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Shivering Timbers, Noah Earle
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Husband-and-wife duo Sarah and Jayson Benn were discovered by Grammy-winning artist and producer Dan...Husband-and-wife duo Sarah and Jayson Benn were discovered by Grammy-winning artist and producer Dan Auerbach (The Black Keys) at a birthday party. From there, the band’s rough-hewn Americana sound began to make its way to the masses. Vocally, Sarah is a revelation – she has been compared to a cross between P.J. Harvey and Patsy Cline – while Jayson uses his six-string to supply much of the band’s sonic texture.
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Willamina’s Wildwood MusicFest & Campout is back bigger and better this July!
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Organizers of last year’s hugely successful inaugural Willamina Wildwood MusicFest & Campout have an...Organizers of last year’s hugely successful inaugural Willamina Wildwood MusicFest & Campout have announced that their family friendly festival of Americana, folk, roots and rock music is coming back bigger and better in 2013.
Taking place July 19 – 21, 2013 in Willamina, OR (located an hour and a half southwest of Portland), this year’s festival has expanded from a one day to three day event with expanded camping amenities (for a small fee), local artists and lots of choices for local, affordably priced food and drink (including vegan and gluten free options) served responsibly on recycled, re-usable dishware. Most vendors will be raising money for local non-profits.
Kids will have lots to keep them busy when they are not stomping along to the hill sounds with face painting, bouncy house, a petting zoo and crafts.
Those needing to take a stretch after camping out the night before can join yoga class which will be held Saturday and Sunday mornings.
From the organizers:
We are very excited to announce the line up to our second annual Wildwood MusicFest that will be happening this July. We are expanding to having music Friday evening as well as all day Saturday and until afternoon on Sunday Jul 21st. We are again featuring the talent of the Pacific Northwest but are also hosting several artists from out of the area. Delaney Davidson being all the way from New Zealand. Shivering Timbers will be coming west for the first time from Akron, OH with their 5 yr old daughter who joins them on stage with her toy piano. Konrad Wert who goes by the stage name Possessed by Paul James will be bringing his family from Austin, TX. As well as the Deadstring Brothers who are originally from Detroit, MI. We are also happy to welcome Rollie Tussing back home from his current Michigan to reunite the Diminshed 7 for one special performance. There will be 20 performers all together with a special surprise on Sunday morning.
It is going to be a great year, we hope to see you there.
Early bird tickets are available thru May 1st - $35 for Saturday only and $59 for the weekend pass with camping only $10 per site for a two night pass. Kids 12 and under are free. Tickets are limited so make your plans and buy early!
Lineup:
BrownBird
Deadstring Brothers
The Harmed Bros.
Hillstomp
Possessed by Paul James
Sasparilla
Truckstop Darlin’
The James Low Western Front
McDougall
Water Tower
Jackrabbit
Rollie Tussing & The Diminished 7
Sidestreet Reny
Shivering Timbers
Jeffrey Martin
Tom VandenAvond
Delaney Davidson
Hip Hatchet
Broken Rodeo
The Hill Dogs
Oregon Music News is proud to be a media sponsor for the second annual Wildwood MusicFest
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Music: Shivering Timbers with Darlene
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Performing songs written for your baby daughter at a grown-up’s birthday party might not be the most...Performing songs written for your baby daughter at a grown-up’s birthday party might not be the most typical way to kick off a career in music in earnest. But when the birthday party is for one of today’s most successful music stars, it definitely ups the ante on your chances for success. That’s how things went down for Sarah and Jayson Benn, the married couple that makes up Shivering Timbers. They hail from current Grammys sensation Dan Auerbach’s homebase of Akron, Ohio, which helped lead to the birthday gig for Auerbach.
The twosome — which blends Folk, Blues, Indie Rock and other elements into their dark, compelling mix — recorded its first album in Auerbach’s studio, then befriended one of Auerbach’s pals, Cincinnati’s Brian Olive, using his studio in the Queen City to record their superb, acclaimed second album, Sing Sing. With great songwriting and an ever-rising profile thanks to consistent touring — including a few weeks out with stardom-bound Shovels & Rope — Shivering Timbers might just find themselves following in Auerbach’s footsteps to the Grammys stage within the next couple of years. The duo performs with local Indie Pop greats Darlene. 21 and up. Free. 10 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 16 at MOTR Pub, 1345 Main St., Over-the-Rhine. motrpub.com.
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Artist Interview - Shivering Timbers
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Shivering Timbers is a crazy great folk rock band that puts on an awesome live show. After seeing t...Shivering Timbers is a crazy great folk rock band that puts on an awesome live show. After seeing them at a show at the Kent Stage I made a point of making contact with Sarah, the lead singer and stand up bassist. The band was willing to answer a few of our digital inquiries here. If you’re in the Cleveland/Akron area be sure to check them out live at the show announcement at the bottom of the interview.
1) So for those not introduced to your music, how do you describe your sound?
We’re combining sounds from all music that interests us — rocknroll, folk, gospel, blues, touches of bluegrass, some punk and experimental, plus nursery rhymes and child-thematic… it’s all in there.
2) It seems like “Generations” is growing into a “hit” for you all. Can you tell us a little about the background to that song?
I (Sarah) wrote that song during a time of insecurity and fears about the future. I guess it’s a coming-of-age song for grown-ups. It’s a song of survival and commitment to your family. It’s interesting how it turned out on the album, the way Collin DuPuis mixed it because we’d placed the mices improperly on the drums and had too much cymbal. He mixed it to get some of that out, and it gave the drums an interesting kind of boxy sound. It changed the feel of it, but we went with it because we didn’t have time to re-record the whole song. We didn’t hate it, so we let it be. Sometimes accidents happen, that end up being alright.
3) How did you get your start in music? How did the band form?
Jayson and I both started playing in bands in our late teens, evolving through various genres. When Jayson and I met, we were in vastly different bands, eventually we came to writing music together. It took some time to evolve our sound, and figure out how we fit together, which is what we were working on when we made the first album.
4) The stand up bass is part of what makes your sound unique, but is must be such a burden to take on the road. Do you have a love-hate relationship with it? Oh, and does your bass have a name?
No, I love it. It’s not that bad, we use a trailer to haul gear, and the bass lays on my daughter’s old crib mattress, padded by body pillows! It doesn’t have a name yet. My old bass didn’t earn a name until it almost died…Jayson tripped over a haybale carrying it at a party and snapped the neck off. It earned the name Dixie after that. I had it glued back on, then traded it for our trailer. Same with the only car I ever named, an old mustang that I unfortunately wrecked, then rebuilt with my dad.. Only when it’s in a state of despair does a name come out. That’s similar to my songwriting process…
5) What does the songwriting process look like for Shivering Timbers? Do you write together or is there one writer for the group?
I admittedly have to wait for inspiration to strike; however, even inspiration for one or two lines, or a melody, or a piece of a song can come, and I have a journal and a recorder I put it all in. Jayson is the same way, with more focus on riffs and melodic lines. I just collect all the ideas and keep working on them until a song forms.
6) Seeing you on stage I said to my friend that you were, “the definition of folk rock” due to both your instrumentation and style. Is that something you enjoy, or would you like to correct my assessment there?
Sure, that’s probably true. We opened for Kenny Loggins a few months ago who told us we were “the future of folk”.
7) What’s your favorite song to play? And… why?
Sarah – I really like playing “Satan Your Kingdom Must Come Down” because it’s dark and dramatic, and I love the way it feels to sing it. My voice really likes that song.
Jayson – Evening Prayer – It’s always a little different every time we play it
8) What else would you like our readers to know about your music? (You can be serious or silly with this one.)
We try and put as much passion into our live shows as we do when we initially write the songs. So coming to hear us perform is really the best way to get to know us as a band, and as people.
Upcoming Show:
Friday, March 22 8:00pm
Mahall’s 20 Lanes 13200 Madison Ave. Lakewood, OH
With The Womack Family Band, and Angela Pearley& The Howlin’ Moons
Tickets $6.00 / $8.00 under 21; online through Ticketfly
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Shivering Timbers to play the MOTR Pub
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Shivering Timbers has a unique story, beginning with first being discovered by The Black Keys' Dan A...Shivering Timbers has a unique story, beginning with first being discovered by The Black Keys' Dan Auerbach when married couple/band leaders Sarah and Jayson Benn played at Auerbach's birthday party, songs they'd written for their infant daughter. Their first album was subsequently recorded at Auerbach's studio, a collection of home-spun dark folk songs and fractured fairy tales.
One year later, Shivering Timbers met and hit it off with Brian Olive (Greenhornes, Dr. John). Pretty soon the band was at his Cincinnati studio recording shivering_image_3817055.jpgtheir second album, "Sing Sing", a much more accomplished and complex album. The album was released August 14, 2012, and the band is touring the US in support of it’s release, with their 5-year-old daughter in tow! (who also plays toy piano when on tour). In November, Shivering Timbers traipsed across the Midwest playing the supporting slot on a two-week tour with up-and-comers Shovels & Rope.
“Utilizing disparate elements like scorching Indie Rock, rough cut Blues, raw Punk, sprightly Pop, tent revival Gospel and dark Folk, Shivering Timbers has crafted a sound that is both hauntingly appealing and a raucous bitch-slap.” –Cincinnati City Beat
Sarah is a captivating singer -- part P.J. Harvey, part Patsy Cline, while the nuanced howl of Jayson's guitar work is the perfect mate to her sultry vocals. What's more difficult to describe is the mood they create, which can, at times, entrance and haunt the audience, while in the next breath, invite them into a whimsical, foot-stomping play land.
Shivering Timbers has toured with, or been direct support for: Shovels & Rope, Kenny Loggins, Jessica Lea Mayfield, Tav Falco, Frontier Ruckus, O'Death, David Wax Museum, and many more great bands... www.shiveringtimbersmusic.com
Shivering Timbers
MOTR Pub
Saturday, February 16, 9PM
MOTR Pub ~ 1345 Main St ~ Cincinnati, OH
Publicity:
Mike Farley
Michael J. Media Group
608-848-9707
mike@michaeljmedia.com
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Shivering Timbers Performing at MOTR Pub February 16
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Shivering Timbers
MOTR ~ 1345 Main St ~ Cincinnati, OH
Saturday, February 16
9:00pm, 21+
www.mot...Shivering Timbers
MOTR ~ 1345 Main St ~ Cincinnati, OH
Saturday, February 16
9:00pm, 21+
www.motrpub.com or www.shiveringtimbersmusic.com
Shivering Timbers has a unique story, beginning with first being discovered by The Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach when married couple/band leaders Sarah and Jayson Benn played at Auerbach’s birthday party, songs they’d written for their infant daughter. Their first album was subsequently recorded at Auerbach’s studio, a collection of home-spun dark folk songs and fractured fairy tales.
One year later, Shivering Timbers met and hit it off with Brian Olive (Greenhornes, Dr. John). Pretty soon the band was at his Cincinnati studio recording their second album, “Sing Sing”, a much more accomplished and complex album. The album was released August 14, 2012, and the band is touring the US in support of it’s release, with their 5-year-old daughter in tow! (who also plays toy piano when on tour). In November, Shivering Timbers traipsed across the Midwest playing the supporting slot on a two-week tour with up-and-comers Shovels & Rope.
“Utilizing disparate elements like scorching Indie Rock, rough cut Blues, raw Punk, sprightly Pop, tent revival Gospel and dark Folk, Shivering Timbers has crafted a sound that is both hauntingly appealing and a raucous bitch-slap.” –Cincinnati City Beat
Sarah is a captivating singer — part P.J. Harvey, part Patsy Cline, while the nuanced howl of Jayson’s guitar work is the perfect mate to her sultry vocals. What’s more difficult to describe is the mood they create, which can, at times, entrance and haunt the audience, while in the next breath, invite them into a whimsical, foot-stomping play land.
Shivering Timbers has toured with, or been direct support for: Shovels & Rope, Kenny Loggins, Jessica Lea Mayfield, Tav Falco, Frontier Ruckus, O’Death, David Wax Museum, and many more great bands…
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Best of 2012: Top Live at KDHX photos
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Each year hundreds of musicians perform live in the intimate confines of the Magnolia Avenue Studios...Each year hundreds of musicians perform live in the intimate confines of the Magnolia Avenue Studios of 88.1 KDHX. These are some of the best photos taken during these sessions. To find more photos, videos and recordings from these sessions and more, visit the Live Performance archives.
* Click to enlarge image 8182220030_d328d89652_b.jpg Said the Whale Said the Whale
* Click to enlarge image 8281256427_5220b0916a_b.jpg Derek Hoke Derek Hoke
* Click to enlarge image 8187889949_1dc8515f22_b.jpg Sarah Jaffe Sarah Jaffe
* Click to enlarge image 8241267225_d6cff8fea9_b.jpg Great White Caps Great White Caps
* Click to enlarge image 7684477878_5ac77f71a7_b.jpg The Union Electric The Union Electric
* Click to enlarge image 7544060318_6dc0d6e967_b.jpg Tycho Tycho
* Click to enlarge image 8188968272_678d6b65a1_b.jpg Sarah Jaffe Sarah Jaffe
* Click to enlarge image 8158685280_76222848fa_b.jpg Waco Brothers and Paul Burch Waco Brothers and Paul Burch
* Click to enlarge image 8183250810_bb10358d72_b.jpg Lucy Kaplansky Lucy Kaplansky
* Click to enlarge image 7993425196_bcd147777c_b.jpg Two Gallants Two Gallants
* Click to enlarge image 8242332640_3a91b25028_b.jpg Great White Caps Great White Caps
* Click to enlarge image 8183210489_0a7680900c_b.jpg Lucy Kaplansky Lucy Kaplansky
* Click to enlarge image 8182296292_81335b8a42_b.jpg Joe Pug Joe Pug
* Click to enlarge image 7544018782_9d3e331d12_b.jpg Mynabirds Mynabirds
* Click to enlarge image 8028416672_df9e6e3e7e_b.jpg Eleni Mandell Eleni Mandell
* Click to enlarge image 7939568500_3edc8b7888_b.jpg Gaelic Storm Gaelic Storm
* Click to enlarge image 7598369244_7b9c09e412_b.jpg Alberta Cross Alberta Cross
* Click to enlarge image 8182178314_e78a17f1f5_b.jpg Rhys Jones, Jeff Miller and Jim Nelson Rhys Jones, Jeff Miller and Jim Nelson
* Click to enlarge image 7850887982_eebb7c234f_b.jpg Santah Santah
* Click to enlarge image 8057069192_74e918289e_b.jpg Astronautalis Astronautalis
* Click to enlarge image 8144568644_04852f8642_b.jpg Shivering Timbers Shivering Timbers
* Click to enlarge image 8057089618_2a73169bc6_b.jpg Astronautalis Astronautalis
* Click to enlarge image 8046238911_d89c57e69e_b.jpg The Raveonettes The Raveonettes
* Click to enlarge image 8057076751_cc797e96e0_b.jpg Astronautalis Astronautalis
* Click to enlarge image 8028094476_eece53af38_b.jpg Glen Hansard Glen Hansard
* Click to enlarge image 7993425459_fb8627710c_b.jpg Two Gallants Two Gallants
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Best of KDHX photography: November 2012
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Each month, this site features numerous photography pieces based on the work of the intrepid members...Each month, this site features numerous photography pieces based on the work of the intrepid members of KDHX's pool of volunteer photographers.
Covering live music and arts events ranging from hip hop to indie rock, from country to metal, these talented photographers capture dynamic, impassioned and intimate moments both on stage and off. The photos that they turn in provide a wide-ranging, unique perspective on live music and arts in St. Louis.
These are some of the best photos turned in by KDHX photographers during the past month. This month's picks include shots of the Matt and Kim, Japandroids, Carolina Chocolate Drops, Aimee Mann, Regina Spektor and many more. If you enjoy these photos, then be sure check out the KDHX photography archives.
Image Gallery
* Click to enlarge image 8150968887_a07b945292_b.jpg I Fight Dragons I Fight Dragons
* Click to enlarge image 8151189661_ba8feb741f_b.jpg Sara Watkins Sara Watkins
* Click to enlarge image 8151277175_a84aff115d_b.jpg Walter White Walter White
* Click to enlarge image 8151309468_692e5d28d2_b.jpg Wheel of Destruction Wheel of Destruction
* Click to enlarge image 8158568892_e14773b5d1_b.jpg Shivering Timbers Shivering Timbers
* Click to enlarge image 8158700124_dec152f393_b.jpg Waco Brothers and Paul Burch Waco Brothers and Paul Burch
* Click to enlarge image 8161827555_b97ddd4afa_b.jpg Matt & Kim Matt & Kim
* Click to enlarge image 8161897363_e682f5821c_b.jpg Sharon Van Etten Sharon Van Etten
* Click to enlarge image 8197497440_f6e000ea4f_b.jpg Carolina Chocolate Drops Carolina Chocolate Drops
* Click to enlarge image 8170205296_7ce859bff4_b.jpg Regina Spektor Regina Spektor
* Click to enlarge image 8206680806_c3e70d8a31_b.jpg Japandroids Japandroids
* Click to enlarge image 8167785281_d670297545_b.jpg Milo Greene Milo Greene
* Click to enlarge image 8182141383_1196b07f74_b.jpg Rhys Jones, Jeff Miller and Jim Nelson Rhys Jones, Jeff Miller and Jim Nelson
* Click to enlarge image 8182220030_d328d89652_b.jpg Said the Whale Said the Whale
* Click to enlarge image 8241187861_40d5d9d5e5_b.jpg Pokey LaFarge and Ryan Spearman Soundcheck Pokey LaFarge and Ryan Spearman Soundcheck
* Click to enlarge image 8186057978_9a413eb10a_b.jpg Aimee Mann Aimee Mann
* Click to enlarge image 8186122752_301d5dc415_b.jpg Sonny Landreth Sonny Landreth
* Click to enlarge image 8188969766_ac8c41219e_b.jpg
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Alt-country rowdies Shovels & Rope sing, shout and impress at the High Noon Saloon
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A couple of couples performed at High Noon Saloon last night. In a somewhat cheesy scenario, this sh...A couple of couples performed at High Noon Saloon last night. In a somewhat cheesy scenario, this show featured two married acts, Shovels & Rope and Shivering Timbers. So who won the Best Couple award? I'd say the award goes to headliners Shovels & Rope.
Shivering Timbers opened the show, led by spouses Sarah and Jayson Benn. They also employ a drummer to accompany them on tour. More importantly, though, they employ their incredibly adorable 4-year-old daughter, Suzi, on a miniature, pink toy piano. With Mrs. Benn on big bass and Mr. Benn on lead guitar, Shivering Timbers' performance brimmed with dark, bluesy folk powered by Sarah's haunting vocals. Little Suzi's tinkering on toy piano intensified the eerie, ghostly vibe during songs like "Crooked Man." Though Sarah embodies a gypsy spirit, I liked Shivering Timbers best during songs like "The Mopping Floor," which showcased the Benns' ability to perform crunchy blues-rock reminiscent of the Black Keys.
Above all, little Suzi Benn stole the show. An adorable kid on a toy piano is bound to do so. Her mother Sarah said it best when she remarked, "I can't be playing second fiddle to my own daughter." I can't wait to hear what kind of music Suzi herself will end up making in 20 years, after growing up on tour with her mom and pop.
When you hear Shovels & Rope though your headphones, you're apt to picture a cute little country-western couple. You'll learn that they're married, and you'll imagine Cary Ann Hearst in a sweet dress, like a modern-day June Carter Cash to Michael Trent's Johnny. But then you'll walk into High Noon, you'll witness them on stage, and you'll be caught off-guard. Cary Ann and Michael are a couple of punk rockers playing alt-country music. Really rowdy, twangy, alt-country music.
Michael and Cary Ann, who both began as solo artists (Trent also spent time as lead singer of the Films), came together in matrimony and music to form Shovels & Rope a couple of years ago. Their musical union has blended folk, country and a little bit of punk. The couple exemplified the highs and lows of marital relations as they made pretty sounds together and then shouted and hollered at one other (Trent scolded his wife as she took a shot from a member of the crowd, saying, "Didn't you learn your lesson last night?"). Regardless, the pair sure can make a lot of noise for only two people, wailing during songs like "Hail, Hail." Meanwhile, "Shank Hill," their murder ballad, demonstrated their softer side and their ability to tenderly harmonize like total lovebirds.
The best line of the night, from the song "Birmingham," was shouted to the audience as an anthem: "It ain't what you got; it's what you make." Shovels & Rope have got two folks, and what they make is good music.
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Shivering Timbers album art and a video for “Bad Luck” by Shovels & Rope
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After the show, I stopped by the merch table and had a chat with Sarah from Shivering Timbers. I was...After the show, I stopped by the merch table and had a chat with Sarah from Shivering Timbers. I was admiring the gorgeous album artwork from their newest LP, Sing Sing, and their first release, We All Started in the Same Place.
Sarah explained to me that the artwork for this newest album was a collaborative effort. Artist Julia Bunn created the drawings and watercolors and collaged several images together and then Chelsea Blackerby was responsible for bringing it all together, laying it out and enhancing it digitally.
For the first LP, Madison Hite printed the black and white image onto a needlepoint fabric and did the embroidery by hand.
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Shovels & Rope | 11.03.12
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Saturday night at Off Broadway, Cary Ann Hearst of Shovels & Rope quipped that it was a “Family Plan...Saturday night at Off Broadway, Cary Ann Hearst of Shovels & Rope quipped that it was a “Family Planning Tour,” referencing the other half of her duo, husband Michael Trent, and the spouses in their opening act Shivering Timbers, Sarah and Jayson Benn. I feel the need to thank the agents of karma and the stars for aligning to bring both of these couples together because, to be totally and completely clichéd, they make beautiful music together.
Shivering Timbers are all heavy mood and vibrant vocals. Jayson Benn is a damn fine guitarist and adds some grit to balance the sweetness of Sarah’s vocals. Sarah is completely captivating on the double bass, swaying with it and dancing around it as she plays. I had not heard of them before the show but it did not take long to make me a fan. They merge folk music with a touch of gospel and a dark and smooth, jazzy vibe. Then the intensity picks up and the sound becomes very Jefferson Airplane-esque, especially in songs like “Holly Holy” from their LP Sing Sing. Speaking of Jefferson Airplane, there is something distinctly ’70s about Shivering Timbers; from the artwork on their albums and t-shirts, to the luscious sounds they are producing and the look of the band. I was really kind of jonesing on her whole look and outfit: a simple black mini-dress with sheer bell sleeves, fringed tan suede boots, and long, dangly chain earrings with feathers. (Sorry to get all girly-girl on you there.)
What I was not thrilled about was the behavior of the crowd. Folks, the talking was out of hand and just downright rude. At the beginning of the evening I was up in the balcony and realized that was a bad move, since that’s the appropriate place to be if you are just there for background music to accompany your conversations. However, I moved down to the floor and it was even worse. People weren’t just talking, they were yelling at each other—over quiet love songs. It was out of control and it made me cringe. I wish people could get over themselves and show some respect.
It got a little better during Shovels & Rope, but there were several of us throwing the evil eye around at the chatters all night long. I have a suggestion to the management of our local venues: Introduce the bands and give a simple etiquette reminder. As a matter of fact, on Shovels & Rope’s LP O’ Be Joyful, there is a track that begins with a club owner doing this exact thing in his introduction of the band. It sets a tone and an expectation of behavior. Anyone who’d get pissed off about being told not to talk during a performance needs to hand over their ticket to someone who appreciates it and go talk their fool head off elsewhere.
I digress—that blemish on the night was the only one. Let me just tell you, Shovels & Rope are one hell of a good time! One part old-school country, one part traditional folk, one part punk and one part rock, these two are a perfect storm onstage. Hearst’s got a raspy voice and a sparkle in her eye. Trent is at once both laidback and simmering with energy. It’s a beautiful thing to watch how they interact onstage. It’s especially fun that they play everything like separate “one-man-band machines” that have merged. I especially loved the tambourine, tied to the kick drum with bandanas to be hit with the drumstick. You can’t help but stomp your feet and clap your hands along with them, adding to the percussion.
I was so happy to have songs I have absolutely fallen in love with, like “Shank Hill Street” and “Hail, Hail,” performed two feet away from me. The perfect ending to the night’s set was their encore of “Lay Low”; I cannot even put into words how much I love that song. It is one of the most bare-to-the-bones, raw, and exposed songs I have ever heard. I highly recommend that you track down the recording of them performing it together at this year’s Pickathon Festival. What Shovels & Rope are especially good at in their compositions is pacing and spacing, and leaving a little room to let a word or a phrase have some room to breathe.
I just want to end by emphatically stating that I think these are the people the Grand Ol’ Opry was built for. I don’t have much love or respect for most of what’s been hogging the floorboards there for the last few decades. Honestly, I’d like nothing more than to see what passes today as “country music” (which is actually just pop music with a twang) to be shoved to the side and for bands of this caliber to call the stage home again and take over the country station airwaves. A girl can dream, right?
Along with contemporaries like Justin Townes Earle, The Avett Brothers, Neko Case, Drive by Truckers, Joe Pug, and Gillian Welch, both Shivering Timbers and Shovels & Rope are proof that country music is alive and well. These modern artists have picked up a punk-rock attitude here, a jazzy vibe there, and a more pronounced folk sensibility. However, there is an obvious respect for the greats of the past and their roots are still in mountain music. The heart of their sound is still pure Americana.
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Musical Assembly
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A little over a month ago, I bought Matt and me tickets to see Shovels & Rope at The Blue Door in Ok...A little over a month ago, I bought Matt and me tickets to see Shovels & Rope at The Blue Door in Oklahoma City. I’m not one for being in a crowd (and really not one for paying exorbitant amounts of money to see bands play live while getting pushed around in a crowd), but for some bands I’m willing to forgo my personal comfort and suck it up.
So Tuesday night, I took in my second concert in less than two weeks. (To expound my earlier point, the last concert I saw before last week’s RHCP show was Morrissey back in…oh, 2007 or 2008? Before the turn of the decade, that’s for sure…) But The Blue Door was cozy and not at all what I expected when I was told it was a very small venue. I envisioned a standing crowd with lots of spilled beer on the floor. And while there was spilled beer on the floor, it wasn’t a rowdy bunch and I think everyone there appreciated that, from the young teenagers to the musicians to the grandparents in the audience. Yes, grandparents. Of whom? I don’t know, but there were some much older folks there and I was thrilled to be in such a varied group of listeners.
In fact, it was much liked a fourth-grade musical assembly complete with metal folding chairs lined up in an orderly fashion, some merchandise at the table, and no drinks for sale. There’s a water fountain back there on the wall, I was told. And I was grateful for one, seeing as Matt and I came unprepared even after acknowledging the venue’s BYOB policy.
For three hours, we happily listened to some pretty incredible musicians.
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samantha crain
Samantha Crain
Samantha Crain, a local musician from Shawnee, has a voice that I compared to Tori Amos (but accompanied by a guitar instead of a piano) mixed with a little bit of a Southern Plains girl-version of Bjork. Too cheesy? Well, it was wistful and I don’t know how else to say it. My ears liked it a lot, though.
shivering timbers
Shivering Timbers
When Shivering Timbers took the stage, they spent a few minutes working out the sound kinks on their bass but when you could finally hear the words being sung, it was like listening to some very funky, creepy lullabies. I told Matt during their set, “I feel like I’m in a very weird version of Alice’s Wonderland.” We both agreed the singer was a sexier version of Olive Oyl, tall and spindly-limbed and just all kinds of porcelain-faced gorgeous. (Check out Crooked Old Man on their website’s music player)
shovels & rope
Shovels & Rope
Finally, Shovels & Rope came out. This is a band comprised of only two people, Michael Trent and Cary Ann Hearst. It’s her voice I’m so captured by. Maybe it’s the way Cary Ann Hearst’s Southern drawl overtakes every word she says or that it is such an overwhelming force, but a good kind of overwhelming, coming from a woman who is much smaller than I could have ever imagined. And she’s so charming! You know, the kind of woman you would never invite out on a double date because your date would end up falling in love with her, too. Oh, I was in musical heaven.
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Shivering Timbers bring hybrid sounds to Civic
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DOWNTOWN AKRON — Sarah Benn doesn’t want to talk about what musicians influence her.
The vocalist...DOWNTOWN AKRON — Sarah Benn doesn’t want to talk about what musicians influence her.
The vocalist and stand-up bassist, who is one-half of Shivering Timbers with her husband, Jayson Benn, describes the band as folk rock with hints of gospel, blues, punk and nursery rhymes. But she stops short of mentioning specific influences to compare their sound to.
“I always steer away from that because it depends on the day,” Benn said in a phone interview. “Today I’m listening to Joni Mitchell but tomorrow I might be listening to Rancid or the Dropkick Murphys. That’s what makes us be able to work together so well because we understand these other types of music that we both like. I like it all, he likes it all and it all influences us.”
The Akron-based duo will perform as a quartet for its first-ever show at the Akron Civic Theatre Nov. 10 at 8 p.m. Drummers Brad Thorla and David Marchione, who usually alternate accompanying them, will play drums and keyboards at the show that also will feature Roger Hoover and the Hurt on the Civic stage for an intimate cabaret-style performance. Akron visual artist Todd V. also will be on hand with an exhibit of work from his iPhone.
Both Benns are veterans of local bands, but their current project started more than two years ago as they created music to children’s rhymes to entertain their daughter, Suzi, who’s about to turn 5.
“A lot of the nursery rhyme stuff is still with us,” Benn said. “A lot of them are nonsense, so they can mean what you want them to mean.”
After playing a set at a birthday party for The Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach, he offered to record the duo at his Akron studio, and the result was their first album, We All Started in the Same Place, released in 2010.
This fall, the band released Sing Sing, which features a title track that has been played on local radio station The Summit.
At the end of October, the Benns hit the road with their daughter in tow for a Midwest tour supporting Shovels & Rope, a Charleston, S.C.,-based duo that also features a married couple.
“They are an up-and-coming band that just released their first full-length album,” Benn said. “They will keep Suzi while we perform. She’s actually convinced she will be playing with us. We’re bringing the toy piano, and I said we’ll see how that works out.
She added that the tour is significant because it will expose the band to a broader audience in the Midwest. They’ll return home right before their show at the Civic, which is their only local gig planned for some time, Benn said.
“We’re playing less and less locally,” she said. “We’re looking at booking spring tours now, and we’ll be touring a lot.”
Benn heads up the business end of the band, while her husband supports the family as a drafter. They previously lived in Highland Square but now own a house in Goodyear Heights. They have no plans to leave Akron, but the two would like to eventually make a living from their love of music, she said.
“I’m done with the playing shows in crappy bars stage,” Benn said. “We have a lot of good contacts we’ve made and people we’ve met. Everything we’ve done has led to something else. We’re hoping that will be the outcome from the Civic show and that it will be an introduction for us to Greater Akron. A lot of people know us, but a lot of people don’t.”
Tickets for the Civic show are $15 and available at www.akroncivic.com, at the Civic Box Office or by calling 330-253-2488. For more information on the band, go to www.ShiveringTimbersMusic.com.
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Shivering Timbers 10/29/12
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The Shivering Timbers that make up the soul of this preview are Jayson and Sarah Benn, an Ohio-based...The Shivering Timbers that make up the soul of this preview are Jayson and Sarah Benn, an Ohio-based husband and wife team that performs under that name.
When they booked a gig at his birthday party, Dan Auerbach of the Black Keys became so smitten that he decided to produce their first album, 2010's "We All Started In the Same Place." The album is a charming, tangential foray that mates nursery rhyme melodies, Kimya Dawson/Adam Green speak-sing harmonies and a humorous, macabre musical sensibility that makes a song like "Nose Nose Nose" sound like a jocund, yet trippy nightmare.
The labyrinthine nature of Shivering Timbers' work lends to their oeuvre of grim mysticism. Dramatic tracks like "Evening Prayer" sound like a dead end following songs like "See-Saw Sacradown" -- the latter would be at home sung to a child at bedtime. Then "Three Young Rats" erupts with a disorienting dose of Scottish influences that incorporate the tone of a bagpipe.
Shivering Timbers' second LP, 2012's "Sing Sing," treads the same path heard on "We All Started In the Same Place." The sonically ominous sound of the band never ceases to be foreboding. Their songs sound like dark fairy tales where the creatures, however harmless, look ferocious. "Big Fire" could soundtrack a story where spritely beings -- all colored black, with translucent gray wings and red pupils -- guide the lost home with the assumed benevolence of those painted white, gold and glitter. Rather than sounding like the elegy of a carnival freak, their music is filled with whimsically dark elements suited for a Jim Henson film, à la "The Dark Crystal."
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User's Guide to CMJ
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In lieu of a must-see show lineup this week, here’s a crazy long list of acts in town for the CMJ fe...In lieu of a must-see show lineup this week, here’s a crazy long list of acts in town for the CMJ festival, ready to wow our mittens off of our pretty little paws.
Some of these are familiar names for folkers, but I’m sure there are a handful of newbies, as well. You’d get to see a lot of great acts just by hanging around Rockwood Music Hall, but some of the best bang-for-your-buck shows will be Thursday’s Texas Takeover Party (check out Wild Child, a duo out of Austin) where a bunch of names will be playing, including Robert Ellis. That same night, Union Hall’s hosting Joy Kills Sorrow and Admiral Fallow underground. Divide your time wisely.
Some other off-the-radar picks include Minneapolis’ Communist Daughter, who’ll play Cake Shop on Wednesday, and Shivering Timbers – a sensitively rocking husband/wife duo who take on the intimate Pete’s Candy Store on Friday.
Here’s a full(er) list of recommendations:
Tuesday, October 16:
6:00 p.m. — Tall Heights at Rockwood Music Hall
8:00 p.m. — Darlingside at Rockwood Music Hall
8:00 p.m. — The Infamous Stringdusters at Brooklyn Bowl
8:30 p.m. — Shakey Graves / Plume Giant / Town Hall / Swear and Shake at The Delancey
Wednesday, October 17:
Starting at 1:00 p.m. — Last.fm Showcase, with Friend Roulette / Christopher Paul Stelling / The Lone Bellow (formerly Zach Williams and the Bellow)
7:00 p.m. — John Fullbright at Rockwood Music Hall
7:15 p.m. — Jonatha Brooke at Rockwood Music Hall
8:15 p.m. — Communist Daughter at Cake Shop
11:45 p.m. — Pillow Talk at Lit Lounge
Thursday, October 18
8:00 p.m. — CMJ Texas Takeover Party, With Robert Ellis, The TonTons, Wild Child, Shakey Graves at Rebel NYC
10:30 p.m. — Mount Moriah at Mercury Lounge (Currently sold out)
10:00 p.m. — Admiral Fallow / Joy Kills Sorrow at Union Hall
Friday, October 19
7:00 p.m. — Matthew and the Atlas at Rockwood Music Hall
9:00 p.m. — Tall Tall Trees at Rockwood Music Hall
10:00 p.m. — Shivering Timbers at Pete’s Candy Store
12:00 a.m. — Holy Ghost Tent Revival at Rockwood Music Hall
Saturday, October 20
3:30 p.m. — Yellow Red Sparks at Fontana’s
4:00 p.m. — Aunt Martha at Rockwood Music Hall
8:00 p.m. — Fences at Rockwood Music Hall
9:30 p.m. — The Lone Bellow at Rockwood Music Hall
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The Whiskey Collection's CMJ Picks
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What we like: The song Annalee really hits the spot for us. We feel a kinship with this band who tak...What we like: The song Annalee really hits the spot for us. We feel a kinship with this band who takes traditional songs and melodies and re-contextualizes them in a very refreshing way. Plus, they’re rocking out as a husband-wife couple with their adorable 4-year-old daughter featured prominently in their new album. It’s hard not to love them.
Where they’re playing: Pete’s Candy Store
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Kaleidoscope: It was a foot-stompin' night at historic Nelsonville opera house
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Ever since I visited Nelsonville for the first time in spring 2009, I've wanted to see the inside of...Ever since I visited Nelsonville for the first time in spring 2009, I've wanted to see the inside of Stuart's Opera House and perhaps attend a performance.
I saw the historic building on Public Square from outside twice during visits to the Athens County city of 5,400, but never had the opportunity to go inside.
That changed on Labor Day weekend. During an overnight stay in Athens, I found out about a show that night at Stuart's, which was built in 1879.
I never heard of the two groups playing -- Shivering Timbers and Shovels & Rope -- but read about the show in the Ohio University Post. They sounded like something I'd enjoy.
The three hours of foot-stompin', knee-slappin' music for an audience of about 350 people was the perfect end to a memorable day in Southeast Ohio.
ABOUT THE MUSICAL GROUPS
Shivering Timbers opened the show, and I was amazed to discover its three members are from the Akron area.
Husband and wife Jayson and Sarah Benn play guitar and bass fiddle, respectively, and they are joined by a drummer.
The group plays high-spirited folk, country/rock and blues/rock. The night before their Nelsonville show, they debuted their second CD, "Sing, Sing." Their first, released in late 2010, was "We All Started in the Same Place."
Akronite Dan Auerbach of the Black Keys produced their first album.
The band recently performed with the Blue Sky Riders at the Kent Stage and at Kent State University's fall folk festival.
Whimsical and eccentric are two words to describe some of the band's songs, which include "Crooked Old Man," "Noble Duke of York," "Gonna Getchya," "Three Young Rats" and "See-Saw Sacradown."
According to their website, Shivering Timbers will play Oct. 16 at the Beachland Ballroom in Cleveland and Nov. 10 at the Akron Civic Theater.
Also, their website reports they will be on a November tour with Shovels & Rope, which includes shows in Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Wisconsin and Minnesota.
After Shivering Timbers' performance, I told the guy sitting beside me that it would be tough to top that, but Shovels & Rope managed to do it.
Cary Ann Hearst and Michael Trent, a married couple, hail from Charleston, S.C., and began performing together in 2005.
An album project titled "Shovels & Rope" -- because of many murder ballads in which many characters buried their secrets with shovels or hung from ropes -- led to their name.
During the annual Nelsonville Music Festival in May, Shovels & Rope captivated area residents so much that Stuart's Opera House invited them back.
The group performs a rousing show of uptempo songs. After taking their music on the road, the couple recorded an album titled "O' Be Joyful" in their home, backyard, van and several motel rooms.
The duo is unique in that they don't play expensive instruments.
They stir up venues with two old guitars, harmonicas, a drum kit rescued from a garbage dump and adorned with tambourines, flowers and kitchen rags, and occasionally a small keyboard. Both play all the instruments.
Some of their songs are "Birmingham," "Hail Hail," "Kemba's Got the Cabbage Moth Blues," "This Means War" and "Shank Hill St." A line in the latter goes: "With a handshake like a hammer and a suicide grin, that wooden door creaked open and the butcher man let me in."
The crowd loved Shovels & Rope. Many followers who apparently fell in love with the duo at the May festival stood the entire show in front of the stage.
ABOUT STUART'S OPERA HOUSE
In the mid-19th century, Nelsonville native George Stuart had a showboat called the Arizona, which traveled on Ohio's canals and played minstrel music.
In 1869, the Arizona sank in the Erie Canal during a storm. So Stuart returned to the then booming coal mining town of Nelsonville and built an opera house with bricks baked from nearby clay.
When it opened in 1879, the Athens Messenger proclaimed it "an ornament to the town and a monument to the public spirit of its projector."
In its heyday, the intimate second-floor theater hosted vaudeville acts, minstrel shows, musicals, recitals, dances and high school graduations.
Among those appearing there were Elsie Janis -- "The Queen of Vaudeville" -- magician Howard Thurston and "Yankee Doodle Dandy" composer George M. Cohen.
With the decline of vaudeville came the decline of Stuart's. It closed in 1924 and sat empty -- with scenery and theatrical equipment still intact -- for more than 50 years.
A non-profit group called the Hocking Valley Museum of Theatrical History was founded in 1976 to restore and maintain the old opera house.
The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979. But its rebirth was short-lived. In early 1980 a fire nearly gutted the building.
After extensive renovation, including the reconstruction of the building's street-level commercial space, Stuart's reopened in 1997 and has been going strong ever since.
The building, on the Northeast corner of Nelsonville's Public Square, has a lobby on the first floor, where concessions and merchandise for acts that play there are sold.
The second-floor auditorium is quaint, with creaky wooden floors and old wrought-iron, padded fold down seats. The lower seating area accommodates about 250 people, while a balcony above seats about 100.
There is ample standing room in back of the lower level and at the sides of the balcony. Two small boxes at the side of the stage are reserved for benefactors and sponsors.
Some acts which were scheduled to perform at the venue this fall were the Red Clay Ramblers, Taj Mahal Trio, Arlo Guthrie, Tinariwen, Iris DeMent and Dwight Icenhower.
Productions by the Athenian Berean Community Players, which has existed since 1973, also take place there. In coming months, the group will present "Nightfall with Edgar Allan Poe," "Hansel and Gretal," "Is There Life After High School?" and "First Things First."
WHAT ELSE IN NELSONVILLE?
In a column after a previous trip to Athens County, I mentioned the Hocking Valley Scenic Railroad as being one of Nelsonville's attractions.
The Rocky Outdoor Gear Store also is there, as well as Hocking College, Robbins Crossing pioneer village and remnants of the Nelsonville Brick Co., from which Star brick for Indianapolis Speedway's surface and streets in hundreds of towns came.
And the world's largest privately-erected cross stands atop a hill on the northeast side of the city.
The former Dew Hotel, built in 1839, sets on the Southeast corner of Public Square. It's famous for the balcony where presidents William Howard Taft, William McKinley, Warren G. Harding and Teddy Roosevelt spoke from during some campaign stops.
Public Square, or the Historic Square Arts District, is a thriving art-lovers paradise. Adorned with classic Star bricks, it includes more than a dozen retail shops, restaurants and an iconic fountain.
The staff of Wayne National Forest, which encompasses about 240,000 acres in Athens and surrounding counties, is headquartered on Route 33, just east of Nelsonville.
The forest contains 300 miles of trails. On the headquarters grounds is the Snake Ridge fire outlook tower, which was built in 1939 on Route 278 southwest of Nelsonville and later moved there.
Eight fire towers, which were 75 to 100 feet high, once kept look over the area's forests. The towers were actively used until the 1970s. Only the Shawnee tower south of New Straitsville remains in its original location.
Email: klahmers@recordpub.com
Phone: 330-541-9400 ext. 4189
Photo of Jayson and Sarah Benn courtesy of Nate Burrell www.beforetheblink.com
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Shivering Timbers
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The family that rocks together locks together, and there’s no
better proof than Jayson and ... The family that rocks together locks together, and there’s no
better proof than Jayson and Sarah Benn, a husband-and-wife
duo making weirdly powerful music as Shivering Timbers.
Utilizing disparate elements like scorching Indie Rock, rough cut
Blues, raw Punk, sprightly Pop, tent revival Gospel and dark Folk,
Shivering Timbers has crafted a sound that is both hauntingly
appealing and a raucous bitch slap. The Timbers’ debut album,
2010’s We All Started in the Same Place, was produced by the
Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach, while their new release, the justreleased
Sing Sing, was recorded here in Cincinnati and mixed
at Auerbach’s Nashville studio. In any event, Shivering Timbers
is as unsettling as an apocalyptic sermon and as soothing as a
mother‘s lullaby.
Dig: A murder ballad hootenanny at an abandoned warehouse
fire with P.J. Harvey, The Handsome Family and The Sundresses.
B.B.
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A Good Read, A Good Listen
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It’s a simple yet sublime pleasure, and just thinking about it can make you feel a little calmer, a ...It’s a simple yet sublime pleasure, and just thinking about it can make you feel a little calmer, a little more content. Imagine: You bring out one of the good rocks glasses (or your favorite mug or a special occasion tea cup) and pour a couple fingers of amber liquid (or something dark and strong or just some whole milk). You drop the needle on the jazz platter (or pull up a blues album on your mp3 player or dig out that mixtape from college). Ensconcing yourself in the coziest seat in the house, you crack the spine on a classic (or find your place in that sci-fi paperback or pull up a biography on your e-book reader). And then, you go away for a while. Ah, bliss.
In this series, some of NTSIB’s friends share beloved albums, books and drinks to recommend or inspire.
Life in the Shivering Timbers’ household, i.e. the home of Sarah and Jayson Benn in Akron, Ohio, doesn’t leave much time for leisurely drink while flipping through pages and listening to the hi-fi. On top of raising their four-year-old girl and the handful of jobs that Jayson works, the band just released their second, beautiful album, Sing Sing. But, fortunately for us, they did find a moment to share a few favorites for when they do have time to sit still for a while.
“Wayfaring Stranger/Evening Prayer” – Shivering Timbers
Sarah says: Free time is scarce, so a 78 is perfect for a moment of escapism, and I relish Ernie Andrews “Dream Awhile/Green Gin” (GEM records 1945). Add a tall glass of iced sweet tea, and the latest copy of Garden Design magazine, and I’m blissful for 10 minutes. On the road I have time to read, and it’s almost always some sort of world history (or music history) book, right now I’m reading A People’s History of the United States [by Howard Zinn], which I think everyone should read.
http://youtu.be/gA51TK0tUdw
Jayson says: On the rare occasion when I’m able to disappear for a while, I can usually be found lying on the floor in my living room, directly in front of the stereo. Lately I’ve been listening to the country gentlemen of guitar: Chet Atkins, Merle Travis, and Duane Eddy, to name a few. There is something about these old timers that has been lost on a lot of modern guitar players; they had grit, class, and knew how to make their instruments sing. My drink of choice is typically a glass of good bourbon (neat).
On the other hand, if the girls are out of town visiting family, I’ll grab a six pack of High Life and blow the speakers out with some Motorhead or Iron Maiden.
Reading while listening to music usually doesn’t go hand in hand for me. I do, however, have a couple of books going at the moment: Tom Waits – In the Studio by Jake Brown, and Speaker for the Dead, the follow-up to Orson Scott Card’s great sci-fi novel, Ender’s Game.
http://youtu.be/N8vOTKMqzw4
April Fecca
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Shivering Timbers to play at Musica
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By Malcolm X Abram
Beacon Journal pop music writer
When the Shivering Timbers, aka the husband a...By Malcolm X Abram
Beacon Journal pop music writer
When the Shivering Timbers, aka the husband and wife duo of Jayson and Sarah Benn, released its first album, We All Started in the Same Place, it was the sort of band that had casually made a record.
The Benns, who have both been in other bands, had written some lullaby-like songs in 2008 for their then-newborn daughter Suzi, who is now 4, and had played some shows when they were invited to play a few songs at a friend’s birthday party. That friend happened to be Dan Auerbach of the Black Keys, who was so impressed by their modern musical nursery rhymes that he invited them to make a record at his Easy Eye Studios in Nashville, Tenn., and a few months later the Shivering Timbers had a debut album.
Now two years later, the duo has grown into a trio, adding drummer Brad Thorla (of Relaxer, cover band Black Sabath and others) and fill-in drummer David Marchione. The band has played many shows and has crystallized its sound adding some frayed rock edges and grooves to its dark lullabies.
The expanded sound can be heard on its new album, Sing Sing. The band is celebrating with a CD release show Friday at Musica in Akron along with White Pines, Good Morning Valentine and Light of the Loons.
“I’m a little nervous,” said upright bassist, banjoist, singer/songwriter/manager/booker Sarah from the ?Benns’ home in Akron.
For anyone who is enchanted by the band’s calm, ethereal debut, but has yet to see it live, Sing Sing may come as a bit of a surprise with more up-tempo backbeat-driven tunes and unique arrangements of traditional folks songs. The title track is a peppy up-tempo indie rock tune getting airplay on 91.3 the Summit (93.1-FM). I would also suggest a listen to the fuzzed-out stomping song Generations.
Both Benns credit drummer Thorla’s addition to helping focus the band musically.
“He brought a lot of extra energy to the old songs from the first record that wasn’t there before when it was just me and Sarah,” said guitarist, multi-instrumentalist and singer/songwriter Jayson Benn, adding that it took a few shows with Thorla before the band started “making music that I like. Up to that point it was kind of shticky.”
“It felt like a fling, a musical fling,” Sarah added.
Jayson said: “We didn’t know where we were going to go from there. We were kind of stuck playing those songs, but we didn’t know what to do next. At the same time, we didn’t just want to keep doing nursery rhymes, and Brad helped us expand.”
With a drummer and a batch of new songs, it was Sarah who first floated the idea late last year of recording album No. 2. The band enlisted buddy Cincinnati-based artist/producer Brian Olive to co-produce and used Auerbach’s Easy Eye Sound for mixing Sing Sing.
Then the duo had to figure out how to pay for the record and its release. With the help of another friend, local artist Chelsea Blackberby, who made a promotional video and helped with the album’s cover art and packaging, the band began a Kickstarter campaign at the beginning of January.
The initial pledge goal was $4,000, and within a week the band had surpassed that total, eventually reaching $8,784 by the end of January.
The result is a baker’s dozen of strong tracks showing the band’s growing musical versatility and Sarah’s love of old folk song lyrics as the band applies its own melodies and arrangements to several traditional tunes, including the title track, a twangy guitar- and reverb-drenched take on Wayfaring Stranger, a spooky, banjo-driven Satan, Your Kingdom Must Come Down, along with a slow building, fairly rocking and dark version of Neil Diamond’s Holly Holy.
“It’s darker than Neil Diamond could pull off, he wears way too many sequins to be dark,” Jayson said.
Also included is a song co-written by budding songwriter/singer/drummer Suzi Benn, I Love You Too Much, which hearkens back to her parents’ Suzi-inspired debut.
There are a couple of songs featuring lyrics by local songwriter and Shivering Timbers fan Chuck Auerbach (Dan’s dad), including the lonesome wailing country-folk flavored Without Someone and simmering Annalee.
Many independent artists (particularly young or already established ones) love the new paradigm shift in the music industry that allows them to keep control of every facet of their music and career and deal directly with fans through the Internet. But Sarah Benn, who acts as the band’s business manager, booker, publicist and wears every other business-related hat while being a stay-at-home mom (Jayson works full-time as a drafter at a land survey company) says she’d love to have some help and has been lobbying record labels and bookers and others to no avail.
“We’re not on the road eight months out of the year. If we were, they’d probably be knocking down our door, or at least answering my emails,” Sarah said with a dry laugh, noting that they can only play out on weekends.
“We have a mortgage and a daughter and two cars and credit cards and student loans, you know what I mean? We’re 30,” she said. “We can’t just hope that playing little crappy clubs with no booking help or management or publicist behind us would ever pay the bills because it won’t. We need a machine behind us.”
Nevertheless the Benns say the Shivering Timbers are doing pretty well playing festivals and gigging whenever it can while working on maintaining and building the band’s fan base.
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The NE Ohio Music Scene Has Major League Talent
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There has been some great music from Northeast Ohio players this past year, led by Akron native sons...There has been some great music from Northeast Ohio players this past year, led by Akron native sons The Black Keys touring the world promoting El Camino. I have already touched on some other artist’s getting some national exposure including Ryan Humbert, Alex Bevan, and Kate Tucker. Our area local songwriters are out showcasing their original music and working hard to make a living as musicians any place that will have them perform. Some even take the show on the road, traveling across the state and country hoping to gain a larger audience and appreciation of their work. So it is my honor and privilege to tell you the band Shivering Timbers, and troubadours Roger Hoover and Brian Lisik will all be releasing brand new albums. The three albums cover different genera’s are unique and brilliant to their wide spectrum listening audience.
Husband and wife team of Sarah Benn (upright bass, banjo lead vocals) and Jayson Benn (electric guitar) are Shivering Timbers and will be releasing their second record titled Sing Sing on September 4th. The sophomore follow-up to their Dan Auerbach produced 2010 release, the new disc has a very retro ‘60’s psychedelic sound that is also fresh and new. Self-produced along with the help of Brian Olive, the thirteen tracks were recorded at The Diamonds in Cincinnati and mixed by Collin Dupuis at Easy Eye Sound in Nashville. The flow takes you on a listening journey from the opening title track to the final number. I love the beautiful ballad “Annalee” with its twangy-edged blues guitar riffs to “Satan, Your Kingdom Must Come Down” with opening banjo/gospel that leads to a layered heavy bass/guitar climax. “Wayfaring Stranger” is dark and mysterious compared to the dreamy and whimsical “All Our Days” written by Joey Beltram of Good Morning Valentine. The Benn’s add a slice of parental humor with “The Mopping Floor” and a cool take on the Neil Diamond classic “Holly, Holy”.
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Key To Their Success
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"This is a place that Dan Auerbach used to talk about all the time, but I discovered it first," ... "This is a place that Dan Auerbach used to talk about all the time, but I discovered it first," says Shivering Timbers' singer and bassist Sarah Benn as she and her husband, Timbers guitarist Jayson Benn, sit at a table at La Taqueria Rancheros, a hole-in-the-wall Akron eatery that's known for its authentic Mexican food. Not that Benn is dissing the Black Keys' frontman. After all, he did produce the Timbers' 2010 debut, We All Started in the Same Place, and helped them find a producer for their new album, Sing Sing, a moody alt-country/indie-folk record that recalls alt-country crooner queen Neko Case.
The Benns first met six years ago after a show at the Lime Spider, the defunct Akron indie-rock club that's since been transformed into a restaurant and bar. Sarah knew Jayson played in a band, but he didn't know she had any musical talent until he visited her at her house one day and saw that she was reading the score for Miles Davis' Birth of the Cool. "I was playing the trumpet at the time, and my favorite thing to play was the song 'Deception,'" recalls Sarah. "That's the only thing I ever play. I get out the horn and play that song a few times, and then put the horn away for eight months."
It was then that they discovered that they had played in a number of Akron and Kent punk and indie bands that had crossed paths over the years. But the couple didn't begin collaborating until their daughter was born five years ago. "We spent all of our time entertaining this little baby and singing songs to her," says Sarah. "So we tried to write songs that she would like."
They played those songs at Auerbach's 30th birthday party, and he loved them so much that he decided to produce their debut album. "The Black Keys were in the process of mixing their Blakroc album, and Kanye West called Dan while we were in the studio with him," recalls Sarah. "I could hear Kanye's voice over the phone. I was like, 'Oh my God, that's Kanye.'"
It was at this point that the couple began to take their music more seriously. They started performing live more often and recruited drummer Brad Thorla to play drums on a full-time basis. (The record's assorted instruments — banjo, castanets, glockenspiel, toy piano — reflect the group's eclectic nature.) On a trip to Nashville to meet Auerbach, the Benns hooked up with Brian Olive, who was mixing a solo album at Auerbach's studio.
"He had these women singing harmony on one of the songs, and they were having a tough time," says Sarah. "I can do harmonies like that. It's one of my true gifts as a singer, which is a shame because I don't have anyone in this group I can harmonize with. I was like, 'Throw me in there. I can do it.' I was just joking, but I went in there and did it."
The Benns made such a strong connection with Olive, a former member of the heralded garage-rock bands the Greenhornes and the Soledad Brothers, that he ended up producing Sing Sing. The recording process was much different this time around at Olive's Cincinnati studio. "At Dan's studio, everything is set up so you can just play and have fun," says Sarah. "At Brian's place, you have to set everything up and get things put in place. We had some sound issues, because on the other side of the wall there was a mini-mart, and there were certain times of the day when we couldn't record anything in a certain room. I know there's one spot on the album where I can hear a door squeaking."
The record begins with the title track, a twangy number that shows off Sarah's powerful voice. But it's the album's second song, a cover of Neil Diamond's "Holly Holy" that comes as a real surprise. The band adds some much-needed grit to the Diamond classic. A couple of the songs also feature lyrics written by Auerbach's dad, Charles, who gave them a whole stack of material to sift through. "I went through all of them, and a lot of them were cheating songs and drinking songs," says Sarah. "But we really liked 'Annalee' because it was so dark."
The rest of Sing Sing – which will be released at this weekend's CD-release show at Musica – mines musical territory that's much more intense than most of the songs found on the Timbers' debut. The group's growing fan base sure seems to like them. "Our music and lyrics have already appeared on websites, and the album isn't even out yet," says Sarah. "This is completely different from when we released our first album. Nobody knew who we were — we were just people from Akron who had Dan Auerbach's name on their record. Now we kind of have our own thing."
Jeff Niesel
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Shivering Timbers: Sing Sing
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About a year ago, my wife and I went to an arts/music festival at our favorite neighborhood in Akron...About a year ago, my wife and I went to an arts/music festival at our favorite neighborhood in Akron. Against all odds, we found an outdoor table at Chipotle (well-kept secret: their Margaritas are killer), right next to the main stage. But we were ready to give up our choice spot about three songs into the first act, which made my brain bleed. They were one of these gleefully tuneless post-punk bands with a basic contempt for things like rhythm, chord changes, singing, dynamics… It’s like they came together for the sole purpose of making me question my love of music.
Then Shivering Timbers hit the stage, demonstrating how a great band can lift your spirit and turn a fairly commonplace setting (like Chipotle, for example) into hallowed ground. I found myself carried away by the warm, ethereal sound of Sarah Benn’s voice, floating above a lush bed of acoustic bass. And I quickly forgot about the painful noise of the previous band when Sarah’s husband Jayson started playing guitar. Both lyrical and soulful, he reminded me of Chris Isaak’s former guitarist James Wilsey… which also reminded me that sad songs are perfect for a beautiful sunny day – if they’re performed by the likes of Isaak or Shivering Timbers. Brad Thorla brought it all together with some tastefully understated drumming, and even chimed in on toy piano at one point. They truly saved the day, and my family (sister Mary and bro-in-law Chuck showed up too) will always be thankful for that.
Shivering Timbers’ first album – “We All Started in the Same Place” – was recorded in 2010 and produced by Chuck and Mary’s son Dan Auerbach at his former home studio in west Akron. It wouldn’t be a stretch to call it a homespun collection of fractured fairy tales accompanied by some dark and twisted music (sounds like Dan might’ve had Tom Waits in mind). An auspicious debut, but it doesn’t really prepare you for their more accomplished follow-up, “Sing Sing” (set for release on Sept. 4).
The band has been favorably compared to various indie darlings like PJ Harvey, Iron and Wine and Nick Cave. But as I listen to the new album, I can’t help but think back a lot further to some of the better psychedelic rock of the Sixties. The Youngbloods with Jesse Colin Young, It’s a Beautiful Day, Traffic, Jefferson Airplane… bands that were both highly original and musical, in the sense that they typically built their songs around folk-based melodies and other organic hooks as opposed to endless jamming.
Here’s a standout cut by The Youngbloods: Darkness, Darkness
And here’s a perfect example of how Shivering Timbers is keeping that spirit alive (great cover of a Neil Diamond tune): Holly Holy
That’s just a small taste of the new album’s many charms – we’ll share a couple more as part of a recent online conversation I had with Sarah (below). But first, some background on “Sing Sing”:
* Sarah Benn: upright bass, lead vocals, banjo, horns, percussion
* Jayson Benn: guitars, background vocals, Earthquaker Devices, vibes, thunderharp, mandolin
* Brad Thorla: drums, percussion
* David Marchione: drums, piano, background vocals
* Brian Olive: backup vocals, sax
* Tori Kadish: backup vocals
* Full Disclosure: Doing his best Robert Hunter, bro’-in-law Chuck Auerbach wrote the lyrics to two songs on “Sing Sing”: Without Someone and Annalee
* Produced by Shivering Timbers and Brian Olive at The Diamonds, Cincinnati, OH; engineered by David Marchione and Brian Olive; additional recording by David Marchione at Sonic Blues, Beach City, OH; mixed by Collin Dupuis at Easy Eye Sound, Nashville, TN; mastered by Brian Lucey at Magic Garden Mastering, Columbus, OH
* Cover art by Julia Bunn; layout and design by Chelsea Blackerby, Sarah and Jayson Benn
Photo by Nate Burrell
T.Q.: On behalf of our male readers (and with all due respect to your husband Jayson), let me just point out you rock the whole dress-boots thing.
S.B.: THANKS!!
OK, got that out of the way… I’ve been wearing out the new album, which sounds more aggressive and muscular than your spooky debut, “We All Started In The Same Place.” I love your voice, and it’s nice to hear Jayson really dig in on guitar. Was nephew Dan a little reluctant to turn you loose on that first album?
Last album we didn’t have a drummer, and honestly a lot of that stuff was written right there on the spot, recorded in one take. We hadn’t yet developed or honed in on a sound, or decided which instruments we wanted to play. We played everything on that album. This time around we’re coming off a good two years of performing as a trio and have found out what we are capable of, and what sounds we like making.
A few songs have this hymn-like feel to them… almost pastoral (in an edgy sort of way). Holly holy, for example – also Wayfaring Stranger and Satan, Your Kingdom Must Come Down. Sounds like you’ve been listening to some gospel music.
Holly Holy is a great song. Neil Diamond is a kindred spirit I think. We both have this affinity for gospel music; it’s the feel of it, and how it stirs people so deeply for all different reasons. I’ve always had an affection for it. Right after Katrina I went to Jazz Fest in New Orleans (with Jessica Lea Mayfield… oh we had some fun, but that’s another story). But I remember being struck by the energy coming from the performers in the gospel tent. That same energy has been in front of me before, and it almost always involved someone singing some sort of spiritual song, regardless of religion. I get some really good energy out of spiritual music. Singing to and about an infinite deity is the end of the road… it goes way beyond moaning about some ex-lover, or even about your personal problems. The gospel songs represent to me life and death, and I take “Jesus” to be just another word for God, which applies to most spiritual beliefs. Our most popular song – Evening Prayer (first album) – has me chanting an English translation of a Hebrew prayer. It’s all in there… BUT then I balance it out with songs of utter frivolity and meaninglessness, like The Mopping Floor (on this album) or Three Young Rats (on the last album). Hence the nursery rhyme stuff. I love nursery rhymes because they’re nonsense, but you can read into them if you choose, and often there’s an historical context.
What are some of your other musical influences?
Well, Suzi (Jayson and Sarah’s daughter) will likely grow up knowing almost every Joni Mitchell song because that is what I sing around the house all the time. But I don’t think there’s much of her influence in the music I’m making with this band. Honestly I’m afraid to allow myself to sing that way, she’s so fearless with her voice. I haven’t yet gained that fearlessness, but I hope to. Watching her performance videos on YouTube is a secret indulgence Suzi and I enjoy often. But then I love Minor Threat just as much. And The Descendants, my very favorite. From the ages 16-20 punk rock was my life, nothing else mattered. My first punk show was like being born again! I kind of feel like if you don’t “get” punk rock, then we can never really relate, because I’ll always carry that spirit in me, and if you don’t understand it then you probably won’t understand me. My dad always listened to ’60s and ’70s rock – Led Zeppelin, CCR, Beatles, Steppenwolf, CSNY, The Nuge… so that was always there in the background, and these days I listen to that stuff a lot. I used to play the trumpet a lot – for a few years I was really into it, and was learning some jazz but I was never very good at improv on that instrument. Then getting pregnant took the wind out of my lungs and I haven’t played much since. I do listen to jazz though, mostly bebop and the cool modal stuff, and old standards: Edith, Ella, Sarah, etc. I love Portishead, and Beth Gibbons’ voice is one of my favorites. I could keep going on and on about how many different styles of music I enjoy, but that would mean you’d need to come over and sit with me and a couple bottles of wine for an evening of yammering and searching YouTube videos of musicians.
You’re on! You and Jayson are raising Suzi, and I’m sure both of you are pursuing other sources of income. How do you balance all of that with touring and promoting your album?
I don’t have a day job other than my home, Suzi and Shivering Timbers work (I book, manage, publicize, organize, schedule… it’s all me). Jayson works like a mad man during the week, and right now we’re auditioning drummers almost every night (our main drummer had to take some time away due to his work constraints). Putting out an album and booking shows requires a lot of time, so we are really swamped right now. Balance, you ask? I don’t know, we figure it out as we go along. We stay really in tune with each other as a couple, that’s the most important part. If we get out of sync with each other, nothing works.
For better or worse, we’ve sort of staked our claim here in Akron (I touched on that here). Lately I’ve been boring people with a lot of blather about our parks, which I really missed when I lived elsewhere. And don’t get me started on Swensons. What keeps you here, and is there anything that might eventually drive you away?
Family is here, and the family of friends that I’ve built. Sure, some of them move away, but someone has to stay home and keep a candle in the window, right? Half of my friends who have moved away have moved back to Akron after a few years. If not, then they visit, or I visit them. I’ve moved a lot in my life, and now I finally have a home in every sense of the word; I have no desire to leave that behind. I am not a defeatist Akronite. I have seen cities change for good and bad, nothing is permanent, and as long as there are good people around and good neighbors to be had, then the city will be okay. I try and do whatever I can to help my city (the PEOPLE of Akron) when an opportunity presents itself. But we can’t all sit around watching cable TV and wishing we could move away. That’s lame. Empowerment…
Jayson: I just want to interject here that Swensons Galley Boys are one of the primary reasons I have remained an Akronite… and a carnivore.
Yeah man… guess I’ll have to bring a sack ‘o burgers when I swing by! What’s on the horizon for Shivering Timbers? Anything else you want to share with us?
As long as we have a drummer available to travel, then we’ll be playing shows somewhere in the Midwest and East Coast next year. West Coast is too far away. I think our car would break down in the wilderness on the way there and we’d have to eat each other. I’m scared of California. Don’t you have to have cosmetic surgery before you’re allowed in? I’m sorry, it’s 1 in the morning and I am starting to lose it….
Shivering Timbers on video… Looks like they’re making a run for it. No problem – I know where they live.
Shivering Timbers launches their new album on Fri. Aug. 31 at Musica in Akron, with special guests Good Morning Valentine, White Pines and Light of the Loon. Show starts at 8.
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Album Review: Shivering Timbers “Sing Sing”
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By Rory Axelrod
Akron’s Shivering Timbers second effort is a sprawling work that comprises as man...By Rory Axelrod
Akron’s Shivering Timbers second effort is a sprawling work that comprises as many genres as it does moods. And that is the strength of this record: its ability to wash the listener over in waves of nostalgia, and wonder, with a sense of introspective inquiry that could make one wistful or regretful, depending on their disposition.
At times they burst forth with wild and unbounded joy (“I Love You So Much!” and “Sing Sing”), and in other moments they chill with haunting melodies and arrangements (“Wayfairing Stranger” and “Without Someone”) that one could mistake for a compilation. However, when listened to as a piece of art, an intricate weaving emerges, with tracks running into one another delicately enough to sound seamless.
Singer and bassist Sarah Benn’s voice shifts between driving Janis Joplin-like lashings (“Mopping Floor” and “Generations”) to soft croons that bring to mind Roy Orbison’s most tender moments (“Holly Holy” and “D.H. Lawrence”). While similarities can be drawn, her voice and delivery is unique enough to stand as a whole novel thing.
Jayson Benn’s — yes, relation — guitar playing creates a moving soundscape, which bounds from fevered and frantic, wailing to hush tones and plucking. The latter particularly shows the musician’s finesse with his instrument.
Overall the record has a much more focused feel than the previous release. “Sing Sing” is an album that showcases a band finding its stride and clipping along at an exhilarating and enrapturing pace.
But where this record really succeeds is in showcasing the band’s versatility, which is amplified to astounding limits during live sets. But don’t take my word for it, get your tuches out to Musica on Aug. 17 and see for yourself. Pick yourself up a copy of “Sing Sing” while you’re there.
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Moving Pictures: Generations by Shivering Timbers
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Simply put, “Generations” by Shivering Timbers is one fine sounding jam. Even in the video embedded...Simply put, “Generations” by Shivering Timbers is one fine sounding jam. Even in the video embedded above, one can discern clean snare hits, solemnly plucked strings, and swampy guitar melodies inspired by the same mythical space which inspired many of CCR’s tributes to the American south. The scene stealer, however, is lead vocalist Sarah Benn. Here, her voice is husky and foreboding, purposeful and almost spirit-like as it wavers throughout the mix. One needn’t even parse the lyrics, and the message is ever so clear: Something big and bad is about to go down, and you would be a fool not to follow this story through to the end.
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Nelsonville Music Festival 2012 Recap
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Akron trio Shivering Timbers, whose 2010 debut was produced by Dan Auerbach, created beautiful disso...Akron trio Shivering Timbers, whose 2010 debut was produced by Dan Auerbach, created beautiful dissonance in the form of guitar and upright bass, complementing Sarah Benn’s haunting vocals.
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Shivering Timbers: The Dark Side of Nursery Rhymes
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There’s something in the water in Akron, Ohio. Maybe it traces back to the old Erie Canal, or runoff...There’s something in the water in Akron, Ohio. Maybe it traces back to the old Erie Canal, or runoff from the abandoned tire factories that once made this town a key Cold War target of the KGB. Whatever it is, Akron produces personalities—a bizarre pedigree of blue collar but thoroughly non-traditional musical types: from Chrissie Hynde and David Allan Coe to Devo, The Waitresses, and the Black Keys. And the well hasn’t run dry yet.
Late last year, the Akron-based husband/wife duo Shivering Timbers self-released their debut album We All Started in the Same Place—produced by the Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach. Ostensibly, this was a “children’s album,” with bandmembers Jayson and Sarah Benn finding direct inspiration from their newborn daughter Suzi. Within their adaptations of classic nursery rhymes and folk tunes, however, the Benns couldn’t help but gravitate toward the more macabre end of the spectrum, twisting an almost Nick Cave-ish, lo-fi spookiness out of tracks like “Crooked Old Man” and “Noble Duke of York.” In other words, it might be kids music, but is sure as hell ain’t VeggieTales.
The Big Takeover recently caught up with Sarah Benn (vocals, upright bass, banjo) and Jayson Benn (guitar, banjo, misc.) to talk about adult-appropriate kids music, kid-appropriate adult music, and of course, Akron.
ANDREW CLAYMAN: I know you and Jayson have both played in other bands over the years. What’s the basic background on how you two met and the role music played in the relationship?
SARAH BENN: I think Jayson fell in love with me while he was watching me sing.
JAYSON BENN: Yeah. I went to see one of her bands called the Rhondas [in 2006]. And I was pretty mesmerized the whole time. I think she was actually a little creeped out by me staring at her.
SARAH BENN: Maybe a little.
AC: Being creeped out is often the first step toward marriage.
JAYSON: Ha, in this case, anyway.
AC: But your musical collaboration actually came much later in the relationship?
SARAH: Well, when we got married the idea of having a band together was in the back of both of our minds. But we weren't sure when that would happen and what it would sound like because we were both busy with other bands at the time. Then, after Suzi was born [in November of 2007], we just started writing these songs to keep our sanity intact and our newborn entertained—the songs that would make up the Shivering Timbers album. But it was a while before we even thought of it as a more serious project.
AC: When did it start to become clear the music you were making for Suzi could have a much wider appeal as it clearly has?
SARAH: Probably not until the album was actually completed and people started listening to it. We let people listen to it and started performing out, and people actually liked it. So that’s when it really dawned on us that, hey, people actually like this stuff!
JAYSON: Up until that point, we’d only played these songs for ourselves, and Suzi, and my family. So there was a lot of positive reinforcement from that audience.
SARAH: Yeah, can’t just listen to the parents. …Our first real show wasn’t even until 2009-- on the day Michael Jackson died [June 25]—at a bar in Akron called Annabell’s. At the time it was just the two of us rotating instrumentation-- toy drums, banjo, upright and electric bass, guitar, and trumpet. Things didn’t really solidify until last summer when [drummer] Brad [Thorla] joined us.
AC: In both the live show and in the studio with Dan [Auerbach], how important was it for you to maintain the sort of genuine, uncalculated vibe of the original family recordings you’d done?
SARAH: Well when we went into the studio, we’d only played two shows, and one was just a house show. We still didn’t really take it seriously. So we went into the studio with the songs kind of half written. We didn’t have a drummer yet, either. It was just me and Jayson rotating instruments for each song. So we brought all of our gear in, and Dan had a lot of stuff in there for us to play with, as well. He basically said, ‘use anything you want.’ So we would play the pieces of songs we had for him, he’d listen to it, and we’d all just start brainstorming what we wanted to do with each track from there.
JAYSON: It wasn’t even really brainstorming. We’d lay down the basic stuff and then build on it.
SARAH: Yeah, we didn’t really strategize in the studio. It was more like, ‘hey, what’s that thing over there? What does it sound like?’ While I was laying down my bass track, Jayson would be sitting in the control booth fiddling with some cool guitar or something, and Dan would hear that and say, ‘hey, go in there and play that.’ For instance, I had a trumpet line on “Noble Duke,” and it was Dan’s idea to put all these other melodicas on top of it to kind of fill our the horn section sound. For the most part, though, the main thing was just that we got to go in there and basically play with whatever we saw and build the songs that way—a lot of spontaneity and a lot of first cuts, since we only had like three and half days to work with.
AC: There’s obviously tons of horrible music for kids out there. What’s the secret to making music that a three year-old and a 30 year-old can enjoy equally?
SARAH: I guess just not singing about stuff that is inappropriate for children. I mean, as long as everything you’re singing is somewhat G rated but still inspires you personally as an adult. I don’t think there’s a secret to it. We just brought our own personal feelings into the songs even though they are technically children’s songs.
JAYSON: I think the key is just to have fun and not take yourself too seriously. Having a child really brings that out in you. Every day you’re coming home to this playland and you’re singing silly songs all the time. So that’s where it all began. There wasn’t really any strategy or thought put into it. Those are just the things we were singing.
AC: Still, even though it’s kid music, you kind of have that Lewis Carroll / Jim Henson knack for not shying away from the darkness.
SARAH: I like really dark stuff and Jayson was playing in kind of a metal sort of band at the time. And I’ve always really liked sort of dark and depressing music. That’s just kind of what naturally comes out of me. So I guess when you combine the darkness with the light, you meet somewhere in the middle, that can appeal to anybody.
AC: How much of Shivering Timbers evolved out of your efforts to avoid listening to the traditional VeggieTales and Barney CDs?
JAYSON: [laughs] That was like one of my main fears about becoming a parent—having to listen to bad music all the time.
SARAH: I don’t think we set out to avoid anything, honestly. But I suppose that was a happy consequence of writing our own music, sure.
AC: Does Suzi already have good taste in music? Is she going to be the cool girl with a record collection in 7th grade?
SARAH: I think she’s going to rebel against us eventually, because everybody rebels against their parents. And if they don’t, they have issues. It’s going to be sad when that happens, though, because I think we’re really cool parents. [laughs]
AC: For the next album, you’ll obviously be coming in as an established band now and you mentioned moving into more adult material. Are you starting to get a stronger sense of what that next record might sound like?
SARAH: I don’t want to veer too far away from the kind of material we’ve been doing, but I also don’t want to keep singing nursery rhymes-- although I like them. We’re playing a lot of shows right now, and new things are definitely emerging. I’m trying to write a few more happy, upbeat songs, but I don’t really know how [laughs]. I’m not good at that. You know, I write slow, depressing, slit-your-wrists music.
AC: You mentioned working with Chuck Auerbach [Dan’s father], as well, on some new material. How did that come about?
SARAH: I love hanging out with Chuck. Those conversations are always very stimulating. He challenges us to think about our music. He really likes us. He was one of our earliest, biggest supporters. He also has a lot of advice to give us, having raised a fairly successful musician himself. We’ve got three of his songs that we’re going to be doing.
AC: As far as touring goes, I know some artists will take their toddlers on the road with them, while others will just play sporadically and find babysitters. How do you guys plan to balance the parental life with the touring band life?
SARAH: On our last tour, we left Suzi behind with her grandparents. It was only a five or six day tour, but we don’t have a big enough car to bring her and all of our gear. And she’s just so young still. She just turned three. In the future, when she’s a little older, I do plan on taking her with us and teaching her how to hang out at mommy and daddy’s show—‘wear your earplugs and stay away from strangers.’ She might even end up sitting on the stage with us. Who knows how it will work. We might even have to get a minivan. Oh gosh. [laughs] I’ll have to trade in my Jetta for a minivan!
AC: With so many Akronites leaving town lately [Black Keys relocated to Nashville and New York, and Akron native LeBron James took his talents to South Beach], could you see yourself moving to a town with a bigger music scene or more culture in general?
JAYSON: Well we just bought a house in Akron, so we’ll be here for at least a little while. I like it. There’s family here, and I don’t really see any reason to go anywhere else-- unless that reason suddenly arrives and there’s no question about it.
SARAH: It would be easier if we were in a place with more venues. But then you’d just be stuck in that town playing those same venues.
JAYSON: There’s something to be said for sticking around. Do it in your community rather than going to another community where something is already established.
SARAH: Well if we got so big that we actually had to move to Nashville or L.A. or wherever, I guess we would do it. But we would really have to blow up. Right now, no way. I love my house. It’s beautiful, we have a happy home and a big backyard.
AC: Do you ever feel that strange tugging at the heartstrings known as “Akron Pride?”
SARAH: It’s developing for sure. We’re right on top of a hill in Goodyear Heights, and from the back windows of our house, you can look out and see the blimp hanger [Goodyear’s headquarters is in Akron]. And during the summer time, the Goodyear Blimp is literally always floating around in our backyard. I always get a sense of pride from that. I’m a true Akronite. I’ve got the blimp!
AC: Final question: simply stated. What are your realistic goals for Shivering Timbers in the next few years? How do you see things developing?
SARAH: I want a booking agent! Put that in big huge bold letters and put my phone number next to it. I am the booking agent right now, and it is hard. A label would be cool, too, of course, because then we’d have help with all those things. Mainly, though, I just want to get to the point where Jayson can quit his job and we can just play music and travel around. Pay the bills. Play music. Happy family.
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Kid Tested, Rocker Approved
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By Andrew Clayman | February 24, 2011
Struggling artists often equate "settling down" with "sur...By Andrew Clayman | February 24, 2011
Struggling artists often equate "settling down" with "surrender." Marriage and children — so the theory goes — will only distract from one's work and compromise ambitions. For Jayson and Sarah Benn, however, there was a considerable loophole in that logic. As married musicians with a young daughter in tow, this Akron, Ohio, duo started Shivering Timbers as more of a function of family life than anything else — reinterpreting traditional children's folk tunes and nursery rhymes in their own slightly spookier, lo-fi style. Eventually, fellow Akronite Dan Auerbach of The Black Keys caught wind of the project, and the Benns soon found that "settling down" could just as easily be a first step in "taking off."
"When we got married, the idea of having a band together was in the back of both of our minds," says Sarah Benn (vocals, upright bass). "But we weren't sure when that would happen and what it would sound like, because we were both busy with other groups at the time."
After the couple's daughter Suzi was born in the fall of 2007, the new band plan looked all the more hazy. But then something funny happened. With no intentions outside of entertaining their newborn and maintaining their own sanity (i.e., avoiding the musical stylings of Barney and The Wiggles), the Benns started developing new material — beginning with nursery standards like "The Noble Duke of York" and "Crooked Old Man." Much like a Lewis Carroll story or Jim Henson film, though, this kid's stuff had a darker edge to it — imagine a mellow P.J. Harvey fronting the Bad Seeds on a shadowy corner of Sesame Street.
"It came out that way very naturally," Sarah explains. "I tend to like dark and depressing music, and Jayson was playing in a metal-ish sort of band at the time. So I guess when you combine the darkness with the light, you meet somewhere in the middle — something that can appeal to any age."
"I think the key was just having fun and not taking ourselves too seriously," adds Jayson (guitar, banjo). "Having a child really brings that out in you. Every day you're coming home to this playland and you're singing silly songs all the time. So that's where it began. There wasn't really any strategy beyond that."
Nor was there a strategy in the summer of 2009, when the Benns were coaxed into playing one of their first gigs as Shivering Timbers at the 30th birthday party of their pal Dan Auerbach, who was so impressed with their Mother Goose murder ballads that he offered to bring the duo into his Akron studio and produce their debut album himself.
"We went in with the songs basically half written," Sarah says, "and Dan just welcomed us to play around with this room full of instruments and build the songs that way. There was a lot of spontaneity and a lot of first cuts, since it all happened in like three days."
After the sessions, Auerbach enthusiastically praised Shivering Timbers as his favorite "junkyard orchestra." But the Benns weren't thoroughly convinced of their own merits until their album, We All Started in the Same Place, finally came out late last year.
"That's when it really dawned on us that, hey, people actually like this stuff!" Sarah says.
In response to the positive feedback, the Benns (joined by drummer Brad Thorla) have turned Shivering Timbers into a full-scale live band: Expanding their sound into increasingly grownup-oriented — though no less playful — folk and gospel territory. They've also done something The Black Keys and Akron's other native son, LeBron James, didn't do this past year — stay in Akron.
"We like it here," says Jayson. "And there's something to be said for sticking around and doing it in your own community, rather than just going somewhere that's already well established."
Of course, plans can change. Right now, Shivering Timbers are an unsigned band — booking their own sporadic shows and the babysitters they necessitate. But some day, Sarah Benn envisions young Suzi hitting the road with mom and dad on a much bigger tour — room permitting.
"Who knows," she says, "I might have to trade my Jetta for a minivan."
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Unsigned Universe : Shivering Timbers
Read PDF here: http://www.shiveringtimbersmusic.com/press?id=3027
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(Cover Story) Warming to a Shiver: Akron’s Shivering Timbers Ready New Release
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While being no more than three years on the scene, Akron’s Shivering Timbers has bloomed rapidly int...While being no more than three years on the scene, Akron’s Shivering Timbers has bloomed rapidly into one of the most touted bands from the Northeast Ohio region. Composed of husband-and-wife duo Jayson and Sarah Benn, the group’s sound comprises folk-tinged indie rock that blends enough styles to make it nearly uncategorizable.
The band’s strength is in its ability to shift dynamically from sing-songy nursery rhymes to noisy jams that bring to mind the more cohesive compositions of Cap ‘n Jazz. In between, the group dabbles between gospel, punk and blues. The band’s records are truly a testament to the love of music and the creative process, two things that are essential to producing something that’s honest. The sound is driven on by Jayson’s versatile guitar-playing and Sarah’s vocal prowess, which has been compared to Patsy Cline and P.J. Harvey. She also does double duty on the bass.
While the band could leverage its position as a married couple as a marketing ploy, playing up the cutesy factor, it thankfully chooses to go an opposite route and downplay the fact. Most audience members have no idea. In fact, the only real hint that gives it away is the couple’s tendency to inadvertently finish one another’s sentences.
“It’s kind of hard to deny being married when we dedicate a whole album to our child,” Sarah said. “But we aren’t too sappy on stage, like half making out.
“Here’s my wife over here, the bass player,” Jayson jokingly added.
Initially, the band didn’t know how to handle it, leaving them to determine it would be best to just treat each other like any other band member.
“It has its ups and downs,” Sarah explained of working with her husband creatively. “But I think it makes the band stronger in a way, because we are both committed. We can’t just say ‘Forget this, I quit,’ we have to stick together.”
Jayson agreed, saying it has its pluses and minus, and added: “I can’t be too much of a dick to my bandmate, because at the end of the day, she’s still my wife. That kind of eases the band’s tension, but it also adds to it sometimes. There’s a balance that we kind of have to work around.”
While the band is fairly well-known, regularly playing out and performing at a number of larger festivals, such as Nelsonville Musical Festival in southern Ohio, it actually didn’t start with the intention of doing any such things.
“The first album was made before we were even a band out playing shows,” Sarah said. “It was just something fun to do in Dan Auerbach’s studio. It was after that we found our sound and really evolved into a band. This album is more of a debut as to who we are as a band; the first album was more of its own thing.”
Sarah said it was not long after the band started working with drummer Brad Thorla and playing shows that momentum started to build. In addition to Thorla, the band occasionally also works with David Marchione on drums. It was only after the release of the first record (which was dedicated to the couple’s daughter, Suzi) and the attention it brought that the Sarah and Jayson realized what they had.
“Once we got a drummer that we really liked and gelled with musically, we realized that we really liked where this was going and wanted to pursue it,” Sarah said.
The Shivering Timbers are getting ready to release their sophomore effort, something they say took a considerable amount more work than its predacessor.
“It took a lot longer, for one thing,” Jayson said. “We tracked for seven days down in Cincinnati, whereas the first record was just three days.”
Sarah said that before going into this recording session, the band knew to expect everything to take three times longer then they planned. She explained that after tracking, the group spent a month working on overdubbing tracks when they could and then spent three days mixing at Dan Auerbach’s studio in Nashville.
“That was grueling,” Sarah said. “Long days without any real breaks, it was just go, go, go. Trying to constantly process what’s going on.”
The songs on the new record, Jayson explained, have been worked on and played live for the past year and a half, further solidifying them. While the group has found its sound, the new record still contains an eclectic mix, shifting on track to track from gospel, to nursery rhymes, to more straight indie rock numbers.
“It’s still a Shivering Timbers record, which I feel is all over the map as far as genre,” Sarah said. “It’s hard to pinpoint any one influence because me, Jayson and Brad all listen to so many different types of music. It all kind of gets blended in there somehow.”
Jayson added: “This one is more rock ‘n’ roll. A full band sound, focused on guitar, vocals, bass, drum. And then we put little things here and there, whereas the first record had a lot of different sounds. This is more focused, for sure.”
The group is currently making plans for a fall tour of Ohio and the surrounding region, and is working on a scheduling a winter tour with Pat Sweany, with whom it has shared the bill before.
“It was awesome when we played with him,” Sarah said. “Our fans loved him, and his fans loved us. It was like this mutual badassness. So we’re looking forward to doing it again.”
The Shivering Timbers will be performing Aug. 17 in Mason, Ohio, and Aug. 31 the group will debut its new record at Akron’s Musica with the White Pines, Good Morning Valentine and Light of the Loon.
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Shivering Timbers: Sing Sing
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About a year ago, my wife and I went to an arts/music festival at our favorite neighborhood in Akron...About a year ago, my wife and I went to an arts/music festival at our favorite neighborhood in Akron. Against all odds, we found an outdoor table at Chipotle (well-kept secret: their Margaritas are killer), right next to the main stage. But we were ready to give up our choice spot about three songs into the first act, which made my brain bleed. They were one of these gleefully tuneless post-punk bands with a basic contempt for things like rhythm, chord changes, singing, dynamics… It’s like they came together for the sole purpose of making me question my love of music.
Then Shivering Timbers hit the stage, demonstrating how a great band can lift your spirit and turn a fairly commonplace setting (like Chipotle, for example) into hallowed ground. I found myself carried away by the warm, ethereal sound of Sarah Benn’s voice, floating above a lush bed of acoustic bass. And I quickly forgot about the painful noise of the previous band when Sarah’s husband Jayson started playing guitar. Both lyrical and soulful, he reminded me of Chris Isaak’s former guitarist James Wilsey… which also reminded me that sad songs are perfect for a beautiful sunny day – if they’re performed by the likes of Isaak or Shivering Timbers. Brad Thorla brought it all together with some tastefully understated drumming, and even chimed in on toy piano at one point. They truly saved the day, and my family (sister Mary and bro-in-law Chuck showed up too) will always be thankful for that.
Shivering Timbers’ first album – “We All Started in the Same Place” – was recorded in 2010 and produced by Chuck and Mary’s son Dan Auerbach at his former home studio in west Akron. It wouldn’t be a stretch to call it a homespun collection of fractured fairy tales accompanied by some dark and twisted music (sounds like Dan might’ve had Tom Waits in mind). An auspicious debut, but it doesn’t really prepare you for their more accomplished follow-up, “Sing Sing” (set for release on Sept. 4).
The band has been favorably compared to various indie darlings like PJ Harvey, Iron and Wine and Nick Cave. But as I listen to the new album, I can’t help but think back a lot further to some of the better psychedelic rock of the Sixties. The Youngbloods with Jesse Colin Young, It’s a Beautiful Day, Traffic, Jefferson Airplane… bands that were both highly original and musical, in the sense that they typically built their songs around folk-based melodies and other organic hooks as opposed to endless jamming.
Here’s a standout cut by The Youngbloods: Darkness, Darkness
And here’s a perfect example of how Shivering Timbers is keeping that spirit alive (great cover of a Neil Diamond tune): Holly Holy
That’s just a small taste of the new album’s many charms – we’ll share a couple more as part of a recent online conversation I had with Sarah (below). But first, some background on “Sing Sing”:
* Sarah Benn: upright bass, lead vocals, banjo, horns, percussion
* Jayson Benn: guitars, background vocals, Earthquaker Devices, vibes, thunderharp, mandolin
* Brad Thorla: drums, percussion
* David Marchione: drums, piano, background vocals
* Brian Olive: backup vocals, sax
* Tori Kadish: backup vocals
* Full Disclosure: Doing his best Robert Hunter, bro’-in-law Chuck Auerbach wrote the lyrics to two songs on “Sing Sing”: Without Someone and Annalee
* Produced by Shivering Timbers and Brian Olive at The Diamonds, Cincinnati, OH; engineered by David Marchione and Brian Olive; additional recording by David Marchione at Sonic Blues, Beach City, OH; mixed by Collin Dupuis at Easy Eye Sound, Nashville, TN; mastered by Brian Lucey at Magic Garden Mastering, Columbus, OH
* Cover art by Julia Bunn; layout and design by Chelsea Blackerby, Sarah and Jayson Benn
Photo by Nate Burrell
T.Q.: On behalf of our male readers (and with all due respect to your husband Jayson), let me just point out you rock the whole dress-boots thing.
S.B.: THANKS!!
OK, got that out of the way… I’ve been wearing out the new album, which sounds more aggressive and muscular than your spooky debut, “We All Started In The Same Place.” I love your voice, and it’s nice to hear Jayson really dig in on guitar. Was nephew Dan a little reluctant to turn you loose on that first album?
Last album we didn’t have a drummer, and honestly a lot of that stuff was written right there on the spot, recorded in one take. We hadn’t yet developed or honed in on a sound, or decided which instruments we wanted to play. We played everything on that album. This time around we’re coming off a good two years of performing as a trio and have found out what we are capable of, and what sounds we like making.
A few songs have this hymn-like feel to them… almost pastoral (in an edgy sort of way). Holly holy, for example – also Wayfaring Stranger and Satan, Your Kingdom Must Come Down. Sounds like you’ve been listening to some gospel music.
Holly Holy is a great song. Neil Diamond is a kindred spirit I think. We both have this affinity for gospel music; it’s the feel of it, and how it stirs people so deeply for all different reasons. I’ve always had an affection for it. Right after Katrina I went to Jazz Fest in New Orleans (with Jessica Lea Mayfield… oh we had some fun, but that’s another story). But I remember being struck by the energy coming from the performers in the gospel tent. That same energy has been in front of me before, and it almost always involved someone singing some sort of spiritual song, regardless of religion. I get some really good energy out of spiritual music. Singing to and about an infinite deity is the end of the road… it goes way beyond moaning about some ex-lover, or even about your personal problems. The gospel songs represent to me life and death, and I take “Jesus” to be just another word for God, which applies to most spiritual beliefs. Our most popular song – Evening Prayer (first album) – has me chanting an English translation of a Hebrew prayer. It’s all in there… BUT then I balance it out with songs of utter frivolity and meaninglessness, like The Mopping Floor (on this album) or Three Young Rats (on the last album). Hence the nursery rhyme stuff. I love nursery rhymes because they’re nonsense, but you can read into them if you choose, and often there’s an historical context.
What are some of your other musical influences?
Well, Suzi (Jayson and Sarah’s daughter) will likely grow up knowing almost every Joni Mitchell song because that is what I sing around the house all the time. But I don’t think there’s much of her influence in the music I’m making with this band. Honestly I’m afraid to allow myself to sing that way, she’s so fearless with her voice. I haven’t yet gained that fearlessness, but I hope to. Watching her performance videos on YouTube is a secret indulgence Suzi and I enjoy often. But then I love Minor Threat just as much. And The Descendants, my very favorite. From the ages 16-20 punk rock was my life, nothing else mattered. My first punk show was like being born again! I kind of feel like if you don’t “get” punk rock, then we can never really relate, because I’ll always carry that spirit in me, and if you don’t understand it then you probably won’t understand me. My dad always listened to ’60s and ’70s rock – Led Zeppelin, CCR, Beatles, Steppenwolf, CSNY, The Nuge… so that was always there in the background, and these days I listen to that stuff a lot. I used to play the trumpet a lot – for a few years I was really into it, and was learning some jazz but I was never very good at improv on that instrument. Then getting pregnant took the wind out of my lungs and I haven’t played much since. I do listen to jazz though, mostly bebop and the cool modal stuff, and old standards: Edith, Ella, Sarah, etc. I love Portishead, and Beth Gibbons’ voice is one of my favorites. I could keep going on and on about how many different styles of music I enjoy, but that would mean you’d need to come over and sit with me and a couple bottles of wine for an evening of yammering and searching YouTube videos of musicians.
You’re on! You and Jayson are raising Suzi, and I’m sure both of you are pursuing other sources of income. How do you balance all of that with touring and promoting your album?
I don’t have a day job other than my home, Suzi and Shivering Timbers work (I book, manage, publicize, organize, schedule… it’s all me). Jayson works like a mad man during the week, and right now we’re auditioning drummers almost every night (our main drummer had to take some time away due to his work constraints). Putting out an album and booking shows requires a lot of time, so we are really swamped right now. Balance, you ask? I don’t know, we figure it out as we go along. We stay really in tune with each other as a couple, that’s the most important part. If we get out of sync with each other, nothing works.
For better or worse, we’ve sort of staked our claim here in Akron (I touched on that here). Lately I’ve been boring people with a lot of blather about our parks, which I really missed when I lived elsewhere. And don’t get me started on Swensons. What keeps you here, and is there anything that might eventually drive you away?
Family is here, and the family of friends that I’ve built. Sure, some of them move away, but someone has to stay home and keep a candle in the window, right? Half of my friends who have moved away have moved back to Akron after a few years. If not, then they visit, or I visit them. I’ve moved a lot in my life, and now I finally have a home in every sense of the word; I have no desire to leave that behind. I am not a defeatist Akronite. I have seen cities change for good and bad, nothing is permanent, and as long as there are good people around and good neighbors to be had, then the city will be okay. I try and do whatever I can to help my city (the PEOPLE of Akron) when an opportunity presents itself. But we can’t all sit around watching cable TV and wishing we could move away. That’s lame. Empowerment…
Jayson: I just want to interject here that Swensons Galley Boys are one of the primary reasons I have remained an Akronite… and a carnivore.
Yeah man… guess I’ll have to bring a sack ‘o burgers when I swing by! What’s on the horizon for Shivering Timbers? Anything else you want to share with us?
As long as we have a drummer available to travel, then we’ll be playing shows somewhere in the Midwest and East Coast next year. West Coast is too far away. I think our car would break down in the wilderness on the way there and we’d have to eat each other. I’m scared of California. Don’t you have to have cosmetic surgery before you’re allowed in? I’m sorry, it’s 1 in the morning and I am starting to lose it….
Shivering Timbers on video… Looks like they’re making a run for it. No problem – I know where they live.
Shivering Timbers launches their new album on Fri. Aug. 31 at Musica in Akron, with special guests Good Morning Valentine, White Pines and Light of the Loon. Show starts at 8.
Tim Quine
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Shivering Timbers Album Release Show
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If you loved the Shivering Timbers Dan Auerbach-produced debut We All Started in the Same Place, be ...If you loved the Shivering Timbers Dan Auerbach-produced debut We All Started in the Same Place, be ready for a little shift. Sing Sing, the Kickstarter-backed album for which they’ll be playing an album-release show at Music in Akron this Friday, diverges from the quirky nursery rhyme tunes of their debut, instead reflecting more accurately the band’s live sound, with Sarah Benn’s strong vocals soaring open wide while Jayson Benn’s gorgeous guitar weaves and fuzzes out back on earth.
As Sarah noted in her interview with Tim Quine over at Rubber City Review, We All Started… was largely an on-the-spot creation. But through all the subsequent gigging, Shivering Timbers have grown confidently and reflect that growth, their stronger self, gloriously on the Brian Olive-produced Sing Sing.
While the album begins on lighter, brighter notes with title track “Sing Sing” and Neil Diamond cover “Holly Holy”, the stream of the album roils with the kind of darkness born from standing resolutely against life’s foes, reflected here in the Chuck Auerback-penned “Annalee”, as Sarah asks, “Who told the Lord I didn’t need her? Who told the Lord I didn’t love her? Who ever said He could take her? When I find Him, I’ll put Him in His grave.”
The clouds begin to clear by the end, and the playfulness of the Shivering Timbers’ first album is revisited in the charming blues tune “The Mopping Floor”.
We All Started in the Same Place was Shivering Timbers’ calling card to get your attention. With Sing Sing, they’re ready to show you what they can really do.
Sing Sing will be released to the wide world on September 4, but if you can make it to Akron this Friday, you shouldn’t hesitate.
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Shivering Timbers
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Back in 2009, Dan Auerbach, the vocalist and guitarist of The Black Keys, was a busy man on the ... Back in 2009, Dan Auerbach, the vocalist and guitarist of The Black Keys, was a busy man on the brink of international stardom. Between releasing his debut solo album, Keep It Hid, in February and embarking on a national solo tour during November and December, Auerbach managed to co-produce and contribute to the rap-rock collaboration album, BlakRoc. He also found time in September to reach out to fellow Akron-based musicians Sarah and Jayson Benn of Shivering Timbers to develop and record their debut album at his Easy Eye Sound studio.
The result was an 11-track record, described on their website as “a collection of original home-spun and studio crafted songs, folk songs and nursery rhymes re-imagined and inspired by the birth of their daughter,” which until now has remained relatively unheard of outside the Ohio music scene. This past week The Phoenix got a chance to talk with Sarah and Jayson about their record and their plans for Shivering Timbers in the future.
Following a slew of one-off shows in Akron, Dayton, Cincinnati and Cleveland during the last year, Shivering Timbers is setting off on a semi-national tour this fall to promote the official release of their first LP, We All Started in the Same Place. Originally intended as simple bedside nursery tunes for their young daughter Suzi, the Benn’s songs garnered much acclaim from family and friends. Soon they were trying out the tracks at house shows and live venues, and eventually they sparked a keen interest from Auerbach.
Before Shivering Timbers, Sarah, born in the small city of Lubbock in northwestern Texas, contributed vocals and played guitar in the Akron-based country/bluegrass group, The Rhondas. Strained by the responsibilities of raising their respective children, however, the group disbanded not long after the birth of Suzi in late 2007.
Similarly, Jayson, an Akron-native, played bass for a local progressive-metal band, Blush, until 2007 when the band decided to go on a hiatus. Since then Jayson has played bass in a couple of other local bands, but mainly spends his time working several part-time jobs to support the family. At once a house painter, a plumber, a pizza delivery man and a window cleaner for, as Sarah described, “big rich houses for fat old people,” it has become Sarah and Jayson’s hope that We All Started in the Same Place becomes more than just a collection of nursery rhymes for their daughter. Due to scarce financial resources and the lack of a proper record contract, the idea of Shivering Timbers as a musical group remained in limbo until recently.
Described by Auerbach as a “junkyard orchestra,” the band is an eclectic mix of lo-fi folk, traditional country and blues-rock. At times throughout the record, like on “Crooked Old Man,” there is a subtle uncanny melody that makes you question whether you are actually listening to the same nursery rhyme-branded band. Then, only a few tracks later, like on “See-Saw Sacradown” or “Three Young Rats,” the eccentric sounds of a toy piano or a quirky drumbeat remind you of a Kimya Dawson-turned-Mother Goose.
Between and beyond these niceties, Sarah and Jayson continually shift the album’s sound and feel, and dare to use whatever instrument Auerbach’s studio can provide. Referring to the track “Noble Duke of York,” Sarah commented, “I don’t know how to play piano at all, but I took an organ solo on it. We knew an organ solo had to happen. It had to happen!
On the instrumental track, “Gonna Getchya,” Suzi can be heard walking around the studio giggling and hitting various instruments. The last track “Little Bird”, which Sarah mentioned as Suzi’s favorite track and one that she often listens to around the house, is ultimately the culmination of a record that stresses the real and tangible love between Sarah and Jayson, and their little Suzi.
Taking on the job of band promoter, booking agent and, all the while, raising her Suzi, Sarah was able to book shows in Ohio, North Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee, Missouri and Illinois. Before hitting the Beat Kitchen in Roscoe Village this October, Shivering Timbers will be featured on the recording session website Daytrotter and also on the Chicago internet-radio website, Fearless Radio. In regards to the band’s future, Sarah said that she and Jayson would get into the studio this winter to start their second album, and that a few songs had already been developed.
Shivering Timbers’ We All Started in the Same Place was self-released in December 2010. They will start off their semi-national tour in Columbus, OH on October 13 and will be headlining the Beat Kitchen (2100 W. Belmont Ave.) on Wednesday, October 19. See more details about the band, their album and their tour at www.shiveringtimbersmusic.com.
Matt Soling
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Shivering Timbers at Now That's Class (live review)
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By April Fecca | January 18, 2011
"This is a nursery rhyme," Sarah Benn almost seemed to be...By April Fecca | January 18, 2011
"This is a nursery rhyme," Sarah Benn almost seemed to be warning the audience, with finger pointed, at the beginning of Shivering Timbers' set. Sarah and husband Jayson traffic in nursery rhymes, littering their album We All Started in the Same Place with jazzy arrangements of the childhood rhymes along with songs inspired by their daughter. But Shivering Timbers' music is not strictly for the babies. With Sarah's slinky upright bass and Jayson's bluesy guitar - along with drums and appearances by banjo, toy piano and toy hand bells - stories like that of the crooked man who walked a crooked mile sound like they were birthed in a smoky club instead of at cribside.
While Dan Auerbach - who produced Shivering Timbers' album - is known for his ability to capture a honest, live sound, the Benns should be seen in concert to appreciate the range of their talents, such as Sarah's powerful voice and Jayson's skilled guitar work. Not to mention the fact that they are charming as all hell, Sarah projecting a warm and friendly presence while Jayson, with a grin, thanked the crowd for "being drunk enough" at one point. And the way the Benns look at each other while playing is enough to make a seasoned cynic melt a little.
The dance-hungry crowd - who were obviously familiar with the band, requesting "Baby Don't" and sending up a pathetic whine when they thought they might have to go the night through without hearing "Little Bird" - was given enough ammunition to keep them happy with the likes of the rock-out endings to "Little Bird" and "Evening Prayer".
April Fecca
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25 Bands To Watch
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PERSONNEL: Jayson Benn (guitar, vocals) and Sarah Benn (bass, banjo, vocals), with Brad Thorla (... PERSONNEL: Jayson Benn (guitar, vocals) and Sarah Benn (bass, banjo, vocals), with Brad Thorla (drums) and David Marchione (drums).
FILE UNDER: Lo-fi blues-folk-rock
LATEST RELEASE: "We All Started in the Same Place" album
SOUND BITE: "I feel most free and most me when I'm performing in this band," says Sarah Benn. "The rest of my life is consumed by things I have to do. When I get up onstage, I get to do what I want to do, and it feels so good. I love the sadness of everyday existence. Things aren't perfect. It's OK to feel that way and not have to play happy songs. They're happy in their own way."
CHECK 'EM OUT: 6:30 tonight (Sept.2 3) at Ohio Music Shop, 118 E. Main St., Kent (330-673-4700), with Thrift Store Cowboys
John Soeder
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Shivering Timbers
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Children are a surprisingly underutilized source of inspiration for music. Think for a second — ... Children are a surprisingly underutilized source of inspiration for music. Think for a second — how many songs or bands can you think of that are inspired by or for children? (For the sake of discussion, material directly made for kids shows doesn’t count.) Your tally will likely be low, even if a few examples pop up here and there — Stevie Wonder wrote “Isn't Shune Lovely?” about his daughter Aisha; The Get Up Kids’ Matt Pryor used The Terrible Twos to make Indie Rock for his kids; and, most famously, Eric Clapton penned “Tears in Heaven” after the horrific death of his 4-year-old son.
Shivering Timbers, the musical entity masterminded by Akron-based spouses Sarah and Jayson Benn, recently joined this unusual lineage. At first, the project existed solely as an outlet for the couple to write songs for their daughter Suzi (who is around 4 now). Then, as their story of improbably good fortune goes, they ended up playing at the birthday party of The Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach and the birthday boy dug Timbers so much that he encouraged them to make a record, eventually materializing as last December’s We All Started in the Same Place, which was produced by Auerbach.
“Nursery rhymes” are frequently brought up when referencing Shivering Timbers’ tender Folk and it’s easy to imagine a child digesting their amiable, spare melodies comfortably. That being said, the band (which now also includes Brad Thorla on drums) isn’t toothless. In “Baby Don’t,” Sarah warns, “Baby, don’t play with that plastic bag/If you do, it’s going to make us very sad/It’ll choke you and smother you and make your little face turn blue/Like your eyes.”
Seeing as Suzi is bound to grow up sometime, the band wisely hasn’t committed to writing in this style for good. “In my mind, I kind of consider our first album as kind of a concept album,” Benn told The Akron Beacon Journal, “but I think there always will be at least a couple of songs that have childishness to them.”
SHIVERING TIMBERS play the Northside Music Festival Saturday, June 11 with guests THE LIONS RAMPANT, KIM TAYLOR, THE DUKES, POP EMPIRE, SOAPLAND and STATE SONG.
Reyan Ali
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Band Rockets From Cradle To Stage
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By Malcolm X Abram | January 20, 2011
Musicians often write songs inspired by their children. Ste...By Malcolm X Abram | January 20, 2011
Musicians often write songs inspired by their children. Stevie Wonder, Paul McCartney, Eric Clapton and many other artists have put pen to paper and laid their hands on their instruments with their offspring as their muse.
But for local musicians Sarah and Jayson Benn, Suzanna, now 3, inspired the creation of the band, Shivering Timbers. She's also behind much of the music on the band's enjoyable debut album, We All Started in the Same Place. The band will perform Friday at Annabell's in Akron.
The Benns, who have been married a little longer than their daughter's arrival on Earth, have both been in bands over the years. (Sarah is also in the ''modern old-timey'' acoustic trio Hey Mavis). They had already decided on the band's name when they were dating. But it was while mollifying the newborn Suzi that the musical seeds for the Shivering Timbers were sown.
While Jayson was between jobs (he currently is a residential window cleaner and pizza-delivery guy, and does other odd jobs to pay the bills), the parents began making up ditties to sing to their bundle of joy.
''We had nothing to do but sit around together and write songs,'' Sarah said.
The pair had played a couple of gigs when good friend Stephanie Auerbach invited them to play at the 30th birthday party of her husband, Dan. (You know, the guitar playing/singing half of the Black Keys.)
''He actually sat and listened, which I was like, 'Wow, really you're going to sit and listen to this?' And then he said, 'That was amazing,' and then a few months later, we just made the album,'' Sarah said.
''We didn't really have many of the songs actually worked out before we went into the studio,'' Jayson said.
''They weren't really written for an album. They were really just little nothing songs,'' Sarah said.
They had only three days to record at Auerbach's Easy Eye Studio. With Auerbach's production and mixing help and using his ''playland of musical instruments,'' the album was completed, Sarah said.
Many of the 11 songs on We All Started in the Same Place are imbued with a calming, lullaby flavor. Others have a toe-tapping bouncy groove, with Sarah's vocals floating ethereally atop a varied musical bed that includes folk, blues rock and banjos, guitars, percussion, trumpet and even the exotic waterphone.
Several tunes draw from traditional children's songs such as Crooked Old Man, recast with a crawling, ominous bass line; the Noble Duke of York, played as a peppy shuffle; and a round-robin See-Saw Sacradown.
There's also a version of the old church song Evening Prayer heathened up as a rockin', fuzzed-out punk-a-billy tune.
The originals are also varied.
The pleasant grooves on the pretty, Jayson-penned Baby Don't belie its cautionary lyrics. The song warns, ''Baby, don't play with that plastic bag, if you do it's gonna be very sad. It'll choke you and smother you and make your little face turn blue, like your eyes.''
''I just thought it was hilarious,'' Sarah said, laughing. ''Of course, it left the grandparents aghast.
''We wrote a ton more lines, but we thought it was inappropriate to go on and on about the ways little babies can injure themselves.''
Education in industry
The duo self-released the album. Sarah is acting as manager, booker, publicist and accountant — all of which has been a crash course in the independent music industry.
And, as is often the case, the time between recording the album and actually having the finished product was a year-long case of hurry-up-and-wait.
''It was frustrating, but it was good for us because up to the recording, we didn't really take it seriously as a band,'' Jayson said.
''But when we made the record it was like, 'Oh, we better get our stuff together.' ''
He said the band has really grown and developed its sound.
Onstage, the Benns are augmented by local drum veteran Brad Thorla. They've been pleasantly surprised by folks' reactions to the album and their shows.
''It's funny at shows, to watch people rocking out to nursery rhymes and not even realizing it . . . watching hipsters dance'' with their Pabst Blue Ribbon,'' Jayson said.
Though baby Suzi may have helped get the ball rolling, the Benns say their newer material will encompass more than ditties for babies.
''That's the thing. The subject matter is going to change somewhat,'' Sarah said. ''In my mind, I kind of consider our first album as kind of a concept album, but I think there always will be at least a couple of songs that have childishness to them.
''But our life has changed. Back when we started, we were just a couple of scared new parents huddled together in this tiny crappy apartment with a ukulele.''
Besides writing their own new material, the duo has been working with local songwriter Chuck Auerbach (you know, Dan's dad and occasional co-writer) on a few tunes.
With an album and several shows under their belts, the Benns are honing the Shivering Timbers' sound. They hope to fit in some out-of-town touring as well as record a special EP for Record Store Day in April. (They will perform at Square Records in Akron's Highland Square for the April 16 event.)
And Shivering Timbers hopes to record a sophomore album later this year, ideally with Dan Auerbach at the mixing board.
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Local Band In Focus: Shivering Timbers
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By Andrew Clayman | January 19, 2011
Meet the Band: Jayson Benn (guitar, banjo, backing vocals), ...By Andrew Clayman | January 19, 2011
Meet the Band: Jayson Benn (guitar, banjo, backing vocals), Sarah Benn (vocals, upright bass, banjo), and Brad Thorla (drums, toy piano)
History: The Akron husband-and-wife team started recording songs for and inspired by their newborn daughter in 2007, and it snowballed into a full-blown project. Their debut, We All Started in the Same Place, was produced by the Black Keys' Dan Auerbach.
What They Do: Back-alley folk tunes, back-porch gospel, and Mother Goose murder ballads delivered by what Auerbach calls "a junkyard orchestra"
Who They Sound Like:
PJ Harvey, Iron & Wine, Nick Cave
Gigged With:
The Lisps, Thrift Store Cowboys, the Chapin Sisters
Big Break: Performing at the 30th birthday party of their friend Auerbach. He was inspired to produce their debut at his Akron studio.
Why They Say They Matter: "We've been adding more songs to our repertoire," says Sarah Benn, "shifting our focus to reworking old gospel and folk songs and writing more adult-themed material, while still retaining the playful and dark sound of the songs on We All Started ..."
Why We Say They Matter: The pretension-free Benns show a Lewis Carroll-like knack for balancing the sweet with the sinister, and their partnerships with Auerbach and his lyricist father Chuck could put them on the fast track to wider success.
Where You Can Hear Them:
shiveringtimbersmusic.com
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Preview: The Sundresses & Shivering Timbers at Rumba Café
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Swinging down from Akron will be Shivering Timbers, proteges of Dan Auerbach whose brand of art-scho...Swinging down from Akron will be Shivering Timbers, proteges of Dan Auerbach whose brand of art-school folk eschews the usual guitar-heavy strummage in favor of flavors like jazz, indie-pop and eerie soundtrack music.
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Shivering Timbers Shake My Leaves - An Interview
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Shivering Timbers are a unique Akron, Ohio outfit. A trio that brings a fresh energy to old-time... Shivering Timbers are a unique Akron, Ohio outfit. A trio that brings a fresh energy to old-timey mountain music, the group is led by the strong, siren-like vocals of Sarah Benn (who also plays upright bass), and the howling, jangly guitar work of her husband Jayson, with drums rounded out by friend Brad Thorla. With influences ranging from classical to country to blues to punk to gospel to rock, Shivering Timbers are reminiscent of "the Akron sound," which is no definitive sound at all, but always completely original (think Chrissie Hynde, Devo, Robert Quine, The Black Keys, etc.). In fact, their unique sound caught the ear of friend and fellow Akronite, Dan Auerbach (of the Black Keys) who insisted on producing their debut album, We All Started in the Same Place, and had the band play his recent birthday party.
As Shivering Timbers prepare to come to Toledo on Thursday, October 20th, performing live at the Ottawa Tavern (1815 Adams St., Doors at 9 p.m. No cover. www.otavern.com), we caught up with Sarah quick to discuss the band, Dan, and the fate of their toy piano in Toledo. Enjoy.
Toledo.com: Let's start with environment. You're from Akron. Does this city itself seem to find a way into The Shivering TImbers' music? If so, in what way?
Sarah Benn: Akron has long been a city full of unique musicians who aren't what a big label would consider marketable, but they do it anyway. There's very few bands around Akron that sound like they're trying to "write a hit", but they write great songs just the same.
Toledo.com: Your voice is a really shining and stand out aspect of the band, where did you learn to sing? And where do you continue to find inspiration (in terms of both style and motivation)?
Sarah Benn: I taught myself to sing, really, just singing along with other albums that I love and trying to match others' vocal inflections and tone. Jolie Holland really inspired me to want to sing, she has such a unique voice, also Patsy Cline, Neko Case, Joni Mitchell, and Mavis Staples. I started out singing in a three-part harmony group, all girls with a similar vocal range, so we traded off the duties of lead, high and low harmony. I sang all three parts.
Toledo.com: Obviously, I have to ask about your friend Dan Auerbach. Were you guys friends before he became involved with the band? Either way, what was your reaction when he offered to produce the album?
Sarah Benn: We were friends before, and we casually just agreed to make a record together, as we were washing lunch dishes at his house (he's a really good cook). I think he made some kind of chinese wild mushroom soup that day. He's so busy and still needs time with his family, so we recorded quickly in three and a half days.
Toledo.com: A) What did Dan bring to the production process?
Sarah Benn: He pretty much insisted on doing as much live as possible, without the use of click-tracks to keep time. That was the only way I'd ever recorded in the past, so getting rid of headphones with the loud click-track was really freeing. Dan kept the focus and kept our feet on the ground so we didn't get carried away picking at something that should be left alone.
B) In working with him, was there an aspect about him you were surprised by, in character or process?
Sarah Benn: Dan kicks ass. He's hilarious. And I was pretty in-awe of his ear, watching him listen to a track over and over, the way he evaluates what needs to be done. I learned a lot just from listening with him.
Toledo.com: There is another The Shivering Timbers from Melbourne, were you aware of this? Do you want to beat them up?
Sarah Benn: Haha! I am aware of that, and our lawyer has advised us to not worry about it until we start touring in Australia.
Toledo.com: We're glad to have you in Toledo. Any special surprises we can look forward to?
Sarah Benn: We'll be recording the show. It's the last night of tour and we'll probably be half-crazed from sitting in the car. Plus we REALLY ADORE The Ottawa Tavern and our Toledo fans, so I'm sure the beast will be unleashed that night. The toy piano might get kicked over.
Ryan Bunch
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Shivering Me Timbers
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Mist clouded the lush hills of Cincinnati’s Price Hill district as I walked toward the blue station ...Mist clouded the lush hills of Cincinnati’s Price Hill district as I walked toward the blue station wagon that serves as Shivering Timbers’ tour bus.
“Sorry we’re late – we got lost in over there in Gummo land,” Sarah said as she slammed the door of the car. Her voice has a lilting quality to it, common to many singers.
She saw me staring at her shoes, which looked about three sizes too big.
“I was wearing sandals when we left Akron, but then it started raining so Jayson gave me his shoes.”
Lead singer Sarah Benn and guitarist Jayson Benn are married. They are both tall and look vaguely Nordic. Bearded drummer Brad Thorla – no relation – describes himself as “the weird Uncle Jesse.”
Jayson and Sarah met at a show in Akron – Brad was bartending and Sarah was talking to one of Jayson’s friends. “But he was … strange,” said Sarah, “so Jayson butted in.”
“I said, ‘Hey, I’m drunk,’” Jayson said.
“And now we’re married,” said Sarah. They have a habit of finishing each other’s sentences.
“Being married in a band is tough sometimes,” said Jayson, “because even if we have disagreements, at the end of the day we’re still married.”
“I like being in a band with my husband.” Sarah said. “I wouldn’t want to do this if it was just a band of friends. It means something this way. It’s one of our marriage projects.”
“Instead of her telling me to cut the grass, like a normal wife, she tells me to practice my guitar,” said Jayson. “It’s awesome.”
“Buy the amp, forget the mortgage,” added Brad.
The couple has a 3-year-old daughter named Suzi. When she gets older they hope to bring her along for shows. In the meantime, she stays with Jayson’s mother in Akron when the band travels out of town. They keep a family photo album on their merchandise table for fans to peruse. Suzi is becoming a musician herself. Not surprising, considering her gene pool.
‘The other day Suzi was just hammering away on her little piano and it sounded so cool,” said Sarah.
“We want to steal her songs, but she might sue us for it when she gets older,” said Jayson.
“We do abscond with her toy instruments though,” said Brad. “We use her bells and her piano at our shows and on our record.”
When Brad plays Suzi’s toy piano onstage it gives a whole new meaning to the phrase “baby grand.”
The band recorded their first album after Sarah gave birth to Suzi. We All Started In The Same Place sounds like a Dr. Suess-ish, prayer-like meditation on the childhood of Edgar Allan Poe. The band is still working on material for a new album.
“We have enough songs for another album,” said Jayson, “but we want to let the new songs germinate first and wait for Dan (Auerbach).” Auerbach, singer and guitarist for the Black Keys, produced Shivering Timbers’ first album in 2010.
“Our new stuff is a lot darker, it has more gravitas,” said Sarah. “I like to sing murder ballads and songs about people’s day of reckoning – in the gospel tradition, not in the ‘sell your soul to the devil’ type of way. I like to take gospel songs and give them darkness, so that it shakes you, the way it’s meant to be. I’m kind of a lyrical scavenger.”
Shivering Timbers used to play all sorts of instruments when the band consisted of only Jayson and Sarah, to the point where it took a full hour to set up for a half-hour show. With the addition of Brad on drums, they started stripping down their sound for their sophomore album, which is sure to be more abrasive and adult.
When I heard them play, the sound blew me away. Shivering Timbers are what would happen if you locked Grace Slick in a room with Cranberries records and Led Zeppelin IV and forced her eyes open to read William Faulkner’s entire bibliography.
Sarah’s haunting siren-song chills to the bone. It’s obvious where the name Shivering Timbers comes from; her voice will give you goosebumps. She sings without effort, from a wise, dark place inside her soul. Jayson had confided in me earlier that her voice was one of the reasons he fell in love with her.
After two songs she acknowledged the audience.“By the way … hi.”
The crowd laughed and the band tore into the rest of their set, flirting with the blues and verging on the psychedelic. Their songs build and build until they reach an epic crescendo, and rock ‘n’ roll is born. Jayson shreds with a shape-shifting dissonance that channels the best of Jimmy Page. Brad’s drumming is sparse, yet elegant in its precision. This is the kind of music you listen to when you rock your darlin’ to sleep on a sweaty porch in New Orleans. Spooky.
Banshee-folk. Their album could provide the soundtrack for an entire episode of True Blood.
After the show I sat with the band at the bar and they invited me to a party. But I didn’t want to overstay my welcome. I knew I would see them again.
As I walked out of the bar, I looked back. It was like seeing old friends again.
Shivering Timbers will play Friday, May 27 at South Park Tavern, 1301 Wayne Ave. in Dayton. Doors open at 9 p.m. Tickets are $5. Visit shiveringtimbersmusic.com.
Reach DCP freelance writer Benjamin Dale at BenDale@daytoncitypaper.com.
Benjamin Dale
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From Us to You – Introducing Shivering Timbers (Auerbach Produced)
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Akron's Shivering Timbers are a new revelation to me. I just was hand delivered some tracks via... Akron's Shivering Timbers are a new revelation to me. I just was hand delivered some tracks via the internet mail, and I'm here to preach the gospel. Sometimes I'll admit that I look outward too broadly and need to be lassoed back in to look at killer music being produced right on my own front doorstep. Dan Auerbach produced Shivering Timbers' December 5th release, We All Started in the Same Place and recorded the record at his own Easy Eye Studios. Additionally, he laid down the drums on two of the tracks. However, Auerbach's interest and involvement is really tertiary. The story behind the band and album is fabulous, and I feel slightly embarrassed that, as a Clevelander, I haven't caught wind of this duo until now. I'll blame it on all of the snow and FBI probes into the auditor's office.
Essentially, Auerbach was moved enough at hearing the husband and wife duo, Jayson and Sarah Benn, of Shivering Timbers, that he put this whole album together. Auerbach describes their sound as "a junkyard orchestra." It does not dissapoint in the slightest, and manages to span the gamut of musical styles with enough control to keep it consistent and intriguing. One part macabre, one part chamber gospel, one part Grimm fairy tale, the tracks are expansive and are difficult to pinpoint into one particular genre. What is easy to decipher, however, is the coolness and unique variety dripping from every track. I've posted "Nose Nose Nose" and "Crooked Old Man" for a taste below. Some of the tracks are downright spooky in tone and ambience, distortion shredding up the clarity, a la No Age. Other tracks are more vaudevillian and rooted in kind of twisted jazzy gospel tone and structure. Some tracks even go into a sort of White Stripesian square dance mode. Sarah Benn's vocals are striking with smoky ambience and confidence, like other Ohioan chick rocker Erica Wennerstrom of Heartless Bastards, and perhaps the coolest thing is that many of the songs are based in old-school nursery rhymes; the birth of the couple's daughter inspired the reinterpretation of these lyrics. I hear tinges of Grace Slick and Janis. I hear a bluesy center with lip-sneering attitude. I also hear children laughing. The juxtaposition of fantastical, juvenile lyricism with darker and brooding music is just what the doctor ordered. I'm ga-ga for these two and even more excited that they are playing all over the place locally. Even on a national level, my hope is that people catch wind. Big things on the horizon.
Kevin
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Interview: Shivering Timbers
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By Rick Benedum | Dec 1, 2010
II have wronged Akron’s Shivering Timbers. On two separate, sigh-la...By Rick Benedum | Dec 1, 2010
II have wronged Akron’s Shivering Timbers. On two separate, sigh-laden nights I watched them perform. Earlier this year I stumbled into Annabell’s after consuming what felt like half of the Matinee’s supply of Two-Hearted because Unnamed Girl A had said “blah, blah, blah…go away” a few hours earlier. Shivering Timbers played upstairs… I remembered that much. But I couldn’t for the life of me remember what they sounded like (or walking to my friend’s house and passing out on his couch, for that matter).
So, this past summer, I made it my goal to catch them at the Zephyr in Kent. I cleared my “busy” schedule, called my Kent friends and told them to “be there or you’re dead to me” and basically got really excited about the whole thing. Unfortunately, on the night of the show, Unnamed Girl B said “blah, blah, blah…you suck.” Needless to say, vast amounts of alcohol were once again consumed and I spent the entirety of the Timbers’ set outside bitching about Unnamed Girl B to anyone who would listen.
Fortunately, however, I was able to catch them recently at Akron’s Musica. This time, no rot-gut was needed, for this had been a day filled with awesome, and I was finally able to give the band the attention they deserve—and I am pleased to report I remember the night in vivid detail.
The nine-song set was a 30-minute, foot-stomping, electric-folk-gospel-infused explosion of buzzsaw guitars, banjo-y goodness, haunting bass lines and sultry vocals provided by the husband-and-wife duo of Jayson and Sarah Benn (guitar, bells, vocals and vocals, double bass, banjo, respectively). Joining the two that evening was the dynamic Brad Thorla (Hell’s Information, Duunes) on drums (and toy piano), who shifted from the raucous to the quiet with ease and, as Sarah said, “really brought the music together.”
It’s hard to imagine the two didn’t originally intend to start a band.
“It was a strange genesis,” Jayson said. “It took us a while to get to this point.”
Their songs—based on nursery rhymes, hymns and old traditionals, in addition to fun little ditties written for their 2-year-old daughter Suzi—were never really intended for anyone but their young child. After Dan Auerbach heard the couple’s songs, however, what started as a parents-bringing-joy-to-their-kid-type deal morphed into a full-fledged band. Auerbach got the two into the studio and the Shivering Timbers have been sharing Suzi’s songs with Northeast Ohio music fans ever since. And the response has been overwhelmingly positive.
“I can’t describe how much I enjoyed that,” said one enthused fan to Jayson following the Musica performance. “It’s hard to put into words.”
Their debut album, We All Started in the Same Place, which is set to be released on December 5, is a family-friendly melding of genres. Both multi-instrumentalists, the Benns incorporate everything from melodicas and glockenspiels to farfisas and banjos to create a vivid soundscape that wouldn’t seem too out of place on NPR or Yo Gabba Gabba.
Their take on the familiar nursery rhyme “Crooked Old Man” sounds like something you may have heard in a smoky jazz bar in the 1930s. “Noble Duke of York’s” fun organ line and brass-heavy hook evoke both the psych-pop stylings of Brazil’s Os Mutantes and the off-kilterness of Akron’s Chi-Pig. Their arrangement of the hymn “Evening Prayer” can only be described as what you would probably hear at a punk rock tent revival somewhere in Mississippi. But the real treats on the album are the duo’s original compositions. The couple’s love for their toddler shines brightly through in the angelic “Baby Don’t”, the rowdy and playful “Nose Nose Nose” and the adorable “Spit-Up Song.”
In addition to being recorded at Auerbach’s Easy Eye Sound studio, the Black Keys’ frontman also served as the album’s producer and played drums on two of the album’s 11 tracks.
“Dan was like the maestro,” said Sarah. “We weren’t sure at first if he would just be at the soundboard the whole time, pushing buttons and talking on his cell phone. But he was really into it. We went in there with these half-songs and he helped us build from there.”
“The studio was like Disneyland,” added Jayson. “It was really magic.”
The band will celebrate the release of We All Started in the Same Place with a show at Beachland Tavern on December 5. If you can’t make it out that night, you can also catch them at Cranky’s Pub in Cleveland on December 17 and Akron’s Annabell’s on January 21.
Be sure to check them out. Do not make the same mistake as I. In fact, I would like to apologize to Jayson and Sarah, as well as their muse, Suzi. It was wrong of me to let Unnamed Girls A & B get in the way of enjoying your amazing music. And I will not let Unnamed Girls C & D get in the way, either. I promise.
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Show Preview: Shivering Timbers w/ The Incurables and We Are Warm at Off Broadway
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Tonight, Akron, OH’s Shivering Timbers play Off Broadway with our own Incurables (Guitar monster... Tonight, Akron, OH’s Shivering Timbers play Off Broadway with our own Incurables (Guitar monster Jimmy Griffin’s most-recent-and-slower-paced-but-equally-as-impressive-as-his-harder-stuff-project) and We Are Warm (Former Chicagoan Derrick Streibig’s melodic-and-often-soaring-and-sometimes-experimental-rock-project).
Shivering Timbers’ sound is an intriguing, confounding (in a good way) mix of delicacy and darkness. It would provide the soundtrack to a film wherein Mother Goose slings back Jamesons with Ichabod Crane. ST’s Sarah Benn answered a few of my questions about the creation of the band, performing live, and working with The Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach.
Sarah Benn of Shivering Timbers. Photo by IWTAS.
So you and [husband] Jayson released ‘We All Started In the Same Place‘ in 2010 (Brad Thorla plays drums for ST). It’s a collection of songs with influences from all across the board, thematically centering on the birth of your daughter. What’s it like to make music as a family? How does it feel to create a piece of work both for an outside audience and for yourselves, as a relic of this important time in your lives?
We share a lot of mutual interests outside of music as well, but somehow I think it’s all related. The life we live together is what inspires the musical choices we make, and as life changes, so does our music. Our newer material is a little heavier, and I think that mirrors our life – these times are tough for everyone, and life feels heavier.
How long have you been playing together and what was the catalyst for becoming an actual band?
Recording the album is what made us decide to consider ourselves a band. We knew it was a great record, so different and unique, we couldn’t just leave it sitting on a shelf. So we went to work trying to figure out what kind of band we wanted to have, and the simplicity of a trio was what took.
Jayson Benn of Shivering Timbers. Photo by IWTAS.
I know that you and Dan Auerbach are both from Akron. How did your band and Auerbach cross paths, and what was the experience like working with him?
I first met Dan when he would come hear my old band (The Rhondas) perform. I was pregnant I think, and so was his wife. She and I met a few years before, then bonded through the shared experience of having our first child around the same time. We’d take our babies on walks together since we lived close by. At that time neither of us had childbearing friends; we needed each other. Of course recording music inspired by a shared experience made the work in the studio a piece of cake. Dan understood us. He ‘got it’.
I was fortunate to catch S.T. play a set at a design and music conference in Cleveland earlier this year. It was a weird atmosphere, with people funneling in and out of the bar and a bunch of sunlight behind you guys. What kind of live performance “principles” do you ascribe to that keep your shows sharp and interesting regardless of setting/venue?
When I get on the stage, I try and lose sight of the activity going on around me. I attempt to just get inside the music and feel it the way I want the audience to feel. It can be hard to do when there’s crappy sound or some other issues that come up from time to time, but at some point you just have to let it go and sing. And I love it.
Show Notes:
– Songs are starting somewhere between 8:30 and 9p tonight. They should have you home before midnight.
– Price – $8/$11, and more info can be found on this FB invite. Enjoy!
Jessica Luther
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Kid Rock | Makin' the Scene | Cleveland Scene
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By Jeff Neisel | Dec 1, 2010
Just after their daughter was born three years ago, Sarah and Jayson...By Jeff Neisel | Dec 1, 2010
Just after their daughter was born three years ago, Sarah and Jayson Benn of Shivering Timbers (myspace.com/shiveringtimbersmusic.com) penned some songs they could sing to her. "We just wrote these silly tunes," says Sarah. "We never thought anything would happen with them. That they are so broadly appealing really boggles my mind." The songs didn't receive much exposure outside of the Benn household until Sarah's friend asked if Shivering Timbers would play her husband's 30th birthday party. The birthday boy — the Black Keys' Dan Auerbach — loved the group so much, he produced We All Started in the Same Place. The assorted instruments — banjo, castanets, glockenspiel, toy piano — reflect the record's eclectic nature. Inspired by PJ Harvey's raw power and Natalie Merchant's refined elegance, Sarah establishes herself as a compelling singer. "I don't anticipate us doing nursery rhymes forever," she says. "We want to move on. We wrote the songs that were relevant for that time." She says the group is now working on some "adult-themed" material. "I'm not a big fan of having every song being about love. There's no reason to write any more love songs." Shivering Timbers perform with Rebekah Jean at 8:30 p.m. Sunday at the Beachland Tavern. Tickets are $6.
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Music
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By John Soeder | Dec 4, 2010
You need to get hip to Shivering Timbers, an idiosyncratic pop-folk-...By John Soeder | Dec 4, 2010
You need to get hip to Shivering Timbers, an idiosyncratic pop-folk-blues outfit from Akron featuring the husband-and-wife team of Jayson Benn and Sarah Benn. They'll celebrate the release of their wonderful debut album, "We All Started in the Same Place" (produced by The Black Keys' Dan Auerbach), with a concert at 8:30 p.m. Sunday at the Beachland Ballroom and Tavern, 15711 Waterloo Road, Cleveland (in the tavern). Also on the bill is Rebekah Jean. Tickets are $6. Call 216-383-1124
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Shivering Timbers Draws on FamilyLlife to Make Music
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Jayson and Sarah Benn owe a passion for music to their 3-year-old daughter Suzi. The husband and... Jayson and Sarah Benn owe a passion for music to their 3-year-old daughter Suzi. The husband and wife duo from Akron left separate bands to form Shivering Timbers after they started putting nursery rhymes to music to entertain their daughter.
The result is their debut album “We All Started In The Same Place.” Jayson provides backing vocals and plays guitar and banjo, and Sarah sings lead vocals and plays upright bass and banjo. Family friend Dan Auerbach, frontman for The Black Keys, produced the album in his Akron studio after the couple performed at his 30th birthday party.
Shivering Timbers
“The birth of our daughter made the band,” Sarah Benn said. “We weren’t playing together until then. You spend a lot of time trying to entertain a baby. She had an embroidery piece on the wall with ‘Now I lay me down to sleep’ on it. Jayson grabbed her toy ukulele and we started stomping and dancing around like a couple of monkeys, howling the lyrics over and over. I liked the way it sounded. That’s how we wrote our first song ‘Evening Prayer.’”
Most of the other songs on the album developed from entertaining Suzi.
“I wrote ‘Noble Duke of York’ while I was changing her diaper,” Benn said. “I wrote another song while I was nursing her. It was a period of creation. It came in weird ways. Another one was getting puked on.”
With such a musical upbringing, it’s no surprise Suzi is learning multiple instruments.
“She has instruments all over the house,” Benn said. “There’s always a little parade in our house with banging out rhythms and being silly. It’s just what we love to do, and it’s what she’s learning to love to do.”
Suzi stays with her grandparents when the band hits the road, but she could eventually replace drummer Brad Thorla and tour with her parents.
“When she comes to the basement when we’re doing rehearsals, Brad is really nice,” Sarah said. “He loves Suzi. He lets her drum. Sometimes she’ll sing. She gets to be the frontwoman for Shivering Timbers down in the basement. That’s the running joke in the band. Brad calls Suzi his future replacement. It would be awesome if she’s good enough in a few years and she wants to.”
“That’s always been the plan,” Thorla said. “I’m just the fill-in drummer until she can play shows with them. I’m alright with that.”
Thorla can’t make the band’s July 30 show at the Ottawa Tavern, but Suzi isn’t ready to step in yet. They have a friend filling in on drums, but Sarah and Jayson do occasionally perform as a duo. The band’s debut album was recorded before the band had a drummer. With Thorla playing drums, the band’s second album is shifting to a more adult sound.
“We have been leaning a lot more toward a darker, more adult album,” Benn said. “We’ve all come into our own and found our sound. I’m really excited about the next album. I can’t wait to make it. It’s much more powerful and stirring.”
The band plans to start recording the album in January before starting its first tour of Europe in March. Benn said the band is considering running a Kickstarter.com campaign to raise money for the next album.
“We’re really broke,” she said. “We’re totally working our butts off. Jayson has a job, and the band makes a little money, but it goes right out the door for all the equipment and travel. It’s expensive to be in a band. We’re totally independent. Every move we make comes out of our pockets. We have a mortgage and a child. We’re trying to make it all happen.”
Shivering Timbers plays at 10 p.m. July 30 at the Ottawa Tavern, 817 Adams St. Visit ShiveringTimbersMusic.com for more information.
Jason Mack
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Shivering Timbers
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By Rick Benedum | Jan 12, 2011
Who said kids' music has to suck -- or that only young 'uns should...By Rick Benedum | Jan 12, 2011
Who said kids' music has to suck -- or that only young 'uns should be able to enjoy it, for that matter? Whoever it was, they must not have told Sarah and Jayson Benn. The couple began writing and singing songs for their daughter Suzi soon after her birth. When The Black Keys' Dan Auerbach heard their stylings at his 30th birthday party, those little itties blossomed into a full-fledged band. Impressed with the two, Auerbach got the couple to stop by his Easy Eye Sound studio and produced their debut release, "We All Started In The Same Place". Making use of almost every instrument imaginable -- think farfisa, banjo, melodica, waterphones and glockenspiel in addition to guitar, upright double bass and drums -- the tunes, which include originals as well as fresh re-imaginings of traditional nursery rhymes and hymns, are both playful and, at times, dark. Not one of the album's 11 tracks would be out of place at either your local watering hole or your daycare center. As rocking as this album is, at it's heart is one underlying thing: two parents' burning love for their daughter.
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Meet The Band: Shivering Timbers
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Members: Sarah Benn (vocals, upright bass, banjo), Jayson Benn (guitar, banjo, backing vocals), ... Members: Sarah Benn (vocals, upright bass, banjo), Jayson Benn (guitar, banjo, backing vocals), Brad Thorla (drums, toy piano)
Hometown: Akron
Sounds like: dark songs inspired by nursery rhymes and gospel music
Latest project: "We All Started In the Same Place" came out in October
Web: www.shiveringtimbersmusic.com
Once described as “a mellow PJ Harvey fronting the Bad Seeds on a shadowy corner of Sesame Street,” the threesome Shivering Timbers embody a sound that is difficult to put into words, but impressive enough that The Black Keys Dan Auerbach wanted to work them. He produced the band’s debut album "We All Started In the Same Place."
We talked with husband and wife Sarah and Jayson Benn about the Ohio bands that are influencing them – from Mark Mothersbaugh to Cincinnati’s own Brian Olive and Chocolate Horse – and about what’s growing in their garden.
You have a small daughter, which has influenced distinct sound, but what is it like being musicians before and after having a child?
Sarah: Well, with Suzi in our lives, it’s just one more thing to have to juggle. I guess it’s like having a fourth band member who doesn’t come to the gigs.
What instrument will she play?
Sarah: We always joke that she will replace Brad on drums. I don’t know. We’ll see. She likes to play her harmonica a lot. She’s only three so there’s time.
Is she a fan of "Yo Gabba Gabba"?
Sarah: Oh yeah. We all love that actually. Mark Mothersbaugh is on that, and well, you know, he’s from Akron. But she loves him. He teaches the kids how to draw something in every episode. He goes, “Hi, I’m Mark. Come join me,” and he says, “Today, we’re going to draw whatever.” So now she stands at her easel and she’ll turn around and go, “Hi, I’m Mark. Today we’re going to draw…a pirate.” She’ll do it exactly like he does, so I think Mark Mothersbaugh is teaching my daughter to draw, which is kind of cool. Mark’s niece actually did the artwork for the album cover.
How did that come about?
Sarah: Well she used to live here—she just moved to L.A, but her mother still lives here and runs an art gallery. So we just happened to be in the art gallery checking out her work and I loved it. We were still trying to figure out what to use as the album cover, so we hired her to do a piece and that ended up being the album cover.
Given the band’s name, I wanted to ask, are you guys fans of pirates or just word plays?
Sarah: Our name actually doesn’t have anything to do with pirates. I’ve heard the term used in other ways, like describing an emotion that a performer can give from their performance. Like “She’s been shivering timbers since blah, blah, blah—this singer’s been causing….” So I don’t think of it as a pirate term.
Jayson: I’ve always thought of it as like something that shakes your bones to the core kind of experience. That’s kind of what we strive for in music. To get you in your soul.
Sarah: To make you shiver.
What sort of things have been giving you the shivers lately?
Sarah: The Black Angels. They are very cool. … We were just listening to Odetta Live when you called. I pretty much always hear Jolie Holland in my head because she is my favorite.
Jayson: I’m a big Nick Cave fan. I mean, sitting on our CD player now, there is Charles Mingus, Morphine, Lord and Arrow, Devotchka—pretty much anything.
Sarah: I’ve recently been listening to Esperanza Spalding, because, man, she just rocks the bass and the way she sings is just wonderful. I love her. We’re kind of all over the place. … I like things that have a darkness to them, that have a soulfulness.
Kind of going back to an earlier question, how do you guys juggle having a band, jobs and a family?
Sarah: Jayson works, for a while he was working two jobs, but now he is back to one. I stay at home. I do everything, I run the band, I run the house. Our daughter is in preschool three days a week, so that gives me a little bit of time to get stuff done.
I work in phases. I’ll spend months where I stay up all night doing nothing but band stuff. You know working on the website, doing publicity, booking shows, just like tearing my hair out.
Right now I’m in phase where I’m just kind of like letting things germinate, but I’m more focused on my gardening [laughs] for this month. I’ve been trying to put in a vegetable garden and things like that. … I got us booked all the way through September and now I am taking a break, because booking is not easy. I’m really hoping that someday we’ll have a booking agent who can do that. For now it’s me.
What do you have going on with the garden?
Sarah: My windows are all full of vegetables and sunflowers, marigolds, morning glories, radishes and things that are all just little sprouts, but I’m going to move them out to the plot that I ripped up a few days ago. And pumpkins and strawberries and all kinds of stuff. … We just bought this house last year, so I’ve got to put a tiny bit of effort into it once and while.
You recorded with Dan Auerbach of The Black Keys, who is also from Akron. What is the local music scene like?
Sarah: It’s packed with really good bands, I think, and there’s only two venues! I mean, there are a few more, but not, you know, real venues where… I don’t know. There is just a surplus of bands and too few venues.
Who are some bands that people should check out?
Jayson: Our drummer Brad is in a band called Duunes. They’re kind of an Akron supergroup, heavy kind of prog stuff.
Sarah: We’ve got a lot of good acts up here. If you want a really great country vocalist, then it would be Rebecca Jean. She has the most solid country sound, it’s so good, this old school country voice.
You’ve got some ties to our local music scene as well. Could you tell me about those?
Sarah: We’ve been talking to Brian Olive about possibly doing some tour dates together. We became buddies when we were down in Nashville. His house has now become our crash pad when we’re in Cincinnati. That’s actually one of the acts that I am kind of obsessed with right now, but I’m kind of bummed because I gave his CD to my father-in-law so he could listen to it, and now I am waiting to get it back. But I really love his music a lot
Jayson: Sarah got to sing on his new album. When we were down in Nashville, he was done there doing some mixing with Dan (Auerbach) and we were just in the studio hanging when they were recording a song. And we’re like hey, you should go sing on the song and she got to sing on a track.
Sarah: That was in February. That was the moment that I met him when I sang on his album. [Laughs] We were just hanging out there in the studio, and there were three girls in there, Nashville session singers, who were putting down vocals for a song. I spent years singing in all female harmony groups, so that’s one thing that I am really good at. These girls were having trouble and I was kind of joking, “Come on, put me in there and I’ll show them how it’s done.” [laughs] It was in a total joking way, but Dan was like, “All right, go in there.” So that was kind of fun to go and sing on Brian’s album, but I had just met him just that moment. But that was kind of fun.
We’ve been making a lot of friends Cincinnati-wise, like Jason Schnell and Chocolate Horse. He and I have become internet buddies, so we’re going to be doing some shows together. We met down in Nashville. We’re also doing some shows with The Tillers. I love Cincinnati; it could be my town. I love going to the Bass Cellar. It’s an awesome bass shop I try to go to when we’re in town. And I get to eat Skyline Chili too.
Allison Cayse
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Kaleidoscope: It was a foot-stompin' night at historic Nelsonville opera house
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Ever since I visited Nelsonville for the first time in spring 2009, I've wanted to see the inside of...Ever since I visited Nelsonville for the first time in spring 2009, I've wanted to see the inside of Stuart's Opera House and perhaps attend a performance.
I saw the historic building on Public Square from outside twice during visits to the Athens County city of 5,400, but never had the opportunity to go inside.
That changed on Labor Day weekend. During an overnight stay in Athens, I found out about a show that night at Stuart's, which was built in 1879.
I never heard of the two groups playing -- Shivering Timbers and Shovels & Rope -- but read about the show in the Ohio University Post. They sounded like something I'd enjoy.
The three hours of foot-stompin', knee-slappin' music for an audience of about 350 people was the perfect end to a memorable day in Southeast Ohio.
ABOUT THE MUSICAL GROUPS
Shivering Timbers opened the show, and I was amazed to discover its three members are from the Akron area.
Husband and wife Jayson and Sarah Benn play guitar and bass fiddle, respectively, and they are joined by a drummer.
The group plays high-spirited folk, country/rock and blues/rock. The night before their Nelsonville show, they debuted their second CD, "Sing, Sing." Their first, released in late 2010, was "We All Started in the Same Place."
Akronite Dan Auerbach of the Black Keys produced their first album.
The band recently performed with the Blue Sky Riders at the Kent Stage and at Kent State University's fall folk festival.
Whimsical and eccentric are two words to describe some of the band's songs, which include "Crooked Old Man," "Noble Duke of York," "Gonna Getchya," "Three Young Rats" and "See-Saw Sacradown."
According to their website, Shivering Timbers will play Oct. 16 at the Beachland Ballroom in Cleveland and Nov. 10 at the Akron Civic Theater.
Also, their website reports they will be on a November tour with Shovels & Rope, which includes shows in Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Wisconsin and Minnesota.
After Shivering Timbers' performance, I told the guy sitting beside me that it would be tough to top that, but Shovels & Rope managed to do it.
Cary Ann Hearst and Michael Trent, a married couple, hail from Charleston, S.C., and began performing together in 2005.
An album project titled "Shovels & Rope" -- because of many murder ballads in which many characters buried their secrets with shovels or hung from ropes -- led to their name.
During the annual Nelsonville Music Festival in May, Shovels & Rope captivated area residents so much that Stuart's Opera House invited them back.
The group performs a rousing show of uptempo songs. After taking their music on the road, the couple recorded an album titled "O' Be Joyful" in their home, backyard, van and several motel rooms.
The duo is unique in that they don't play expensive instruments.
They stir up venues with two old guitars, harmonicas, a drum kit rescued from a garbage dump and adorned with tambourines, flowers and kitchen rags, and occasionally a small keyboard. Both play all the instruments.
Some of their songs are "Birmingham," "Hail Hail," "Kemba's Got the Cabbage Moth Blues," "This Means War" and "Shank Hill St." A line in the latter goes: "With a handshake like a hammer and a suicide grin, that wooden door creaked open and the butcher man let me in."
The crowd loved Shovels & Rope. Many followers who apparently fell in love with the duo at the May festival stood the entire show in front of the stage.
ABOUT STUART'S OPERA HOUSE
In the mid-19th century, Nelsonville native George Stuart had a showboat called the Arizona, which traveled on Ohio's canals and played minstrel music.
In 1869, the Arizona sank in the Erie Canal during a storm. So Stuart returned to the then booming coal mining town of Nelsonville and built an opera house with bricks baked from nearby clay.
When it opened in 1879, the Athens Messenger proclaimed it "an ornament to the town and a monument to the public spirit of its projector."
In its heyday, the intimate second-floor theater hosted vaudeville acts, minstrel shows, musicals, recitals, dances and high school graduations.
Among those appearing there were Elsie Janis -- "The Queen of Vaudeville" -- magician Howard Thurston and "Yankee Doodle Dandy" composer George M. Cohen.
With the decline of vaudeville came the decline of Stuart's. It closed in 1924 and sat empty -- with scenery and theatrical equipment still intact -- for more than 50 years.
A non-profit group called the Hocking Valley Museum of Theatrical History was founded in 1976 to restore and maintain the old opera house.
The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979. But its rebirth was short-lived. In early 1980 a fire nearly gutted the building.
After extensive renovation, including the reconstruction of the building's street-level commercial space, Stuart's reopened in 1997 and has been going strong ever since.
The building, on the Northeast corner of Nelsonville's Public Square, has a lobby on the first floor, where concessions and merchandise for acts that play there are sold.
The second-floor auditorium is quaint, with creaky wooden floors and old wrought-iron, padded fold down seats. The lower seating area accommodates about 250 people, while a balcony above seats about 100.
There is ample standing room in back of the lower level and at the sides of the balcony. Two small boxes at the side of the stage are reserved for benefactors and sponsors.
Some acts which were scheduled to perform at the venue this fall were the Red Clay Ramblers, Taj Mahal Trio, Arlo Guthrie, Tinariwen, Iris DeMent and Dwight Icenhower.
Productions by the Athenian Berean Community Players, which has existed since 1973, also take place there. In coming months, the group will present "Nightfall with Edgar Allan Poe," "Hansel and Gretal," "Is There Life After High School?" and "First Things First."
WHAT ELSE IN NELSONVILLE?
In a column after a previous trip to Athens County, I mentioned the Hocking Valley Scenic Railroad as being one of Nelsonville's attractions.
The Rocky Outdoor Gear Store also is there, as well as Hocking College, Robbins Crossing pioneer village and remnants of the Nelsonville Brick Co., from which Star brick for Indianapolis Speedway's surface and streets in hundreds of towns came.
And the world's largest privately-erected cross stands atop a hill on the northeast side of the city.
The former Dew Hotel, built in 1839, sets on the Southeast corner of Public Square. It's famous for the balcony where presidents William Howard Taft, William McKinley, Warren G. Harding and Teddy Roosevelt spoke from during some campaign stops.
Public Square, or the Historic Square Arts District, is a thriving art-lovers paradise. Adorned with classic Star bricks, it includes more than a dozen retail shops, restaurants and an iconic fountain.
The staff of Wayne National Forest, which encompasses about 240,000 acres in Athens and surrounding counties, is headquartered on Route 33, just east of Nelsonville.
The forest contains 300 miles of trails. On the headquarters grounds is the Snake Ridge fire outlook tower, which was built in 1939 on Route 278 southwest of Nelsonville and later moved there.
Eight fire towers, which were 75 to 100 feet high, once kept look over the area's forests. The towers were actively used until the 1970s. Only the Shawnee tower south of New Straitsville remains in its original location.
Email: klahmers@recordpub.com
Phone: 330-541-9400 ext. 4189
Photo of Jayson and Sarah Benn courtesy of Nate Burrell www.beforetheblink.com
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Shivering Timbers bring hybrid sounds to Civic
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DOWNTOWN AKRON — Sarah Benn doesn’t want to talk about what musicians influence her.
The vocalist...DOWNTOWN AKRON — Sarah Benn doesn’t want to talk about what musicians influence her.
The vocalist and stand-up bassist, who is one-half of Shivering Timbers with her husband, Jayson Benn, describes the band as folk rock with hints of gospel, blues, punk and nursery rhymes. But she stops short of mentioning specific influences to compare their sound to.
“I always steer away from that because it depends on the day,” Benn said in a phone interview. “Today I’m listening to Joni Mitchell but tomorrow I might be listening to Rancid or the Dropkick Murphys. That’s what makes us be able to work together so well because we understand these other types of music that we both like. I like it all, he likes it all and it all influences us.”
The Akron-based duo will perform as a quartet for its first-ever show at the Akron Civic Theatre Nov. 10 at 8 p.m. Drummers Brad Thorla and David Marchione, who usually alternate accompanying them, will play drums and keyboards at the show that also will feature Roger Hoover and the Hurt on the Civic stage for an intimate cabaret-style performance. Akron visual artist Todd V. also will be on hand with an exhibit of work from his iPhone.
Both Benns are veterans of local bands, but their current project started more than two years ago as they created music to children’s rhymes to entertain their daughter, Suzi, who’s about to turn 5.
“A lot of the nursery rhyme stuff is still with us,” Benn said. “A lot of them are nonsense, so they can mean what you want them to mean.”
After playing a set at a birthday party for The Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach, he offered to record the duo at his Akron studio, and the result was their first album, We All Started in the Same Place, released in 2010.
This fall, the band released Sing Sing, which features a title track that has been played on local radio station The Summit.
At the end of October, the Benns hit the road with their daughter in tow for a Midwest tour supporting Shovels & Rope, a Charleston, S.C.,-based duo that also features a married couple.
“They are an up-and-coming band that just released their first full-length album,” Benn said. “They will keep Suzi while we perform. She’s actually convinced she will be playing with us. We’re bringing the toy piano, and I said we’ll see how that works out.
She added that the tour is significant because it will expose the band to a broader audience in the Midwest. They’ll return home right before their show at the Civic, which is their only local gig planned for some time, Benn said.
“We’re playing less and less locally,” she said. “We’re looking at booking spring tours now, and we’ll be touring a lot.”
Benn heads up the business end of the band, while her husband supports the family as a drafter. They previously lived in Highland Square but now own a house in Goodyear Heights. They have no plans to leave Akron, but the two would like to eventually make a living from their love of music, she said.
“I’m done with the playing shows in crappy bars stage,” Benn said. “We have a lot of good contacts we’ve made and people we’ve met. Everything we’ve done has led to something else. We’re hoping that will be the outcome from the Civic show and that it will be an introduction for us to Greater Akron. A lot of people know us, but a lot of people don’t.”
Tickets for the Civic show are $15 and available at www.akroncivic.com, at the Civic Box Office or by calling 330-253-2488. For more information on the band, go to www.ShiveringTimbersMusic.com.
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