Sean Mencher |
There are plenty of Mainers supplying the Austin music scene (you know, the Live Music Capital of the World), but there aren’t a ton of Texans holding down the fort in these parts. So, while it’s no surprise Patty Griffin is playing Austin Public Library fundraisers, Slaid Cleaves has practically been named mayor, and Abi Tapia hosts a Wednesday open mic in the capital, it’s something of a feather in our cap that Sean Mencher has chosen little old Portland as homebase. While he may toil in some obscurity here, never really taking to the Old Port bar scene, he gained enough renown as guitarist for the Austin rockabilly trio High Noon to guarantee himself tour work for the rest of his life, should he want it, and now a self-titled release on Helsinki, Finland’s Goofin’ Records.
As you might expect, it contains plenty of hard-charging guitar, duly-slapped stand-up bass, and drums that don’t do a hell of a lot except hold everything together. Luckily, however, Mencher assembled a five-piece for the recording he did with the Studio’s Jim Begley last summer, and the melodic addition of Zach Ovington on fiddle and foundation work of rhythm guitarist Jay Termini not only gives the album some gravitas, but also allows Mencher to veer significantly astray of your traditional rockabilly canon.
Well, maybe not significantly. Mencher only penned one of the tracks here, and the rest sport some familiar names, including Curtis Gordon, whose “Rock, Roll, Jump and Jive” opens the disc. It ain’t Brian Setzer, but it’s not breaking any new ground, obviously. What’s cool is that the familiarity of the guitar-bass-drums vamp allows you to focus on the fiddle. Ovington may be something of an enigmatic figure in these parts (playing at different times with Jerks of Grass, the Piners, and Hot Club of Portland), but nobody’s ever denied his talent. Here and on the following Hank Williams tune, “Settin’ the Woods on Fire,” he toys with Mencher’s guitar, tossing breaks back and forth.
The Williams song and others show playfulness on Mencher’s part, too, as he rides cliché on to the other side of timelessness. Seriously, is this silly or sublime: “You’re my gal, and I’m your fella/Dress yourself up in that frock of yeller”? Or, how about: “You be daffy, I’ll be dilly/We’ll order up two bowls of chili”?
Later, Mencher drops things to a crawl on Bill Neely’s “Cryin’ the Blues over You” (“So please come back to me darlin’/Cuz I’m so lonesome and blue/ These last long months I’ve just rambled/Cryin’ the blues over you”; see what I’m sayin’?). He shows off some great Southern fingerpicking, accompanied by about the most depressing harmonica you’ll ever find. Mencher’s not a natural singer, but the smoke in his pipes lends him a little bit of street cred (you know, along with the fact that he’s played with the late Ronnie Dawson, Wayne Hancock, Rosie Flores, Jimmy Dale Gilmore, Billy Lee Riley, and Hank Williams III).
