Heirlooms

Heirlooms, an indie-folk band that hails from Hartford, CT have been making some considerable waves. Headed by singer-songwriter Jesse Stanford, the band, at least onstage, invokes sort of a hybrid of Springsteen’s E-Street Band and The Low Anthem. A very massive and dynamic sound that is almost too big for places like Rudy’s in New Haven where the 6-piece band had to perform one night back in July of 2011 on a small stage. They’ve been getting great local press, and even made it onto hipster webpage Brooklyn Vegan when they covered B.O.M.B Fest this year.

“The group got together in the summer of 2009 kind of in pieces”, Stanford remembers. “Myself and Neal began working on some new songs of mine together that summer and we soon got Thom and Justin involved. Shortly after, Ciara joined us and we started recording our first EP.”

On the influences of the band, Stanford explains, “My personal influences are all over the place musically. I grew up on my parents vinyl records–so the Beatles, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, John Prine, Dylan, Van Morrison, Bonnie Raitt, Buffy Saint Marie, Paul Simon …
all that stuff got into my head at very early age and when I started fooling around with my mom’s acoustic guitar, it was “Rocky Raccoon”, “Graceland”, and “Blowin’ in the Wind” that I was playing before anything else. I’ll always have a foot in that kind of folk singer/songwriter stuff when I approach writing music. However, there is a lot of current music that is more experimental and probably even more influential on what I’m doing in Heirlooms. Bon Iver is probably the biggest; Also Kurt Vile, Joanna Newsom, Arcade Fire, Broken Social Scene, Deerhunter, the list goes on and on. Thom Servidone (our guitarist) has also turned me on to a lot of 80's music I had sort of ignored until now–The Cure, The Smiths…I think he brings a lot of those influences to what we do.”

After recording a well-received 1st EP, Heirlooms cut a second one titled Heirlooms Live, Vol. 1 (Both are available for download on the band’s Bandcamp page) that sounds far more indicative of the live sound of the band.
Jesse explains, “As much as we all love and attribute much of our early success to our first EP, we began to realize how much we had grown as band in the year that followed its release. The first EP began and ended before we even considered ourselves a band, before we had begun truly writing songs together, before we stepped on a stage. In the months that followed its release, we moved out of ‘studio’ mode and put our collective energy into becoming a strong live band. And naturally we began writing new material together”.

“Heirlooms Live Vol. 1 is essentially a snapshot of the band in new clothes. We wanted to capture the energy and the dynamics and the orchestration of what we were doing on stage. We also wanted to present this new batch of songs that we had written together, and that have become staples in our live sets…By recording these songs live–in our practice space, with no overdubs and no real studio magic–in a weekend, we had a new EP we were really proud of and that was a solid representation of where we are now as a band. We set up a bunch of microphones, got Pro-Tools up and running, turned on our amps, and basically played a typical Heirlooms set. We got some amazing engineering and mixing help from our good friends Alex Cohen (Ciara’s husband) and Marc Andrew Gillig. They are both in a really great rock band Superart and were both a huge help in the making of the Live EP”.

Ciara Cohen is a welcome and refreshing part of this mostly male lineup using a classical violinist’s sensibility in a rock setting. “Ciara is amazing–classically trained, has an amazing ear, and she just shreds on that violin. She’s kind of the den mother–keeps all us boys in line and on task. She has this really sweet exterior, but she’ll kick some serious ass if and when she needs to. She’s our secret weapon.”

The band even has plans to release their first full-length album as well. “We have begun serious work on a new full length album. It seems like the pendulum has now begun to swing back towards the studio. We had a hard time pulling ourselves from playing live (especially in the summer with big shows like B.O.M.B. Fest and opening slots at the Iron Horse), but we have come to terms with the fact that we have to put playing shows on hold for a bit if we really want to make the kind of album we have in mind. This will certainly not be Live volume two. We have a new studio space in downtown Hartford and we plan to hole up this fall and winter and go back to the approach we took on the first EP; Lots of textures and layers and instruments and experimentation–really use the studio as an instrument itself. We might grab a few songs from the live EP for the album, but we also have a bunch of new songs we are really excited about. We’ll be underground for a bit, but I think we’ll have something really special on our hands once we come back up.” - Chris McGovern The Glass

Video - Chip McCabe CTNOW

The Feast spoke with Heirlooms frontman Jesse Stanford, whose rising indie folk outfit will open for Amanda Shires tonight at The Wadsworth Atheneum's Aetna Theatre. Heirlooms is one of Hartford's most exciting young bands. They recently released a well-reviewed EP and performed at B.O.M.B. Fest alongside acts like Weezer, Best Coast and Snoop Dogg. Stanford, a songwriter, vocalist and guitarist, gave us the scoop on tonight's show, the band's favorite local bars and venues, and their recent festival debut.

How would you describe Heirlooms' sound?
New Americana. It was the title of an art exhibit we saw in New Haven and that tone stuck with me. I'm a nostalgic person influenced by Neil Young, Bob Dylan and Wilco, but although I'm drawn to art and music of the past, we're also interested in avant garde and experimental. We try to take a different approach to the genres that influence us: folk, indie, and even electronic music. We pull from a lot of different areas and combine all of that into our sound.

How did Heirlooms get their start?
After a stint in New York, I came back to Connecticut with a handful of songs, acoustic skeletons that had space for instrumentation. I put a call out. We eventually came together and started making an EP before we performed a single live show. It took us eight months to get to know each other as musicians and friends. Then we decided to take what we created in the studio and start working it together as a live band. We almost did it backwards. We wanted to take our time, play with sounds and textures. We didn't care about hitting the bar scene at that point. Once we were done, we felt like we were ready to take it further and make that transition.

How would you describe Connecticut's music scene and what are some of the top local acts?
It's a tough place, but Hartford has so much potential. We are just a small band, and if we are going to be successful, we need to do it as a community and support other acts. Mark Nussbaum from Manic Productions has really done great things for us and continues to put on tremendous shows. We are trying to champion a sense of community of people with the same level of ambition. EULA is a band in New Haven that we really like. I come from a melody-driven folk background, but I love checking out different approaches to music and they are at the other end of the spectrum: very art rock, very raw, very emotional. We're also close with String Theorie. Their lead guitarist Joel Weik is probably the top guitarist in Connecticut. They play a world fusion-type music and he's ridiculous. John Parson is a solo singer-songwriter that's a bit under-the-radar, but he's incredible. The Mountain Movers in New Haven are wonderful, ethereal and yet grungy. We saw them open for Kurt Vile in Milford and got turned on to them. We also love Echo & Drake. They play a sort of British pop/rock, like early Radiohead.

What are your favorite venues to play in Connecticut?
We're very excited about The Wadsworth. It's a great venue that's moving in the direction of getting quality national touring bands to come through Hartford. Arch Street Tavern is another live venue for original indie music and they just built a stage. Sully's Pub is the grandfather of original music out here. They're an old standard that you have to appreciate. We've also enjoyed playing at Daniel Street in Milford, The Space in Hamden and BAR in New Haven. On a smaller scale, there's a Hartford coffee shop called La Paloma whose owner Virginia is an amazing woman. She supports local artists, music, poetry and film. We played there when we started out and I can't say enough good things about that place. She's a beacon to artists.

Where do you guys hang out when you aren't performing?
We end up at a little dive called The Spigot in West Hartford a lot. It's kind of our home away from home. They have really cheap beer and a great mixture of people. I also really like The Half Door in Hartford. It's got a great Irish pub vibe. They have over a hundred beers from around the world. You get a passport with your name on it and try to make your way down the list. We're trying to defeat each other and drink them all. I'm winning. I've got somewhere in the mid-thirties, but I live down the street and enjoy my beer so it's a bit unfair.

Describe your experience at B.O.M.B. Fest
It was our largest show to date. It was humbling and we were excited to be a part of it, grateful that the people involved took a shine to us. We were excited for the festival as fans. The crowd was great and there was a fog machine. What more can you ask for? I think it went really well. We were on the Viva La B.O.M.B. stage by the entrance. I heard from fans that people were being drawn in as they passed by, which is a really cool thing to hear. We started our set with a small crowd of people, but wrapped it up surrounded by an energetic crowd. We played our hearts out for thirty minutes and hope we to get more of those opportunities.

What's next for Heirlooms?
We're really excited about the show tonight. Heirlooms is a lyric-driven dynamic band as opposed to a bar band, so The Wadsworth is ideal for us. Amanda Shires is phenomenal, an outstanding songwriter and violinist, so we're honored to share the stage with her. We just finished a live EP that we are giving away to fans who grab a t-shirt or our first disc. We just want to stretch our arms this summer and get people our music. We have a show coming up in Northampton and want to play a bit more in New Haven, in addition to New York and Boston. Once the summer is over, we are going to buckle down and have set our sights on recording a full-length. - The Feast

The second we heard they were looking for local bands, we put an application in and crossed our fingers,” said Jesse Stanford, the front man for Heirlooms, a six-piece folk-rock band from Hartford. “They’ve done something really amazing by bringing national acts to an area like Hartford, which unfortunately doesn’t get to see a lot of these bands. They bring people out to hear music, which is a great opportunity for bands like ours.” - New York Times

Heirlooms Brings Its Blend of Old and New to Bridge Street Live Sunday

Band members develop musical complexity in short time together.

By John Fitts | Email the author | 5:00am

The left hand creeps up the neck to add a moving subtext to the guitar’s open-chord tuning. A partially clenched right hand hits the strings just hard enough to add a percussive edge to the subtle textures. Soon, a soaring tenor eases in.

“I am just a poor boy, I am just a lonely book on your shelf

Wrapped in twine, along the spine, just enough rope to hang myself"

Jesse Stanford could easily be a lone troubadour but soon the music swells with an electric guitar and keyboard, violin, bass and drums build to an orchestral-like fullness. An ebb and flow follows as the instrumentalists play with texture and dynamics.

It’s just one song from Heirlooms, a band that brings its own take on the deep roots of Americana musical traditions to Bridge Street Live Sunday.

The band pays homage to the past in other ways and, as its website indicates, is intrigued with the lingering parts of Hartford’s history as “a small river port town.”

But despite the musical maturity and love of yesteryear, Heirlooms itself is a young band. None of its members have reached 30 and the band’s beginnings go back only to 2009, when Stanford was still living in Collinsville, near drummer Neal Spencer.

Both graduated from Farmington High School – Stanford in 2000 and Spencer two years later. But their friendship really grew when they were both active in New Haven area bands. Both also happen to be special education teachers, Stanford in Waterbury, Spencer at Farmington Valley Diagnostic Center in Avon.

“We just have similar passions,” Spencer said.

So in 2009, when Stanford was working on writing songs to record a project, Spencer would often listen and add percussion.

“I’ve always been attracted to his ability to capture images in lyrics,” Spencer said. “I’ve always loved that.”

The two would also spend time in town, trying out some material at places like the open mic at LaSalle Market.

“The community of Collinsville is so supportive,” Stanford said.

Soon guitarist Thomas Servidone and Justin Kearney, who grew up together in Rocky Hill, began recording and contributing.

Not too long after a Craigslist ad for a violin player caught the attention of Ciara Cohen. A music teacher in Hartford, she is classically trained but jumped at the chance to do something different with her music.

“I was so excited,” she said about the first time she played with the other musicians.

And it wasn’t just her. As they recorded in late 2009 and 2010, the musicians felt a deeper connection.

“It kind of organically grew from humble beginnings,” Stanford said. “In making this record we realized we had something much bigger on our hands.”

Kearney said he was also thrilled when Servidone introduced him to the recording sessions and when the band materialized, even if he felt a little out of his element on keyboard rather than guitar.

“I was looking to expand musically,” he said. “We really liked Jesse’s music too.”

Later bassist Brendan Cox was added to the mix.

And when someone suggested the name Heirlooms, it just fit perfectly with their love of combining new and old, Stanford said.

Stanford, for example, listened to singers like John Prine and Joni Mitchell growing up. And most band members cut their teeth on their share of classic rock. At the same time modern bands like Wilco and more experimental groups, such as Broken Social Scene have caught the ears of members.

Stanford likes to call Heirlooms’ music New Americana.

“For us that kind of embodies that we have one feet in very traditional kinds of music,” Stanford said.” At the same time we’re really getting into a lot more modern experimental electric music. We’ve got these two opposite form of music that influence us.”

Currently the band has a four-song EP, the result of the 2009 and 2010 recordings, and is working on a new, even more collaborative album.

And the band has played quite a few live shows, gaining a following in Hartford and elsewhere.

Sunday they will be at Bridge Street with John Parson and Simsbury resident Carrie Johnson, a long-time songwriter, performer and music teacher, including at the Avon-based Music Time!! With Miss Carrie.

Dave Martin, another Farmington native, plays with Johnson and also contributed some guitar for the Heirlooms project. Sunday he will sit in with the band for a few songs as well.

“Jesse’s super creative,” he said, adding that the band is “a lot of fun to play with because they’re really expressive.”

“The band has a great way of creating a vibe in the room,” said Pat Ryan, entertainment and publicity director at Bridge Street Live. “Their subtle yet potent sound creeps up on you, in a good way. They are a hardworking band and I'm excited about their return to Bridge Street Live.”

That show, Sunday March 27, will begin at 8 p.m.Tickets are $12 and $22. Log on to www.41bridgestreet.com/calendar/index.php?id=109 for more information.

Keep track of the Heirlooms and hear some music at www.heirloomsmusic.com.
- By John Fitts

Heirlooms (self-released, heirloomsmusic.com). This four song EP is dreamlike. Each of the songs is a mid-tempo suite built around finger-picked acoustic guitar figures and breathy male vocals. Wrapped around those elements is a quilt of electric bass and guitar, distant percussion, strings, samples, keyboards, digital effects and sometimes free-form female vocals. It’s a dense and reverb-laden affair. “Shaker Hymn” reveals the bones of the band by featuring only the vocal, guitar and hand percussion for the first three verses before bringing in the quilt on the coda for a dramatic finish. It’s worth mentioning that the lyrics are strings of rich, poetic images in service to somewhat amorphous emotions and stories; they float in and out of the mix. Heirlooms calls itself “Hartford’s newest oldest band.” They’re folkies and proud of it. They recently shared the stage with Pegi (Mrs. Neal) Young and Bert Jansch, folk guitarist extraordinaire and one of the grand masters of the British folk revival of the ’60s. But Heirlooms is to Bert Jansch as Arcade Fire is to The Beatles: Updated, cool, digital and twenty-first century. —James Velvet

Heirlooms play Jan. 20 at Daniel Street Club with John McCauley and Ian O’Neil (of Deer Tick) and The Shivers. - The New Haven Advocate - James Velvet

It's their best bet.
Jesse Stanford didn’t know he was convening a band when he holed up to finish off four partially completed songs. “I’ve been in a lot of bands that really have never been able to take off. I came into this new project with a better sense of what I needed to do on the other end, aside from writing songs,” said the Hartford musician in a phone interview. “By the time we were done with recording, we realized we had something really amazing, that we were proud of, and we realized we were kind of a band.”

Which is why you, like most people, had probably never heard of Heirlooms — and then started hearing tons about them all at once. The Hartford-based sextet has received a flurry of press lately, not least of all because of Stanford’s tireless and creative promotion. (Their press kit is a work of art — thick, textured paper, closed with a red wax seal, containing sepia-toned photos of the band.) According to Stanford, promotion is “not what comes natural to me. My talents are sitting in a room and writing songs. But we kind of did it backwards. I never really had an album — something tangible — to get some press and give people something to take home. I wanted to have everything together from the start, have band photos. I had a friend who’s an amazing artist, Brian Cook, do posters.”

And suddenly, says Stanford, “it kind of snowballed. The work did itself in a way — people started contacting us.” If their old-timey aesthetic is the attention-getter, then the songs are what make you sit down and stay a while. Their four-song E.P., available for free on their website, is a masterful balance between rich sounds and straightforward, lyric-driven rock. “Our goal hasn’t been so much to sell the CD as to get it into the hands of people who don’t have it. We end up selling a lot at shows. But we’d much rather have 100 people get it for free than 10 people buy it. At least at this point, we just want as many people [as possible] to hear it.”

Stanford also makes a point of talking up Hartford. He says the local resistance to original music is “an uphill battle, to be sure, but there are other avenues. We do bars, but our best shows have been in venues where people are listening. We got an opportunity to play at the Wadsworth Atheneum. Collinsville just opened up Bridge Street Live, which is kind of like a listening room. At the same time, we do Black-eyed Sally’s and Sully’s, but we’re trying to be creative doing other venues. We’ve done house parties. Looking outside of Hartford is on our trajectory at this point — New Haven and Northampton are in our sights. But Hartford … is a really nice place to launch out of, and figure out who we are, and hopefully make Hartford proud. Japan! 2012!” he laughs.

There was one moment during the interview where Stanford faltered a little. As New Haven Advocate writer Laurel Tuohy put it in a recent article, “Folk and Americana are the latest vogue influences of the indie-music scene.” I would go a step further and say that old-fashioned is hot right now across lots of cultural sectors: steampunk fashion; knitting and crocheting; vinyl and cassette tapes; lo-fi production values; the Decemberists’ songs about Industrial Revolution-era chimbley sweeps. Taking such things into consideration, I asked Stanford if he saw Heirlooms as part of a larger cultural moment. I don’t think he meant to dodge, per se, but it’s telling that he took the opportunity to explain the meaning of his band’s name rather than answer directly.

“My grandma was a traveling folksinger who played around Connecticut. And I’ve always been personally interested in things of the past. We took the name Heirlooms for our love and appreciation of folk and traditional music. But also, the idea of heirlooms is something from the past that goes through generational paths. I grew up on traditional folk music. ”

“Can you give me some examples?” I asked.

“Neil Young, Bob Dylan,” said Stanford, and continued to explain that Heirlooms also weaves contemporary influences (Broken Social Scene, Bill Callahan, Wilco) into their tunes.

Regardless of how it’s distilled from its influences, passed along from person to person, the music is what’s most important, and the music is excellent. The tunes are expertly arranged, and despite the size of the band, the songs never feel overburdened. - The Hartford Advocate - By Dan Barry

Heirlooms Featured on Chips Unnamed Local Band Show - Chip Mccabe CTNOW

Because it's the season of year-end best-of lists, here are my five favorite Connecticut album releases of 2010:

1. Titles, "Dirt Bell" (Safety Meeting) -- A collection of dreamy songs featuring gorgeous vocal harmonies, woozy guitars and lush, moody atmospherics, "Dirt Bell" finds Titles reaching new heights -- just in time for mastermind Brad Amorosino to relocate to California. (Buy it here.)

2. Philistines Jr., "If a Band Plays in the Woods ..." (Tarquin) -- When he's not helping other bands (the National, Interpol, Mates of State, Frightened Rabbit) make amazing albums as a producer, Peter Katis makes his own -- just slowly. Philistines Jr.'s first album in 10 years is playful, quirky and beautifully constructed, with impeccable arrangements of guitar, bass and drums augmented with piano, strings and various elements of percussion. (Buy it here.)

3. Low-Beam, "Charge of the Light Brigade" (Cosmodemonic Telegraph) -- Also the result of a laborious process, Low-Beam spent the better part of four years making this album under the watchful eye of Enfield producer/perfectionist Michael Deming. Their attention to detail pays off on this collection of taut pop-rock songs packed with riveting male-female vocal harmonies, sweeping keyboards and bristly, jangling guitars. (Buy it here.)

4. Chris Webby, "The UnderClassman" (self-released) -- Calling Webby prolific understates the case: the Norwalk rapper has released five free mixtapes online just this year. Clearly he has a lot to say, and he says it best on this collection of good-natured motormouth rhymes celebrating the slacker lifestyle: cartoons, weed and his attention deficit disorder are frequent themes. Don't be fooled, though: nobody who works this hard is a slacker. (Download it here.)

5. Alternate Routes, "Lately" (self-released) -- This Bridgeport alt-country band parted ways with Vanguard Records to self-release the best album of its career so far. These songs, pleasantly rough around the edges, are a little warmer, and a lot deeper than on either previous Alternate Routes album, which is a promising sign that a good band is only getting better. (Buy it here.)

Honorable mention: Heirlooms' self-released EP, a highly promising 4-song introduction to an outstanding new band from Hartford. (Buy it here.) - The Hartford Courant

Hartford was a once a small river port town. Tucked between the arbors of the Appalachians and the ancient Atlantic ocean, it served as a conduit for all things coming and going. Bottles and flasks of bourbon and rum, suits of tweed, gowns of gabardine. In the hulls of great ships were wooden toys for children, maps and gunpowder for men at war. Tea kettles and soap, silver chains and bronze medallions. Today, beneath it's arching highways and business veneer, the pieces of Hartford's past still linger. It's the place where the lights of the buildings mingle with the ghosts of the city. It's the place where Heirlooms was born.

I initially began Heirlooms as a solo project. Setting up in a family summer house outside the city, I spent much of 2009 on an ambitious regiment of writing and rewriting handfuls of unfinished songs. My long time friend and former band mate Neal Spencer would often drop by to listen, provide insight, and add his unique and thoughtful percussion to whatever I happened to be working on. Thomas Servidone and Justin Kearney, whose friendship and collaborative roots date back to grade school, soon joined in on the sessions. When violinist Ciara Cohen joined that winter, a project much greater than I had anticipated began to take shape. Together, we spent the next 7 months working on the songs that would become the Heirlooms EP.

ABOUT OUR NEW ALBUM: Part confessional, part musical folk tale, the Heirlooms EP is an album we are extremely proud to present. Written, recorded, and produced entirely by the band ourselves, we see the EP as a practice in dichotomy. Subtle acoustic textures and soaring electric feedback, driving rhythm and exploratory percussion, ethereal strings and raw emotion, isolation and friendships found. - Hartford.Com

Tomorrow, something fantastic is going to happen in Hartford. Billings Forge, a non-profit organization and performance space in Frog Hollow is now going to be opening up its stage to some of Hartford's most talented musicians and performers.

Thursday, September 2nd will mark the first "Billings Forge Indie Music Night" which will feature local indie-folk band Heirlooms. Indie Music Night will be showcasing live musical performances in an intimate setting on the first Thursday of each month. Indie music night is a free event and will run from 8:30pm to 11:00pm.

For those of you who aren't aware, Heirlooms are Hartford's newest band. I was handed their new EP the other day (download and purchase it here) and was blown away. They're headed by Jesse Stanford, who many of our dedicated readers should recognize as a local folk music crooner with similar vocal timbre to Ray Lamontagne. If you're interested, he did a live set at my house show last year, you can read more and download the whole thing for free here. Anyway, Heirlooms is sort of a departure from the singer-songwriter vibe, and adding a full band has allowed him to split the songs wide open and give them the breathing room they deserve. There's so many beautifully orchestrated interludes, background electronics, and all the reverb-laden sparseness that I absolutely love. Take notice, this band is going to go places. - John Hall

The "Monday Blues" items from the print edition of the Living section may well appear somewhere online, but I can never seem to find them. So in the interest of easy accessibility, here's an expanded version of one that ran today:

Heirlooms calls itself "Hartford's newest old band." It's also Hartford's newest best band.

The local fivesome formed over the past year, coalescing around songs that singer Jesse Stanford had intended for a solo project. The band has released only four tunes so far on a self-titled EP, and they're wrenching folk-tinged songs built around acoustic guitar and featuring glimmering electric fills, understated violin and piano.

Stanford (above, at far left) is a subtle writer, his lyrical imagery blurred a little around the edges like a wistful memory, and he sings in a soft voice at once unaffected and compelling, particularly on the downhearted confessional "Shaker Hymn." (Listen here to the band's songs.)

Here it, and more, when Heirlooms performs Thursday at the inaugural Billings Forge Indie Music Night in The Studio at Billings Forge, 563 Broad St., Hartford. Heirlooms tops a bill with Jesse Newman, Kuyla P., "J" on Squared and Josh A. The show is free, music starts at 8:30 p.m. - Eric R. Danton