Reviews of: Alex McMurray - Tin Men - Freaks For Industry
Tin Men - Freaks For Industry
Independent
By Robert Fontenot - Offbeat Magazine
Only in New Orleans could an album featuring jazz guitar, washboard, and tuba—and
those instruments only, save for an occasional short-order cook’s “order
up!” bell—be most notable for its songwriting. And yet, that’s true; while
the Tin Men’s ’03 debut, Super Great Music for Modern Lovers, showcased the
talents of local mainstays Matt Perrine (tuba), Alex McMurray (guitar), and Washboard Chaz
(guess) in reinterpreting and recontextualizing jug-band jazz, the newer, more focused,
more streamlined Freaks For Industry serves as a stage for the continuing development of
McMurray’s writing chops. “She will give her hair a toss / so as to hide that so
so so so face,” he sings on “The Woman I Love,” and you’re not quite
sure where his snottiness and his affection meet. Which is the point. I think.
To a lot of people, however, this is still a joke band, or maybe a curio of a forgotten
time. And the Tin Men spend as much time reveling in the sheer rhythmic joy of standards
like Fats Waller ‘s “Your Feets Too Big” and Cab Calloway’s “The
Man From Harlem” (assisted by the Pfister Sisters) as they do ripping the wires out
of slightly more modern standards like “I’m Gonna Be A Wheel Someday,”
“Mess Around,” and “Immigrant Song.” (Yes. That one.) But
McMurray’s originals take up most of the set this time, and that’s a very good
thing, considering how he inverts the many meanings of “Baby” and crafts scenes
like “Otis Convalesces” that are twice as sinister as their surfaces. Since this
puts him right in line with the actual hepcat songwriting of the time, it’s a perfect
fit—in fact, Alex may find himself backing up into Randy Newman territory soon if he
keeps drawing these snide portraits using the colors of classic prewar Americana. Classic
Newman, that is; you won’t hear the raunchy and somehow incomprehensible sea-chanty
“The Ballad Of Cap’n Sandy” playing over the credits of Toy Story 3. (And
if you do, give me some of that.)
Original page - http://offbeat.com/artman/publish/article_1017.shtml
Tin Men - Freaks for Industry
OPENING ACT By Alex Rawls - from Best of New Orleans
CD Release Party
The Big Top, 1638 Clio St
Freaks for Industry, the self-released second
album from New Orleans' Tin Men, seems improbable. The trio of Alex McMurray on guitar,
Matt Perrine on sousaphone and "Washboard" Chaz Leary on washboard was an
unusual band configuration from the outset, but McMurray's move to New York City last
October after falling in love with a New Yorker sounded like the band's death knell.
The album, though, features the band at its
irrepressible best. Recorded over four days last September and October, it explores New
Orleans' musical forms in original songs or covers that touch on jazz, blues, R&B and
rock. The Tin Men cover Danny Barker's "Palm Court Strut," the Dirty Dozen's
"Blackbird Special," and McMurray's "The Ballad of Cap'n Sandy," which
tells of the darkly funny drinking life of the character McMurray played while working in
a Japanese theme park for six months. That sense of humor and the band's unique
instrumentation unify Freaks for Industry.
Though the album was recorded fairly quickly, the
past five months have been spent mixing it. The hardest part was selecting the best songs
and best versions. The band recorded 24 songs, then cut it down to the 16 that stayed
interesting over time.
"We had no deadlines holding us to make it come
out at a certain time, so we took our time with it," Perrine says.
Besides recording, the Tin Men started touring --
not endless treks through the hinterlands, but short trips to parts of the country where
the band has an audience. Perrine says McMurray's move forced the band to think seriously
about what to do next.
"We realized if we didn't take the next step
business-wise and make sure we were making money as a band, there would be no more Tin
Men," he says. They are booking more shows on the road, primarily in Colorado and the
Northeast, where they enjoy their biggest followings, and when McMurray's in New Orleans,
they're booking shows in bigger rooms.
For musicians who play in a number of bands the way
Tin Men members do, touring is difficult. It means leaving other gigs and their income
while on the road, and -- out of sight, out of mind -- bandleaders tend to stop calling
once you're back, assuming you're still on the road and unavailable. If the tour isn't
profitable, the musicians lose money in more ways than one.
Smaller rooms like the Circle Bar and the Frenchmen
Street clubs have been the musical homes of McMurray, Perrine and Leary, and they credit
them with their musical development. Not only do those clubs give musicians chances to
play and make a few bucks, but Leary points out that they give musicians a chance to work
on their craft in front of audiences. It certainly trained Tin Men to handle almost
anything.
"In New Orleans, there is a very thin shield
between the musicians and the audience," Perrine says. "We're always very
comfortable in front of audience, having audiences in our laps, basically." The
ability to play to 10 or 200 people, to people lining the back wall or sitting on lip of
the stage, explain how Tin Men could walk into a bar in New York, pick up a gig, and start
a crowd dancing that, the bartenders said, never danced.
"That willingness to be intimate, no matter the
size of room -- that comes across," Perrine says.
Original page: http://www.bestofneworleans.com/dispatch/2005-04-19/openact.html
(back to music)