next logical step.
“There’s always been porch music played for family and friends, but what made you an urban musician in the ’20s,” says Ketch Secor, the band’s fiddler/vocalist, “was that you went out and made a career. And with this whole drive for traditional music, we might as well be back in time, ’cause there’s not that much difference. Here we are, a token string band coming from these funny places in East Tennessee and North Carolina with no running water, moving to the capital city in a big Cadillac car.”
Despite their time spent in the eastern hill country, it would be a mistake to label this quintet’s music “bluegrass” or even “Appalachian.” Their live performances—which involve all the cacophony and snake oil of an actual medicine show—reflect their move down from the mountain to the metropolis, and are as likely to include songs by black stringband the Mississippi Sheiks as they are those of Virginia-born banjoist Dock Boggs.
“Musically, we’ve made this shift from mostly Appalachian string music to a more 1920s urban, black blues flavor,” reports Secor. “We’re still trying to be true to the medicine show concept, but also give a more well-rounded look at what music was like before the Depression, before bluegrass, before the blues became Chicago- and New York-influenced. After all, [Memphis musician] Rufus Thomas was in a medicine show long before he wrote 'The Funky Chicken.’ The most important thing is that we not become a greatest hits package of the 1920s, rather to take something that came before and make it feel current, make it feel necessary.”
Though it might seem like a contradiction at first, OCMS’ urge to make this world of wax-cylinder recordings and musical hoboism alive and necessary can be traced to their shared background in punk rock. “We were really into Kurt Cobain and Nirvana and the Pixies...,” relates Secor, “about 12 or 13 years old and buying up this stuff and feeling like a part of something.” Fascination with Nirvana led to Bob Dylan, which led to Woody Guthrie, which led to Blind Willie McTell and the Delmore Brothers.
“You find out where Woody learned his stuff from, and it’s mind-blowing,” says Secor, who sees little difference between punk’s frenetic energy and the groove-oriented fiddle tunes of the American South. “They’re so much like where I started from.... It’s all rhythm and drive and much less melodic than the French or Irish stuff because of the introduction of clawhammer banjo from African slaves. I’ve spent so many hours thinking of when the first fiddle met the first banjo, because I think that’s the conception of everything that you call American music.”
Since arriving in Nashville a year and a half ago, OCMS have aptly ridden the neo-traditional wave. From initial gigs playing for spare tourist change at the Opry Plaza, the band have rapidly become a popular opening act, regularly performing alongside the likes of Ricky Scaggs, Del McCoury, Loretta Lynn and Doc Watson. “As soon as we moved here, we started working cool jobs,” says Secor. “We did a lot of busking, but we didn’t have to play near as many dives as most kids when they come to this town.” In January 2001, the band found themselves invited to perform on the Opry, and their debut on the tradition-friendly Ryman Auditorium stage received a standing ovation.
OCMS’ unique look—old-time shabby chic meets third-generation punk—has also led to television and video work. The band will appear in Matthew Teater’s upcoming documentary on the Renfro Valley Barn Dance (the nation’s second oldest radio show), and they were recently featured on PBS’ American Roots Music series.
Despite the excitement currently surrounding Secor and his twentysomething bandmates—Willie Watson (vocals/guitar), Critter Fuqua (banjo), Morgan Jahnig (upright bass) and Wheatstraw (gitjo, a six-stringed banjo played like a guitar)—OCMS have not lost their street-corner perspective. “The touring that we’ve been doing during the past year has been a lot different than what we’re used to. It’s funny to see these people who’ve paid 16 bucks to be sitting down when we’re used to seeing them upright and walking by for a $2 ticket. But going out with bigger artists and playing to bigger rooms and trying to learn how to be a hot opening number has been a fun challenge.”
It’s anybody’s guess whether the current interest in traditional music is a movement with some permanence or merely a passing fad. For their part, The Old Crow Medicine Show—whose second self-produced CD, Eutaw, was released last year—maintain a healthy skepticism. Though the band have been approached by several record labels and are currently recording tracks with producer/guitar ace David Rawlings, they’re not yet convinced that traditional music is primed to take over the airwaves.
“There’s this tendency with the industry to make ultimatums, like, 'Here’s the new thing, bow down before the new thing.’ ” Secor says. “They’re doing that with bluegrass now, whereas two years ago, we were all singing Ricky Martin tunes. Even though we’re trying to write in the vein of these timeless songs, that’s so hard to do...’cause for the average listener to go from Lila McCann to Charley Patton, they’re not going to understand it. It’s too weird, too unearthly, like going from eating cheese to drinking blood.”
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