Summerfolk

McKeown, Tuthill and Geltman make their move

by Michael Caito

Laurie Geltman

While big sheds get big ink in summer, it's the smaller halls where these artists usually opt to ply their craft. Thrills and a sense of communion are no less just because there aren't some 15,000 people funnin' it up all around you. Yet in the some of the following cases, crowds may soon be unavoidable.

Laurie Geltman: No Power Steering (Eastern Front 11-song CD)

From the liner notes' tone one can assume this CD spent a while on the shelf, but the wait is worth it. A grittier Shawn Colvin meets Mark Cutler would be a fair assessment of singer / guitarist Geltman's long-gestating debut. The songwriting is super, enveloping folk, rock and country, and would translate well in either a band or solo/acoustic setting. Geltman's closest to Cutler in her penchant for examining destructive relationships in a rear-view mirror, with a poet's ability to succinctly recreate harrowing situations without country music's celebrated schmaltz. Geltman has help from various Boston-based pals, most notably Daniel Kellar's violin and Jim Gambino's Wurlitzer / Hammond flourishes. Rising A&M star Patty Griffin sings backup twice, and there's that Rich Gilbert guy again on spotless pedal steel. Overall, No Power Steering is a great-sounding record with dark -- but not dank -- themes a-plenty, buoyed by Geltman's cautionary tale-spinning facility. No flies on her guitar-playing, either, so it's little wonder she made the cut for Sarah Mac's vastly-improved Lilith lineup (Great Woods August 11 and 12, with Geltman opening the Village Stage at 3:30 p.m., just before Syd Straw, on the 11th. Click www.lilithfair.com).

Laurie Geltman performs at the Ravens Nest in Wakefield this Saturday at 8 p.m.

Erin McKeown: Monday Morning Cold (TVP Records 12-song cassette)

This is the first full-length from the on-again / off-again Brown U. matriculatress, who enlists the talents of co-Bears Alex Auritt (d) and Brent Shields (b) for four tracks. Iended her EP review last year by saying there's much to be expected from this rising fireball. Happily, McKeown does not waver on this rough-hewn TVP debut, which recuts some of the original EP's tracks (like "My Hips" and "Softly Moses") and adds several more soft-spoken wallops from the singing/guitar-playing Virginian, currently mid-tour.

By rough-hewn I mean McKeown has cobbled the full-length from varying sources, one-third of which involve a trad studio setup. Some are taped from radio appearances, others live in concert, some from her bathroom, and one, the instrumental "Glass," was composed entirely on a computer. Wherever the input device's locale, there's a depth and clarity to her observations which pay homage to the folk insurgents of the '60s, albeit with a pomo sensibility and enough crafty phrase-twisting to make Elvis Costello blush. Sure, there will be many comparisons to the newly-wed Ani DiFranco, but to be specific they are as follows:1) both have an irrepressible sense of rhythm and 2) both run their own labels and brook no idiocy from "biz" types who attempt to arrange talent vertically on either a gender-based or "radio-friendly folk-singer" totem pole.

Monday Morning Cold can rattle; songs are so personal you squirm while others are so hushed you feel guilty of eavesdropping. McKeown's songs are entire days and months, not just passing flits of emotion, and while a scolding tone periodically seeps in, the objects of her soft-spoken scorn deserve everything they get times three.

If songwriting progress continues (and if production takes a semi-quantum leap; indie hominess has a place but it distracts a bit here) fans will be hunting this "early" tape for years. Day's end finds 20-year-old McKeown going about her business -- booking another summer tour, building TVP brick by brick -- with unflinching determination and increasing momentum. And while the tape is good, live she's better, so when Pork Chop Lounge's Sunday night shrapnel starts flying again in August at AS220 . . . well, you've been warned.

Erin McKeown performs at Club Passim in Cambridge on Friday at Pamela Means' CD release party. McKeown opens, and will back up Means.

Brummer Tuthill: Scared (World Playground CD-single)

Three versions of the title track (full length, radio edit and live version) plus "Breathing" comprise this debut. While it doesn't give a rounded indication of Amy Tuthill's abilities (her solo demo cassette reviewed in '96 was hunky-dory) theirs is a solid, oft-overlooked strategy for a shopper:prove to people (club agents, labels, DJs etc.) in one inexpensive fell swoop that you can handle yourself in both studio, studio remix and live recording situations. Flipside being, you just blew a shot at releasing four songs instead of two, with cost difference prob'ly being negligible.

Anyway, Joe Brummer's singing on "Breathing" is overwrought, but the title track is a mid-tempo winner even gussied up (with bass / drums / keys) in the vein of Luscious Jackson or, again, 10,000 Maniacs (who either get copied a lot or have a HUGE area following among melodi-rockers). The best version? Amy's live solo acoustic take. Go figure.

ZOUNDS. The Slip have shifted about 2500 units of their LP From the Gecko (KA Records) in addition to numerous boots, and there are still two chances to hear this trio before their summer hiatus: July 12 at House of Blues in Cambridge, and on the 17th at Lupo's. They followed a mini-tour opening for John Scofield with a 450-count headliner at Wetlands last week. Drummer / singer Andrew Barr will spend August in Mali studying with master drummer Abdoul Doumbia, with whom the Slip have often worked in the past, so don't be surprised if the trio's next work co-opts some of the Malian rhythmic flavors (Cou-Cou, Madan, Dansa) found on Doumbia's phenomenal self-titled '95 debut, which you may still be able to find by contacting engineer Steve LaValley at Triad Recording.

SEMICOLON SNAFU / CLARIFICATION. Minor Swing (North Star) was from the Gerry Beaudoin Trio, which included Duke Robillard and mandolinist David Grisman. It wasn't Duke's release per se as mentioned last week.

Bongwater's The Big Sell-Out (Shimmy-Disc) remains a funny, arch record, with the Kramer / Ann Magnuson duo swinging a keen scythe at lawyers, free love, credit-card mania and our beloved haute/ trash culture. They really put the plastique to the plastic. So what one of the original linchpins of the Knitting Factory is apt to be doing with Damon & Naomi's Damon Krukowski and Luna's Sean Eden is anyone's guess, but it's worth a stop by the Century Lounge on Friday. On Saturday next door it's Professor Harp and Loaded Dice at the Call, and on Sunday it's Versus at the Century, while Paul Geremia stakes out the Custom House. On Saturday, fetch your ska-face to the Ocean Mist for Agents / nonions / Inspector 7.