EASE DOWN THE ROAD

No smarmy music news this week. Sorries all around to those of you wanting further dirt on Katy Perry or musings about Jimmy Buffett’s pre-cheese decade. I’m sure a number of things are happening in the Sound World that are very stimulating, but I have a story to tell – a story about a city and a songwriter with a foot-long beard. The story of an upcoming show – Castanets at the Brass Rail on July 12 – that came together due to the unflinching help of many great people from a place called Fort Rock City.

It all still feels like a fluke. Months ago, a half a year or so after I finally fell in love with Ray “Castanets” Raposa’s 2004 debut, Cathedral, I signed into the ol’ e-mail machine and started hitting sweaty fingers to worn-thin keys. My goal was simple: I wanted to interview Raposa about his debut release, an album I believe to be one of the most impressive – and tragically least heard – albums of this very strange decade. Multiple folks at Raposa’s record label, Asthmatic Kitty, e-mailed back within an hour or two, all agreeing with my “most overlooked album of the decade” subject line with candid glee. They were readily supportive, quickly putting me in touch with Raposa, who soon replied, saying that he’d be happy to do an interview, but that it might be a few weeks before he could do it properly. Okay. That’s fine. All the more reason to look forward to checking my usually work-filled inbox.

Time passed. I listened to Cathedral almost daily, adding Raposa’s second and third albums, First Light’s Freeze and In the Vines, to my regular playlist – something I should’ve done long ago. “These records,” I said to a friend, “are too good to be so overlooked. All of them. And all so different from one another.” Soon enough I received a press release announcing that there would be a new Castanets record, titled City of Refuge, out on October 7 – good enough reason for me to write Raposa to ask if he’d maybe want to do a phone interview with me for WBOI’s Little Brother Radio. Within a day or two an interview – though not for LBR – was complete (read it now via the Ease Down the Road website, accessible through the whatzup homepage). During this interview Raposa, known to be somewhat of a nomad, mentioned that he is currently house-sitting for a friend in Indianapolis. My reply, of course, was “Do you wanna play a Fort Wayne show?” Now, truthfully, I really don’t know a single thing about booking shows and don’t usually feel too comfortable taking the reigns on such things. But put in this unique situation, well, I just had to ask. It was a duty I hope any real audiophile in my position would feel responsible carrying out.

“Sounds like a good reason to get out of town for a day,” Raposa said. “But I’m not going to be around too long, so it’d have to be the weekend of July 11-12.” Within an hour a venue, the Brass Rail, had confirmed their shared excitement; all it took was a listing of kindred spirit artists – “A little Sparklehorse, definitely some Waits, a dash of Vic Chesnutt, the adventurous spirit of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and, you know, a pinch of that Will Oldham creepiness” – shared with the venue’s always supportive-of-EDtR owners. Booked. Again, me being a writer and not a promoter, things went a bit haywire on my end from there – but maybe only because of the short notice factor. Quickly, as any Harvey Pekar devotee would, I had the urge to call the whole thing off in order to retreat back to my warm hole in the ground. (Ever read Pekar’s The Quitter? Highly recommended!) Basically, I worried that the show would bomb, making Fort Wayne’s quickly growing indie-friendly music scene look less diverse and supportive than it actually is to an artist very much worth establishing a relationship with (Raposa, for the record, works with artists like Sufjan Stevens, Jana Hunter, Phosphorescent, Rafter Roberts and others). And then I backed out. Yep. I passed the whole project on to someone else who then quickly threw it back my way. I needed help.

As I often do, I quickly e-mailed two supreme thinking friends whose opinions I always find much insight from: Vandolah’s Mark Hutchins and One Lucky Guitar’s Matt Kelley. Kelley was in, saying that his partner-in-crime, Nate Utesch (Metavari, OLG), is a fan of Jason Munn – the man behind the look of the first three Castanets albums – and would love to design a show poster. Hutchins, ever the picky listener, wasn’t too familiar. All it took was a few listens and he was all over it, claiming that maybe once per year is he so moved by snippets that he wants to hear everything. Everything. And now. Within 12 hours Hutchins had the Castanets catalog playing at his house – kids in bed, goatee fluffed, eyes red with focus. Still, though, I called it off. Raposa didn’t know it yet – and probably never will unless he reads this column – but I was done with the whole thing. Too busy with other stuff. Too afraid that I’d make not only myself look like an idiot (no problem there, really; I embarrass myself often – sometimes on purpose to inventory my comrades), but also make the rock n’ roll city I love look inadequate. Then two e-mails hit my inbox.

The first came from sometime whatzup writer Sara Peterson, a Fort-area audiophile who moved to Bloomington some months ago for a job and a very important feline (that’s another story). Sara, the person who put me onto Cathedral, was stoked to hear of my correspondence with Raposa. “I can think back to many nights, lights dimmed with headphones on, listening to Cathedral on repeat – so engrossed with Raposa’s voice and words,” Sara wrote. “I have to smile again and wonder about my luck on stumbling upon this album and this band, all thanks to its eye-catching cover art and epic beard.” Sara likes beards.

Before reading the last sentence of Sara’s e-mail (”I can’t believe this show is happening in Fort Wayne!”) I could’ve easily kept my head in the Pekar Hole. Rather, I wrote Hutchins to see how he was doing with his new Castanets albums. “You have to make this happen,” he wrote, going on to explain how he wanted on the bill, but would gladly pay for a ticket if he had to. “The same rustic space odyssey that drew me to Sparklehorse applies here, but Castanets’ music has more of a hint of danger about it,” Hutchins wrote. “You don’t want to look it in the eye too long, even if it’s the most achingly beautiful thing you’ve beheld in weeks. Southern Gothic? It’s spooky. It’s beautiful. It’s uncategorizable – and I’m hooked.”

Their shared excitement swelling from my computer screen, I decided to put the feelers back out. I posted an inquiry on Fort Wayne’s audiophile-soaked message board, StageBanter.com, asking if anyone thought this show has a chance of working with only a few days’ notice. “Would anyone want to get involved in any way?” I asked. My inbox quickly filled. Sean Smith was ready to distribute posters, spread the word and even host the night. R. Mike Horan was also up for distributing posters, natch. Julie Morrison was already doing research so she could write a story about Castanets for the next issue of Expired Magazine. Lee Miles was begging his band to cancel all funerals and wedding plans so they could play along. The Little Brothers were down by law – ready to do whatever they could to keep things going. Hutchins was not only up for playing a set, but he was willing to offer his interviewing skills to the LBR team for a prerecorded interview segment. Even Raposa offered up his friend, Indy-area Asthmatic Kitty recording artist Grampall Jookabox, as an opener. The list goes on. A heartwarming feeling, for sure – especially if you like the idea of biking down the street to see a show you’d otherwise have to drive hours to catch.

Best of all, the person largely responsible for the whole thing, Sara P., will make the drive from Bloomington to her native Fort Wayne for this $80 show at the Rail (that’s $5 at the door and about $75 in gas needed to fund Sara’s almost 400-mile round trip). People stepping up – doing what they can when rare opportunities arrive – is how a scene is built. I know that now, even if it took a whole lot of reminding. Now get online and check out some Castanets tunes if you’re not already familiar. Gooooood stuff. Great stuff.