Cover Lay Down

Regular readers may recall that we hold a special place in our hearts for Boston-based singer-songwriter and sideman extraordinaire Mark Erelli, who recorded his 2001 album The Memorial Hall Recordings in a stately Civil-War-era edifice in our little town, and returned a decade later to grace us with our own little house concert. Indeed, we’ve written so much about Erelli here at Cover Lay Down since our humble beginnings ten years ago – most recently for his double-dip coverage of Dawes, a posthumous homage to Prince, and his previous covers album, a tribute to folk icon Bill Morrissey – it’s hard to know where to begin again.

But MIXTAPE, Mark’s newest project, now in its final days of a crowdsourced campaign over at Kickstarter, offers the perfect coincidence for our love of both Mark Erelli and the celebration of song and culture through coverage. And so, today, we turn once again to one of our very favorite artists, in the hopes that you, too, might lend your patronage to its release.

Though his original recordings are themselves both revered and well-covered by his peers and fans, Mark Erelli’s penchant for covers is well-known in the folkworld. His long-standing and always-worth-checking Mp3 of the Month series, released through his website, has long fed our hunger for great live and lo-fi demo recordings, and currently features a wonderful live take on Roy Orbison’s Crying; his work with bluegrass-tinged collaborative Barnstar! gave us raucous, rollicking takes on Dawes, Josh Ritter, and more. His soft and mostly-solo acoustic lullabies album Innocent When You Dream, recorded originally as a gift for family and friends, is tender and sweet, perfect for the mellow hours with or without children. And we celebrated Milltowns, his 2014 tribute to Bill Morrissey, as a warm, deep, surprisingly poignant tribute to a legendary singer-songwriter featuring multi-instrumentalist and performer-and-interpreter extraordinaire Erelli at his studio best and some smashing sideline work from the likes of Peter Mulvey, Rose Cousins, Kris Delmhorst, Jeffrey Foucault, Anais Mitchell, & Rose Polenzani – all artists we’ve featured on these pages before.

MIXTAPE, which will not officially drop until January of 2018, adds something new and exciting to these collected works: a tribute to both that broader, diverse culture that influences us, and to his perennially sold-out Under The Covers concert sessions, hosted at Club Passim in Cambridge by Erelli and a host of famous friends each December for the past 14 years, that have for years offered joyous celebration of the songs and songwriters that have influenced them, their cultural upbringing, and their craft.

Recorded live at Great North Sound Society up in Maine with a small group of friends (and fellow members of Josh Ritter’s band), all indicators suggest that MIXTAPE is a comprehensive fulfillment of the promise of catchy songcraft, tender and gleeful homage, and deft, detailed, delightful musicianship that has come to represent the hallmark of Erelli’s career and coverage. The tracklisting, which includes songs from the Grateful Dead, Phil Collins, Neko Case, Patty Griffin, Arcade Fire, Solomon Burke, and more, is a temptress, indeed; his cover of Don Henley’s Boys of Summer, a haunting, soulful studio track released earlier this week over at Cover Me, and the live video of the recording session for The Band classic Ophelia, which you can hear and see below, lend substance to that promise, and fuel our excitement.

Mark’s own words regarding this high-energy take on Ophelia are especially revealing, and fit neatly with both our celebration of the impending collection and of our ongoing exploration of the ethnographic function of coverage as integral to the communality of the folkways:

When I think of how music should ideally sound —soulful, melodic, restrained virtuosity over a serious groove — I keep circling back to The Band. I’m not sure that anyone, anyone, has done music better than this group on its first two records. On this masterpiece from their later years, I wanted to evoke a bit of all those things I love most about playing music. A lofty goal for sure, but Ray Rizzo’s rimshot-heavy groove and the New Orleans bounce in Sam Kassirer’s piano took me most of the way there. That’s Jake Armerding, 14-year veteran of the annual Under The Covers shows and fellow Barnstar! member, tearing it up on the fiddle.

In short, then: we’re eager to hear MIXTAPE in full, especially because the above-mentioned tracks, and all previous indicators, suggest that the Kickstarter campaign – now in its last six days – is not kidding when it refers to the album as a true opportunity to hear Mark Erelli’s potent, inimitable voice unleashed.

But to truly unleash MIXTAPE, Erelli needs our support.

So click on through to the Mark Erelli Made You A MIXTAPE Kickstarter to lend your patronage now, before the clock runs out. Snag a patronage gift, from signed and downloadable copies of the album in your mailbox two whole months before its official release to bonus covertracks, out of print records, bootlegs, concert tickets, cover song recordings of your choice, and more.

And then, while you wait for your album and patronage incentives to arrive – since we’ve shared so many of Mark’s own covers before – click back through a foursome of our previous features on Erelli’s coverage below, the better to anticipate the gift that MIXTAPE represents.

But first, a total bonus: We are thrilled to announce that Mark Erelli will be helping us celebrate Cover Lay Down’s 10th anniversary with a pre-album-release show at our very own Unity House Concerts in Springfield, MA, on December 9, just a week before his 14th annual Passim show with bassman Zachariah Hickman and fiddle player Jake Amerding. We’ll be announcing ticket sales in the next few weeks on our Facebook page, so stay tuned; Mark has promised to use the set as an opportunity to test out some of his newest covers for this year’s Passim sets, so the coverage should be thick on the ground.

As an extra incentive to our readers and fans, all who contribute to Mark Erelli’s MIXTAPE Kickstarter at the $25 level or above will receive an exclusive invitation to an appetizers-and-drinks reception before the show, and a soundboard recording of three carefully-chosen covers from that show, with our grateful thanks for your support of both the artist and his art.

Previously on Cover Lay Down:

• Kickstarter Covers, Vol. 1: Mark Erelli Pays Adept Tribute to Bill Morrissey

• (Re)Covered: New Coverage From Old Friends Allysen Callery, Coty Hogue, Mark Erelli, Amber Rubarth, Reid Jamieson and more!

• Double Dippers, Vol. 1: Singer-songwriters visit & revisit Dylan, Dawes, Guthrie, Springsteen, John Prine, and more!

• Mark Erelli Covers: Townes Van Zandt, Roy Orbison, Paul Simon, Porter Wagoner & 12 more!

Looking for more? Today’s bonus tracks feature a sextet of contemporaries taking on the Mark Erelli songbook.

• Rose Cousins: Tired Eyes (orig. Mark Erelli)
• Caitlin Canty: Wyoming Wind (orig. Mark Erelli)
• Red Molly: Ghost (orig. Mark Erelli)
• Chuck E Costa: Hollow Man (orig Mark Erelli)
• Ellis Paul: The Only Way (orig. Mark Erelli)
• Boo Lee Crosser: Volunteers (orig. Mark Erelli)

Always ad-free and artist-friendly, Cover Lay Down celebrates ten years on the web this year thanks to the ongoing support of readers like you.

Cover Lay Down is proud to present Unity House Concerts, a folk-and-more music series hosted by yours truly and the Unitarian Universalist Society of Greater Springfield, featuring well-beloved musicians and new folk voices committed to the UU Coffeehouse tradition of channeling the spirit of community through song.

Our 2015-2016 series features a diverse set of artists, including past shows with The Sea The Sea, Mary Lou Lord, Matt Nakoa, Antje Duvekot, and The Mike + Ruthy Band, upcoming shows with Joe Jencks (March 19) and more…and this Saturday, an intimate session with ambient folk storytellers The Western Den.

Lush harmonies, potent storytelling, and ambient folk textures typify the collaborative work of Boston-based duo Deni Hlavinka and Chris West, who formed as The Western Den just three years ago this month. Echoes of Olivia Chaney, Saintseneca, Joni Mitchell and Sufjan Stevens – all of whom the pair cited as desert island discs in a recent interview – offer apt comparison, and they’ve shared stages with Tall Heights, Paula Cole, Mark Erelli, Meg Hutchinson, The Boston Pops, and Melissa Ferrick, who was Deni’s songwriting teacher at Berklee College.

These days, though still very much grounded in the shared passion and strong sense of music as art with a purpose which Deni and Chris forged together in their earliest days, the Western Den is a true-blue band; after several years of being presented as a close couple duo “with friends”, new promo pictures released this week show a trio, with trumpet player and vocalist Alec Alabado alongside. And sure enough, although their second EP is tender and mild, as befits a holiday release, in their pair of tiny, precious, crowdfunded releases of original work, the sound is bigger, much bigger, than even three players might suggest: their studio work is rich and complex, simultaneously epic and intimate, with each song an entire journey, offering a luxurious entry into an enveloping atmosphere, and I’m eager to hear them live as a four-piece this Saturday.

Other than their Holiday EP, The Western Den has recorded no covers officially, and concert footage is scarce – though to be fair, this is a band early in their rise to greatness; their total output at this point is a tantalizing glimpse, albeit more than enough to fall in love. A quick YouTube search reveals a few recordings from Chris and Deni’s early days at Berklee, however, including a wonderfully deep, still take on Civil Wars song Poison & Wine, and this delightful cover, with Deni and Hadley Kennary taking on a Sara Bareilles and Ingrid Michaelson winter classic with warm tones to heat the heart amidst this February thaw. Listen, and join us for more on Saturday if you can; stream 2015 release All The Birds via Bandcamp regardless, and watch for upcoming shows in your neck of the woods as The Western Den grows to become a household name.

Non-profit and ad-free since 2007, Cover Lay Down posts regular features on artists and songwriters as part of its continuing mission to ply the experience of coverage as a comfortable space for discovery. As always, we encourage you to click through to hear more from and about the artists we feature, the better to support and sustain the arts, the artists, and the folkways.

And if you live within driving distance of Springfield, Massachusetts – just a hop, skip, and jump away from Hartford, Northampton, Worcester and the Berkshires – join us February 20 for a very special evening with The Western Den. No reservations necessary; Facebook confirmations greatly appreciated.

Cover Lay Down is proud to present Unity House Concerts, a folk-and-more music series hosted by yours truly and the Unitarian Universalist Society of Greater Springfield, featuring well-beloved musicians and new folk voices committed to the UU Coffeehouse tradition of channeling the spirit of community through song.

Our 2015-2016 series features a diverse set of artists, including past shows with The Sea The Sea, Mary Lou Lord, Matt Nakoa and The Mike + Ruthy Band, upcoming shows with The Western Den (February 13) and Joe Jencks (March 19)…and our very first show of the year, on January 16, with introspective singer-songwriter Antje Duvekot.

If you want to truly appreciate Antje Duvekot, then be prepared to put aside everything to listen. Her songcraft is searing, her performance honest, graceful, and divine. And although her recorded output is relatively slight, with just three studio albums to her name, it is pitch-perfect and precise: every song matters, and each is a gem.

If her songs sound therapeutic, that’s because they are. Duvekot comes by her sorrow honestly, having been kicked out of her family at 19 for recording her own folk songs against their wishes. But where others might have given up, the German-born, Boston-resident artist only dug deeper, channeling pain into the music. Today, at 40, she is a master craftsperson of fearless, primarily first-person narratives, simultaneously intimate and existential, that speak of deeply personal journeys through growth, risk and courage. And she plays them perfectly, in subtle settings that shape every moment effortlessly towards the heart, with a whispery, sensual voice and graceful fingers on piano and guitar.

For all this and more, Duvekot is well respected by her peers and fans, both in and beyond the boundaries of folk. She took the grand prize in the rock category of the John Lennon Songwriting Contest in 2000, six long years before her debut studio album Big Dream Boulevard won her both #1 on the folk charts and Kerrville’s coveted New Folk competition. She’s played across the US and Europe, headlining at Mountain Stage, Kerrville, and the Newport Folk Fest, The Celtic Connections Festival in Scotland and the Tonder Festival in Denmark. Five of her songs have been recorded by the Irish-American band Solas, with whom she has also toured and performed; her two more recent studio albums were produced by Richard Shindell, lion of the Fast Folk singer-songwriter movement, and feature performances from Shindell, John Gorka, Lucy Kaplansky, and Mark Erelli.

Which is to say: Antje Duvekot is a stunning songwriter and a potent performer, and people know it; you should, too. And happily for us, although none of it is studio-born, there’s plenty of coverage to love in her canon, too – including a solo all-covers YouTube sequence from 2012 featuring stunningly sweet takes on Paul Simon, Jason Mraz, Hank Williams, and more, and Undercover with Antje, a YouTube series featuring collaborations with a strong set of fellow coffeehouse travelers, including Red Molly siren Molly Ventner, fellow Winterbloom seasonal collaborative member Meg Hutchinson, young pianofolk singer-songwriter sensation Seth Glier, and more luminaries from the Boston scene and beyond.

Add in Esther Golton’s dulcimer-driven version of of Antje’s tune Reasonland, and a handful more from our featured artist – most notably a take on Dylan’s The Times They Are A Changin’ that singlehandedly reminds us just why we celebrate her performance – and you’ve got a set that’s got us aching for Saturday. Check out the videos and songs below, dig deep into her albums at her website or skim the surface with her Noisetrade sampler The Best Of…So Far, then catch Antje Duvekot at a venue near you.

• Antje Duvekot: The Times They Are A Changin’ (orig Bob Dylan) [2013]

• Antje Duvekot: You’re Gonna make Me Lonesome When You Go (orig. Bob Dylan) [2013]

• Antje Duvekot and Chris O’Brien: All Of My Days (orig. Alexi Murdoch) [2014]

• Esther Golton: Reasonland (orig. Antje Duvekot) [2007]

Antje Duvekot: Famous Blue Raincoat (orig. Leonard Cohen)

Antje Duvekot: Kathy’s Song (orig. Paul Simon)

Antje Duvekot: Deportee (orig. Woody Guthrie)

Antje Duvekot w/ Sara Milonovich: Sounds Of Silence (orig. Simon & Garfunkel)

Antje Duvekot and Meg Hutchinson: The Gypsy Life (orig. John Gorka)

Non-profit and ad-free since 2007, Cover Lay Down posts regular features on artists and songwriters as part of its continuing mission to ply the experience of coverage as a comfortable space for discovery. As always, we encourage you to click through to hear more from and about the artists we feature, the better to support and sustain the arts, the artists, and the folkways.

And if you live within driving distance of Springfield, Massachusetts – just a hop, skip, and jump away from Hartford, Northampton, Worcester and the Berkshires – join us January 16 for a very special evening with Antje Duvekot. No reservations necessary; Facebook confirmations greatly appreciated.

Cover Lay Down is proud to present Unity House Concerts, a folk-and-more music series hosted by yours truly and the Unitarian Universalist Society of Greater Springfield. Concerts are held monthly in our wooded sanctuary, and feature well-beloved musicians and new folk voices committed to the UU Coffeehouse tradition of channeling the spirit of community through song.

Our 2015-2016 series features a diverse set of artists, including past shows with The Sea The Sea (September), Mary Lou Lord (October), and an incredible show last weekend with Matt Nakoa…upcoming shows with The Western Den (February 13), Joe Jencks (March 19) and more as-yet-to-be-confirmed singer-songwriters, duos, and bands…and our very first Friday night show, on December 4, with revered American roots duo Mike + Ruthy.

He grew up listening to ska-punk and alternative rock radio, dreaming of becoming a songwriter on the political edge. She was raised at the intersection of folk and swing, daughter of fiddle master Jay Ungar and country songwriter Lyn Hardy. They met in NYC, just out of college, and went on to found “subversive acoustic stringband” The Mammals, one of the most popular folk rock bands of their generation. And when The Mammals split up, and they married, they spent their honeymoon in the studio, recording a debut duo album aptly called The Honeymoon Agenda.

Now, after several more full-length albums and over a decade of performance together, indie folk roots pair Mike + Ruthy, aka Michael Merenda and Ruth Ungar, have established a reputation for breathtaking delivery and intimate performance, with exquisite songs and songcraft that combine catchy folk-pop choruses with honest, organic tradfolk and roots elements, played out on guitars, fiddle, banjo, ukulele, and a single microphone. Heralds of an American cultural awakening that values honesty and togetherness, prefers grit to glitz, and revels in the old-fashioned telling of a story, their most recent projects include opening gigs for Ani DiFranco and Kate Pierson of the B-52s, a majestic new album with a full five-piece band that is rich and vast with influence and energy, a twice-yearly folk and roots festival called The Hoot which has brought Sprit Family Reunion, Amy Helm, Elizabeth Mitchell, Natalie Merchant, Jeffrey Lewis, Jay Ungar and Molly Mason, and other Cover Lay Down favorites to the Ashokan Center near their home in upstate NY, a haunting posthumous Woody Guthrie collaboration, and a growing family, with parent and child generations that regularly join them on tour and on stage.

We featured Ruth Ungar in our early years as a blog, touching on her work with Michael and The Mammals, and with Aoife O’Donovan and Kristen Andreassen as “acoustic’n’harmonies” indiefolk trio Sometymes Why. But while it is true that, of the pair, it is Ruth who has the family connections, like many indiefolk musicians today, both Michael and Ruth perform and record in multiple modes, both within and beyond the boundaries of their core pairing. Indeed, the merging of his proto-rock radio grounding and her firm tradition has blossomed into a longstanding journey that ranges from soft blues to raucous tradfolk to grungy folkrock sets that frame them as exemplars of their age to critics and peers alike.

Mike Merenda often claims to see music as a way to both capture the world as a living, breathing organism, and to offer it love in the name of restoration; his three solo albums deliver on this adeptly, with outspoken lyrics delivered in a soft, breathy voice over stringwork and production that ranges from true-blue folk to more electrified roots rock fare. By this standard, their collaborative work together is a triumph: free and beautiful, true and sincere, and powerfully political, reflecting the quirky nuances of the world and resonating with the intimate selves we harbor within it.

Which makes me all the more proud to be hosting Mike + Ruthy at our own concert series, and to have the opportunity to tout their musicianship and performance through coverage today.

So check out our diverse set of covers below from their various incarnations and collaborations, and, as always, consider following the accompanying links to purchase their work, and support their shared mission. And then – geography and time permitting – contact us now to reserve your seat for a date with “one of acoustic America’s most revered musical duos” – an event that promises to thrill your senses, raise your spirits, and delve deep into your soul.

• Mike and Ruthy: Something’s Got A Hold On Me (orig. Etta James) [2014]

• Mike and Ruthy: My New York City (orig. Woody Guthrie) [2012]

• Mike and Ruthy: Romance In The Dark (orig. Lil Green) [2012]

• Mike and Ruthy: Red Rocking Chair (trad.) [2011]

• Mike and Ruthy: Dust Bowl Blues (orig. Woody Guthrie) [2009]
• Mike and Ruthy: Hang Me (trad.) [2009]

• Mike and Ruthy: Long Way Home (orig. Tom Waits) [2007]
• Mike and Ruthy: I’ll Keep It With Mine (orig. Nico) [2007]

• The Mammals: 1952 Vincent Black Lightning (orig. Richard Thompson) [2002]

• The Mammals: Chan Chan (orig. Compay Segundo) [2004]
• The Mammals: Quite Early Morning (orig. Pete Seeger) [2004]

• Jay Ungar & Molly Mason Family Band: The Blackest Crow (trad.) [2011]

• AC Newman w/ Mike and Ruthy: Hey, That’s No Way To Say Goodbye (orig. Leonard Cohen) [2012]

• Sometymes Why: Joey (orig. Concrete Blonde) [2009]

• Wayfaring Strangers ft. Ruth Ungar: Lazy John (trad.) [2003]

• Ruth Ungar: It Don’t Mean A Thing If It Ain’t Got That Swing (orig. Duke Ellington) [2014]

• Ruth Ungar: As Time Goes By (pop. Casablanca) [2001]

Can’t make it to the show? Cover Lay Down shares new songsets and ethnographic musings regularly thanks to the kind support of readers like you. Here’s how to do your part:

Cover Lay Down is proud to present Unity House Concerts, a folk-and-more music series hosted by yours truly and the Unitarian Universalist Society of Greater Springfield. Concerts are held in our wooded sanctuary, and feature a combination of well-beloved musicians and new folk voices committed to the UU Coffeehouse tradition of channeling the spirit of community through song.

Our 2015-2016 series features a diverse set of artists, including past shows with The Sea The Sea (September) and Mary Lou Lord (October), upcoming shows with Mike + Ruthy (December) and Joe Jencks (March), and our next offering, on November 21st, with young singer-songwriter Matt Nakoa, a Berklee-trained artist with a soaring, soulful folkpop voice sure to leave you breathless.

Discovering Matt Nakoa is like discovering air. A stunningly talented musician eminently comfortable in his skin, the Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter is so engaging in live performance that we stopped him the moment he walked off the Lounge Stage at this summer’s Falcon Ridge Folk Fest to ask him to play our concert series – and subsequently went on to catch him six more times during the same weekend.

What’s the big deal here? For starters, Nakoa rocks, sometimes quite literally. His vocal turn on an impromptu Led Zeppelin set this summer alongside psychedelic folkrock wizards The Grand Slambovians, shared in last week’s omnibus (Re)Covered feature, rivaled the original. And, as you’ll see and hear below, his work with The Brit Pack – “the most epic semi-fictitious brit-rock cover band ever” – is searing, and the covers of Radiohead and Roxanne that he has recorded with them are spot on interpretations, transcending the facility and force of their adaptation.

But don’t let his willingness to tread the harder edge fool you. Nakoa’s trio work with fellow folk travelers Brad Cole and Robinson Treacher is catchy and percussive, bright and sunny enough to get a crowd on its feet. And, as seen in the several tender in-studio covers below from Fox Run Studios, Matt Nakoa’s got an ear for high harmony that is truly out of this world.

In sum, Matt Nakoa is a musical adept, one of those well kept secrets you just can’t help but celebrate: intimate and genuine, one of those rare performers who can simultaneously bare his soul and welcome you inside. His growing songbook is rich with metaphor and poetry, sung in praise to a complicated, emotionally present world that envelops the listener, even as his coverage runs towards the beautiful and the lighthearted. The result – on keys or guitar, in acoustic mode or full production – is an emergent body of work that is sweet and soulful, playful yet wise, with a mature depth of observational lyric and an incredible emotional range that runs from soaring to bittersweet.

Nakoa has performed in the White House and India, and is currently opening for Tom Rush on tour; we’re lucky, indeed, to have found and booked him before he gets too big for the coffeehouse circuit. Check out the videos below, dig deep into his albums at his website, then catch Matt Nakoa at a venue near you.

Matt Nakoa: Tainted Love (orig. Soft Cell)

Matt Nakoa, Jared Salvatore, and Eric Schwartz: Dancing In The Dark (orig. Bruce Springsteen)

Matt Nakoa and Eric Schwartz: I’m Only Sleeping (orig. The Beatles)

Matt Nakoa: Arise, Arise (orig. Jean Rohe)

Matt Nakoa and The Brit Pack: Roxanne (orig. The Police)

Matt Nakoa and The Brit Pack: Just (orig. Radiohead)

Matt Nakoa: Moondance/Fever (orig. Van Morrison/Peggy Lee)

Non-profit and ad-free since 2007, Cover Lay Down posts regular features on artists and songwriters as part of its continuing mission to ply the experience of coverage as a comfortable space for discovery. As always, we encourage you to follow the links above to hear more from and about the artists we feature, the better to support and sustain the arts, the artists, and the folkways.

And, if you live within driving distance of Springfield, Massachusetts – just a hop, skip, and jump away from Hartford, Northampton, Worcester and the Berkshires – join us November 21 for a very special evening with Matt Nakoa…and then book now for our December 4 show with Americana roots duo Mike + Ruthy, who we previously hosted in our intimate carriage house concert series back in the Spring of 2013. No reservations necessary; Facebook confirmations greatly appreciated.

A repost of a repost as we slowly regain our footing here at Cover Lay Down after a year of stress and strain – including a comprehensive crash of all musical archives, continued family illnesses, floods, fleas, and mold issues in our home, and a growing workload that exemplifies the current cultural disaster that is the teaching profession under siege.

Yes, it’s been a ridiculously challenging time, and we’re not back for good just yet – but having just inherited both a wonderful UU coffeehouse series and a new computer to blog about it, I can’t help but offer an 11th hour celebration of Mary Lou Lord, an artist near and dear to our hearts, who plays TONIGHT at Unity House Concerts alongside her daughter Annabelle Lord-Patey, whose career appears to be starting with a slow and delicate burn sure to give her claim to fame in her own good time. Stay tuned for more, albeit slowly, as we rebuild our archives, and for more Unity House news as we present Matt Nakoa November 21 and Mike + Ruthy December 4…and enjoy the love below in the meantime.

When we last checked in on Mary Lou Lord, she seemed to be on permanent hiatus following a 2005 diagnosis with a rare vocal cord affliction, though an appearance at SXSW the following year suggested she was still open to possibility. But the pixie-faced singer-songwriter who rose from the subways of Boston to indiegrunge fame through a combination of raw talent and close relationships with both Kurt Cobain and Elliott Smith has been on the move lately, co-founding Girls Rock Camp in Boston, embarking on a new kickstarter-driven album, hosting open mics, and playing alongside her talented teenaged daughter Annabelle in a recent live tribute to Elliott Smith alongside Rhett Miller, Chris Thile, Bob Dorough, and others that was featured in The New Yorker.

As Lord noted at her recent live performance, she doesn’t perform much anymore, and a small but growing set of Soundcloud covers, including takes on Jason Molina, Dylan, and Richard Thompson, reveal an artist still struggling to vocalize, though the resulting strain has a rare intimacy, and reveals charm of its own. But if this is a comeback, we’re all for it. Read our original feature, check out our newly-expanded list of covers – including a stunning Lucinda Williams take from her newest album – and follow Mary Lou Lord on Facebook to keep up with the resurrecting career of a well-deserving superstar.

February, 2008

As far as I can tell, the only major distinction between modern folk and a certain sort of indie music seems to be how the artists choose to produce and use instruments on their songs. And though you won’t find this sort of fuzzed-out guitar on the other folkblogs, the way the modern singer-songwriter mentality seems to find voice in both indierock and folk fascinates me.

But production isn’t what makes folk, and even if it were, the distinction is often fluid. The small but growing cadre of indie artists who perform in both folk and alt-rock modes owe no small debt to a select group of artists — Evan Dando, Lou Barlow, Tanya Donelly, Jeff Tweedy, Ben Gibbard and others — who have, over the years, moved easily across the bridge between the two forms. But these artists, in turn, owe the very existence of that bridge to other, lesser-known forerunners, like Elliott Smith and Daniel Johnston, who spent their entire careers building the bridge for them to cross.

As part of our ongoing exploration of this curious relationship, today we feature one underappreciated artist who is more often found among the indierock, but who has claimed folk credibility from the start: Mary Lou Lord, folksinger and cover artist.

I was a high school student in Boston during Mary Lou Lord’s busker days, and not an apt or diligent pupil; I often skipped class to head off down the T into Harvard Square with friends. Given our relative age, then, and her own preference for playing along the Red Line, I suppose I must have passed by Lord a couple of times. But back then, my ears were full of post-punk grunge, and she was just another streetcorner kid with an acoustic guitar, a ragged approach, and an innocent, little-girl voice. By the time she started recording alongside the best of the growing post-punk world, I had already moved on.

The heavy fuzz and feedback of much of her production puts the bulk of Mary Lou Lord’s recorded work squarely in line with early nineties alt-rock; if you’re looking for her in your local indie record store, you’ll find it alongside the pre-grunge of artists like The Lemonheads and Juliana Hatfield. But like Beck, Lord has always had a folk heart, and worn it proudly. Though she’s famous for her catfights with Courtney Love, she toured and recorded with Elliott Smith, and opened for Cover Lay Down fave Shawn Colvin. By identifying herself with those artists and others, Lord categorizes herself as an artist straddling the bridge between singer-songwriter folk and the indie world.

The songs that Lord has chosen to cover over her two-decade career speak volumes about which artists she considers her musical peers and forefathers, and here, too, we find a curious connection with the folkworld. In and among the Magnetic Fields and Big Star covers, we find covers of Smith and Colvin, indiefolkie Daniel Johnston, Lucinda Williams, Richard Thompson, and even oldschool pre-folkie Elizabeth Cotten. Clearly, this is a woman who listens to folk music on her own time, recognizes good songwriting regardless of original instrumentation, and takes them where she can find them.

Here’s a few of my favorite Mary Lou Lord coversongs which hit that spectrum, and then some. Most are solo acoustic, delicate and coy, but don’t be scared by the occasional guitarfuzz; this is, at heart, a form of folk. Heck, if feedback was all it took, Dylan wouldn’t be a folkie anymore, either.

• Mary Lou Lord: Jump (orig. Van Halen)
• Mary Lou Lord: Shake Sugaree (orig. Elizabeth Cotten)
• Mary Lou Lord: Speeding Motorcycle (orig. Daniel Johnston)
• Mary Lou Lord: Fearless (orig. Pink Floyd)
• Mary Lou Lord: Thirteen (orig. Big Star)
• Mary Lou Lord: Hard Road (orig. Lucinda Williams)
• Mary Lou Lord: I Don’t Want To Get Over You (orig. Magnetic Fields)

• Mary Lou Lord: Metal Firecracker (orig. Lucinda Williams) [2013]

• Sara Radle w/ Mary Lou Lord: Mama Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Cowboys (orig. Ed Bruce) [2012]

Mary Lou Lord Soundcloud Covers [2012-2013]

It’s hard to link to the collected works of Mary Lou Lord; her recorded output remains scattered across several indie labels, some of them short-lived. But some of her back catalog is still available, and it’s chock full of folk covers.

Folk fans are probably best served by starting with the cover-heavy Live City Sounds, a hard-to-come-by acoustic album with several Richard Thompson covers which sounds like the streets where I once passed Mary Lou Lord in her busking days. Alt-punk label Kill Rock Stars also still carries a split bill EP and a couple of compilations.

Though her newest album seems not to have been released yet – she leaked the new Lucinda Williams track last year herself after it started getting play on media outlets – those looking for a more recent treasure trove would be well served to bookmark Mary Lou’s Soundcloud page, which has a growing mix of living room coverage and old found studio sound, including some mid-nineties tracks of her goofing around with Elliott Smith.

Bonus tracks? Sure – here’s a couple more Big Star coversongs in the same grungefolk vein. Dando’s cover is one of my favorite coversongs ever, hands down. And doesn’t Mary Lou Lord sound like a female version of Elliott Smith?

• Evan Dando, The Ballad of El Goodo (orig. Big Star)
• Elliott Smith, Thirteen (orig. Big Star)

Cover Lay Down is proud to present Unity House Concerts, a new folk-and-more music series hosted by yours truly and the Unitarian Universalist Society of Greater Springfield.

Our 2014-2015 season features artists from the Northeast, including Meg Hutchinson (October), The Gaslight Tinkers (March), and our Winter show, a co-bill with Jean Rohe and Jay Mankita, two artists who speak truth to power with beauty, grace, and poise.

My first encounter with the visionary songs of Jean Rohe this summer at a side stage at the Falcon Ridge Folk Festival was so stunning, it left me in tears; I had to leave the tent, and so I missed the rest of her tiny in-the-round set.

Approaching Jean again during the festival and asking her to join us at our fledgeling UU Coffeehouse series this year was a no-brainer, especially after her full band wowed the crowd in their Emerging Artist Showcase set the following day on the mainstage. Waiting six months to hear her again has been the hardest part, but pulling the threads of the digital and recorded output has helped fill the void.

“A sure-footed young singer-songwriter” (NY Times) with a “unique musical voice that sounds like a love song for a world imperiled” (Albany Times Union), Jean Rohe captivates audiences with her intelligent well-crafted narrative songs and a unique, multilingual aesthetic fusion of traditional and modern folk, world beat, and jazz that speaks truth to power in equal measures of beauty and mysticism. The Brooklyn-based artist joins us fresh off her first European tour, accompanied by long-time collaborator and producer Liam Robinson on accordion, guitar, and voice, and we’re thrilled to have them both.

Even if you can’t join us, check out Jean’s carefully curated collection of albums and videos, especially 2014 release The End of the World Show, which one fellow musician at Falcon Ridge named their favorite album of the year. The album won three Independent Music Awards, and deservedly so: from its playful multi-stage packaging to the rich, layered, precisely arranged music it contains, the record is a gem, thick with found sound and poetry, international folkrock and world beat melodies, accompanied by crisp bowed strings and a full rhythm section. Similar praise goes to Lead Me Home, a sultry, subtle, potent and playful folk-meets-bossa-nova release from 2008 that includes several covers of popular Brazilian songs from the seventies among its set – and though it’s no cover, I can’t help but include the video of my favorite Jean Rohe original, the powerful National Anthem: Arise! Arise!, in today’s short set.

• Jean Rohe: Eta Baiao (orig. Jackson do Pandeiro)
• Jean Rohe: E Preciso Perdoar (orig. Joao Gilberto)
  (from Lead Me Home, 2008)

Jean Rohe: National Anthem: Arise! Arise!

Jean Rohe & Rogerio Boccato: O Morro / A Love Supreme (orig. Antonio Jobim / John Coltrane)

Jean is joined by Massachusetts-based American singer-songwriter and guitarist Jay Mankita, an artist well-known and well-lauded on the global stage for his earth-friendly, Grammy-nominated collection of kids albums and songs, and the messages of social justice and environmental consciousness they promote through playful, often hilarious sing-along rhythm and rhyme. (Rohe herself sang Jay’s lyrics as an introduction to her infamous anti-McCain speech at her New School graduation ceremony in 2006, making this a pairing too tempting to pass up.)

But Jay isn’t all kid’s stuff, as evidenced by the universal appeal of such “heart and soul” songs as Bread Alone, and 2004 release They Lied, and its title song, which deftly skewers the political scene of its decade but remains just as apt today. Jay’s songs for adults are equally playful, in their way, as his work for kids – see the video below, of his cover of Bob Blue’s lyric for Scott Joplin’s Pineapple Rag, for evidence of the close connection Jay makes with his audiences – and they retain their messages of social justice, environment, and community. And the breath of sentiment yaws wide, from bitter to wistful, as Jay speaks truth to power in his own accessible, fun way.

In performance, Mankita is “a musical pied piper; quick, nimble, and wonderfully crazy” (Margie Rosenkrantz, Director, The Eighth Step); his children’s show and chapel appearance last year made him a natural choice for return as we dig into our new Saturday series. But Mankita is also as humble as he is gentle. Last week, he touted Jean on his facebook page, noting that Arise, Arise will be appearing in Rise Again, the upcoming next-generation sequel to the seminal sing-along folk bible Rise Up Singing, but failed to note that THREE of his songs will appear in the collection, including From A Dog’s Stance – a delightful, wry parody of the oft-covered Julie Gold song – and Living Planet, which has already been covered by the likes of Emma’s Revolution, Kim and Reggie Harris, and Magpie.

A cover of, and a cover from, then, with our highest recommendations for Jay Mankita’s work, whether you’re a parent or just a fan of the good stuff from the sociopolitical side of the folksinger canon.

• Magpie: Living Planet (orig. Jay Mankita)
  (from Living Planet, 1990)

Jay Mankita: Pineapple Rag (orig. Bob Blue / Scott Joplin)

Non-profit and ad-free since 2007, Cover Lay Down posts regular features on artists and songwriters as part of its continuing mission to ply the experience of coverage as a comfortable space for discovery. As always, we hope you’ll consider following the links above to hear more from and about the artists we feature, the better to support and sustain the arts, the artists, and the folkways.

And, if you live within driving distance of Springfield, Massachusetts – just a hop, skip, and jump away from Hartford, Northampton, and the Berkshires – we hope you’ll join us this Saturday, as Jay Mankita’s gentle wit and biting political satire, and Jean Rohe’s beautiful, visionary lyrics and masterful melodies, find full voice in the passionate, potent collection of songs they bring to our Unity House Concert stage. No reservations are necessary; Facebook confirmations greatly appreciated.

Cover Lay Down is proud to announce Unity House Concerts, a new folk-and-more music series hosted by yours truly and the Unitarian Universalist Society of Greater Springfield. Concerts will be held roughly two Saturdays a season in our own wooded sanctuary, and will feature a combination of well-beloved musicians and new folk voices committed to the UU Coffeehouse tradition of channeling the spirit of community through song.

This year we are excited to present a set of award-winning musicians from the Northeast, including Jean Rohe, Jay Mankita, The Gaslight Tinkers, and our first show of the season with Red House Records recording artist Meg Hutchinson on October 18th.

We originally went to Meg Hutchinson for healing, in the wake of a tornado that ravaged our rural New England town in 2011. Since then, after a great run that featured Mark Erelli, Mike + Ruthy, Danny Schmidt, The Sea The Sea, and more, the converted carriage house in which we hosted Meg has gone dark – but her songbook still resonates, making her an easy choice to kick off our new coffeehouse series in style.

Long lauded by critics and fans, Boston-based, Berkshires-born contemporary acoustic singer-songwriter Meg delivers music as powerful as it is gentle. A master of the introspective ballad, her albums have made the top 10 on US folk radio, and won her numerous songwriting awards in the US, Ireland and UK, including the John Lennon Songwriting Competition, the Billboard Song Contest and prestigious competitions at Merlefest, NewSong, Kerrville, and Falcon Ridge Folk Festival. And her seasonal tour with Antje Duvekot, Anne Heaton, and Natalia Zukerman as Winterbloom has become a don’t-miss staple of the local scene.

Equally at home on piano or guitar, Meg’s pure alto is a potent carrier for her mood and message. Her influences include poet Mary Oliver, songwriters Greg Brown, Shawn Colvin, and Joni Mitchell, and mood maker David Gray, but her voice is all her own, with songs that yearn for inner peace, at once ecstatic and meditative, crafted around elegant and free-floating melodies that feel both modern and rooted. Her most recent album, Beyond That (2013), practically aches with songs – about coming home, transforming desire, and opening the heart for some greater purpose.

We are thrilled to have Meg Hutchinson opening our newest musical venture, setting the stage for what promises to be a vibrant, new, community-centered program at the UUSGS, and invite you to join us, too, if you’re local to Springfield, MA (just 30-40 minutes from Hartford and Northampton). To tempt and to celebrate, here’s a few favorite covers by Meg – including a gorgeous duet with frequent touring companion Antje Duvekot and a very special Townes Van Zandt cover recorded at her first of two visits to our previous house concert series.

• Meg Hutchinson: Born In Time (orig. Bob Dylan)
  [from A Nod To Bob 2, 2011]

• Meg Hutchinson: If I Needed You (orig. Townes Van Zandt)
  [live from A Tree House Productions house concert, June 2011)

• Winterbloom: Rexroth’s Daughter (orig. Greg Brown)
• Winterbloom: O Holy Night (trad.)
  [from Winterbloom: Winter Traditions, 2009]

Antje Duvekot w/ Meg Hutchinson: Gypsy Life (orig. John Gorka)

Edie Carey and Meg Hutchinson: Falling Slowly (orig. Glen Hansard)

Our little house concert series here in rural Massachusetts has grown since we first presented Danny Schmidt in our living room in the Spring of 2009, and so has its reputation. Our current performing space, a restored hundred year old carriage house just up the road, has room for 50, and we’re eager to fill the house, the better to support artists and fans alike.

So read on for a closer look and listen to Mike + Ruthy, who we’re excited to announce will be kicking off our 2013 season. And if you’re local enough to join us for an intimate evening of song and a delicious potluck meal on the first Saturday in April, join our facebook event or email now to save your seat today.

He grew up listening to ska-punk and alternative rock radio, dreaming of becoming a songwriter on the political edge. She was raised at the intersection of folk and swing, daughter of fiddle master Jay Ungar and country songwriter Lyn Hardy. They met in NYC, just out of college, and went on to found “subversive acoustic stringband” The Mammals, one of the most popular folk rock bands of their generation. And when The Mammals split up, and they married, they spent their honeymoon in the studio, recording a debut duo album aptly called The Honeymoon Agenda.

Now, after two more full-length albums and over a decade of performance together, indie folk roots pair Mike + Ruthy, aka Michael Merenda and Ruth Ungar, have established a reputation for breathtaking delivery and intimate performance, with exquisite songs and songcraft that combine catchy folk-pop choruses with honest, organic tradfolk and roots elements, played out on guitars, fiddle, banjo, ukulele, and a single microphone. Heralds of an American cultural awakening that values honesty and togetherness, prefers grit to glitz, and revels in the old-fashioned telling of a story, their most recent projects include a newly minted folk and roots festival called the Winter Hoot which brought Sprit Family Reunion, Amy Helm, Elizabeth Mitchell, Natalie Merchant, Jeffrey Lewis, Jay Ungar and Molly Mason, and other Cover Lay Down favorites to the Ashokan Center near their home in upstate NY, a haunting posthumous Woody Guthrie collaboration which lends its title to their most recent EP, and a growing family, with parent and child generations that regularly join them on tour and on stage.

We featured Ruth Ungar in our early years as a blog, touching on her work with Michael and The Mammals, and with Aoife O’Donovan and Kristen Andreassen as “acoustic’n’harmonies” indiefolk trio Sometymes Why. But while it is true that, of the pair, it is Ruth who has the family connections, like many indiefolk musicians today, both Michael and Ruth perform and record in multiple modes, both within and beyond the boundaries of their core pairing. Indeed, the merging of his proto-rock radio grounding and her firm tradition has blossomed into a longstanding journey that ranges from soft blues to raucous tradfolk to grungy folkrock sets that frame them as exemplars of their age to critics and peers alike.

Michael Merenda often claims to see music as a way to both capture the world as a living, breathing organism, and to offer it love in the name of restoration; his three solo albums deliver on this adeptly, with outspoken lyrics delivered in a soft, breathy voice over stringwork and production that ranges from true-blue folk to more electrified roots rock fare. By this standard, their collaborative work together is a triumph: free and beautiful, true and sincere, and powerfully political, reflecting the quirky nuances of the world and resonating with the intimate selves we harbor within it. Which makes me all the more proud to be hosting Mike + Ruthy at our own concert series to kick-off our 2013 season, and to have the opportunity to tout their musicianship and performance through coverage today.

So check out our diverse set of covers below from their various incarnations and collaborations, and, as always, consider following the accompanying links to purchase their work, and support their shared mission. And then – geography and time permitting – contact us now to reserve your seat for a date with “one of acoustic America’s most revered musical duos” – an event that promises to thrill your senses, raise your spirits, and delve deep into your soul.

• Mike and Ruthy: My New York City (orig. Woody Guthrie) [2012]

• Mike and Ruthy: Romance In The Dark (orig. Lil Green) [2012]

• Mike and Ruthy: Red Rocking Chair (trad.) [2011]

• Mike and Ruthy: Dust Bowl Blues (orig. Woody Guthrie) [2009]
• Mike and Ruthy: Hang Me (trad.) [2009]

• Mike and Ruthy: Long Way Home (orig. Tom Waits) [2007]
• Mike and Ruthy: I’ll Keep It With Mine (orig. Nico) [2007]

• The Mammals: 1952 Vincent Black Lightning (orig. Richard Thompson) [2002]

• The Mammals: Chan Chan (orig. Compay Segundo) [2004]
• The Mammals: Quite Early Morning (orig. Pete Seeger) [2004]

• Jay Ungar & Molly Mason Family Band: The Blackest Crow (trad.) [2011]

• AC Newman w/ Mike and Ruthy: Hey, That’s No Way To Say Goodbye (orig. Leonard Cohen) [2012]

• Sometymes Why: Joey (orig. Concrete Blonde) [2009]

• Wayfaring Strangers ft. Ruth Ungar: Lazy John (trad.) [2003]

• Ruth Ungar: As Time Goes By (pop. Casablanca) [2001]

Can’t make it to the show? Cover Lay Down shares new songsets and ethnographic musings bi-weekly thanks to the kind support of readers like you. Here’s how to do your part: