Eric Bachmann Discusses the Background of "Web in Front"

The A.V. Club is running this great series called One Track Mind, where a classic indie song is discussed with its writer, and then the musician performs it live. There has been about nine episodes so far, and chats with people like Bob Mould on 'Hoover Dam' and St. Vincent on 'Surgeon'.

One of the latest installments is with Archers of Loaf frontman Eric Bachmann, and the song discussed is "Web in Front" from 1993's Icky Mettle. Bachmann clarifies a few things about the song, such as it's not really about anyone in particular ("There's not a specific person that it's about...that I remember. Bitch," he says chuckling), the first two lines were meant as a reference to the movie, The is Spinal Tap, and that contrary to some thought, the first line is not, "Stuck a peanut in your backbone." While the interviewer looks a bit like a deer in headlights-it must have been rough to talk to someone about such an iconic song only to find out it's really about nothing-Bachmann is his generally funny self. And no, that is not a ukulele that Bachmann plays during the performance, he really is just that big of a man.


Eric Bachmann of Archers Of Loaf discusses and performs "Web In Front"

Lights That Flash in the Evening: Archers of Loaf @ Black Cat, Washington, DC (8-5-2011)

The late 90s were quite a time to be in the North Carolina Triangle if you were a music nerd. One of the Triangle's bigger-name bands, Archers of Loaf,went on its hiatus around the time of my arrival for graduate school in '98, so they were one I never got to see live. Which I think is why I wasn't so much into them then. On record, I didn't catch the melody and the hooks enough to dig further than Icky Mettle, and on that, I definitely preferred the more accessible tracks like "Web in Front" and "Plumbline.

Friday night at the Black Cat changed my mind on that. Oh, what a dumb little girl I have been.

Archers live is full of powerful bravado and a drum-and-bass combo that is a visceral call to arms. After they started, bass player Matt Gentling asked us in the first row, "Hey, if you see my amps start to topple over, can you let me know?" Amps tend to do that when you have someone pogoing in front of them for 90 straight minutes (thankfully, they stayed in place). The melodies and hooks that alluded me on record jackhammered my eardrums over the set's 21 songs and it was glorious. Archers of Loaf on record is one thing, but Archers of Loaf live was how rock music should be played.







Other photos from the set can be seen here.

Check out my piece in the Washington City Paper about the show here.

On the News Front: Eric Bachmann/Crooked Fingers and Ryan Adams

(Photo via Chromewaves)

I am a few days behind with this, but some interesting news bits on Eric Bachmann:

1. For you kids in the LA area, tickets are still available for Bachmann's solo show tonight at the Tangier for all of $12. (I'm green with envy btw...)

2. Bachmann's band, the very awesome Crooked Fingers has a new disc out October 7 called "Forfeit/Fortune," aaaannndd...he's putting it out himself, he didn't resign with Merge Records. He says:

...eventually decided to sell "Forfeit/Fortune" to retail, without a distribution partner. The pair connected with AJ Tobey, marketing manager for Flea Marketing, a promotion firm that specializes in indie retail.

"We decided to focus on a small handful of good indie record stores to get the project off the ground," Tobey says of the set, due Oct. 7. They initially selected 20 stores, based on past support of the band and the routing of an upcoming tour, but the number keeps growing. The record will also be sold at shows, through the Crooked Fingers Web site and via iTunes and other digital stores.

3. Nekko Case, Bachmann, and New Order? Hmm, this I gotta hear...

This is a very arranged, louder rock record, with lots of strings, horns and saxes," he says. Bachmann drafted tourmate Neko Case to duet with him on closer 'Your Control,' which he describes as "really different than her style. It almost sounds like New Order.

(Read our previous post on Bachmann and Crooked Fingers with good things to listen to here.)


(Photo via Harp Magazine)

Ryan Adams to publish a collection of prose sometime in 2009 (from today's Page Six, the NY Post:

EMO rocker Ryan Adams has more to say than can be conveyed in one of his crooning songs or in one of his lengthy missives to Gawker.com. Page Six hears Adams has signed with indie Brooklyn house Akashic Books to publish his still-untitled collection of prose. "They just signed the contract," said our source, "and they plan to release it in 2009." A rep for Adams confirmed the deal, but wouldn't comment on a working title or when it would hit the shelves.

All I ever wanted was to be your spine...

After getting turned on to Travis Woods cool music blog, Web in Front, I got itchin to hear some Archers of Loaf. So I tinkered around on the Hype and found this great solo acoustic Eric Bachmann plus interview link. Amazing...I had to chuckle though, I'm 99% sure he no longer lives in the Triangle area, prolly hasn't in years, but he's still on Merge and has those specific and wonderful Triangle inflections in his voice when he says certain words.

Then there's Crooked Fingers...I was introduced to Crooked Fingers kind of late via the ReservoirSongs EP a couple years after it came out, then Dignity and Shame around the same time. Dear God, what a beautiful duo. "Reservoir Songs," consisting of 5 covers,(you've probably heard Prince's "When You Were Mine"), didn't leave my cd player for months. Kris Kristofferson's "Sunday Morning Coming Down" just tears me up. It's a melancholy song to begin with, but Bachmann's voice with it, you feel in your bones how lonely a Sunday morning can be. That's an element I've always loved about him in Crooked Fingers, his voice always gets me in this odd in-between place of extremes where you feel both at the same time....heartbreak and your grandmother singing you to sleep, the sadness of losing of a friend and the tingle of meeting someone new, death and life, all at the same time.

Download:Sunday Morning Coming Down-Crooked Fingers.mp3

On the other hand, with Archers it was more like they, not Yo La Tengo, should have named an album I Am Not Afraid of You and I Will Beat Your Ass because the sort of energy in that statement is exactly what they sound like, but with really cool lyrics (Youre not the one who let me down/But thanks for offering,Its not a voice and Im not around/But thanks for picking it...)

So without for further ado...Icky Mettle
1. Web in Front
2. Last Word
3. Wrong
4. You and Me
5. Might
6. Hate Paste
7. Fat
8. Plumb Line
9. Learo, Youre A Hole
10. Sick File
11. Toast
12. Backwash
13. Slow Worm

Download:Icky Mettle-Archers of Loaf.zip