Apr 26, 2019
About This Episode
Kendl Winter, born in Arkansas,
moved to Olympia, Washington after high school, drawn to the
evergreen forests and the lively and thriving music scene. She put
three solo records out on Olympia’s indie label, K Records, and
performed in nationally-touring northwest string bands before
beginning The Lowest Pair in 2013 with Palmer T. Lee. Palmer built
his first banjo when he was 19 from pieces he serendipitously
inherited. Shortly after deciding songwriting would be the most
effective and enjoyable medium for his musings, he began cutting
his teeth fronting Minneapolis string bands and touring the midwest
festival circuit, which is where he and Kendl first met, on the
banks of the Mississippi.
“Both of us studied roots music and
traditional banjo techniques, three finger and clawhammer. We
started there and then from our understanding of them have
diverged, perhaps because of our own limitations, and probably
because we both tend to err on creative. Even when we are
attempting to recreate old sounds, we can’t help but have our own
twist on it. We approach our instruments as vehicles to explore
poetry, song, and melody and have kind of been making up our own
sounds in the places where we couldn’t find ones that seemed to fit
or make sense to us. We recorded our first album (36cents) in Dave
Simonett’s basement a month after we began playing together, and
our second (The Sacred Heart Sessions) , a year later, in a
beautiful old church in Duluth, MN.” -Kendl
The Lowest Pair had been planning to
release a new record in the Spring of 2016. So in early 2015 Palmer
convinced Kendl to spend a winter in Minnesota, with the temptation
of working with local greats Dave Simonett and Erik Koskinen on the
new material. The duo then set off on what would be a successful
season of touring their second, critically acclaimed album, The
Sacred Heart Sessions (Spin: “solemn and humble;” The Bluegrass
Situation: “deeply felt”), and a new-old-time record, I Reckon I’m
Fixin’ On Kickin’ Round To Pick A Little, Vol. 1. In the fall,
returning to the midwest to finish up the recordings they had begun
a few months prior, Kendl and Palmer found themselves with a whole
new batch of songs ready to lay down. After much deliberation, they
ambitiously decided the two collections should be released together
in 2016.
The two records, Fern Girl and Ice
Man, as well as Uncertain As It Is Uneven, could be viewed as two
windows into the growing and changing world of The Lowest Pair.
Uncertain stays the course of their previous releases, being
focused on stripped down, intimate arrangements to support their
timeless songwriting and haunting vocals. Fern Girl is a more moody
and adventurous exploration of new sounds, new studio production
directions, and what it might sound like for The Lowest Pair to be
supported by a full band, while keeping one foot planted in the
rootsy aesthetics which drew them together from the beginning.
With little attention to tedious
practicalities and with an eye focused securely on delivering to
their growing fan base a truly special treat; a rootsy, bluegrassy,
old-timish version of meiosis has happened as one new album became
two new albums.
For Kendl, making two albums was a
natural reflection of the pace they had set and the experiences
they had accumulated. “It’s not that the two records have to be
next to and with each other, it’s just that it’s all there, our
current story, and the stories we’re figuring out.”
Fans already know that the chemistry
between Palmer’s Midwestern charm, those long winters spent
listening to a steady diet of Townes Van Zandt and John Hartford,
and Kendl’s poetic and playful way with words, her unique approach
to the banjo, and her barefoot-in- the-cool-river-water mystique
combine to make a powerful sound, but what’s new in 2016 is both
the inclusion of those non-banjo sounds (harmonica, drum, bass,
violin) and an incredible expansion of their songbook. In a way,
two records, the playful and the hush, the dark and the rooted, the
pillow and the nightmare, the pin drop and the starry night; the
juxtaposition of the ups and downs that are experiences in a day,
in a year, in a minute, all this has demanded from the band more
than just “a new record.” Fern Girl and Ice Man and Uncertain As It
Is Uneven mark the arrival of America’s next great musical duo, and
it’s over the course of these two albums that that boast becomes
clearly rooted in truth.
This episode also contains a
selection from the Blue Canvas Orchestra's show Wild Woods and
Water.
About Michael Perry
Michael Perry is a New York Times
bestselling author, humorist and radio show host from New Auburn,
Wisconsin.
Perry's bestselling memoirs include
Population 485, Truck: A Love Story, Coop, and Visiting Tom, and
his latest, Montaigne in Barn Boots: An Amateur Ambles Through
Philosophy. His first book for young readers, The Scavengers, was
published in 2014 and first novel for adult readers, The Jesus Cow,
was published in May of 2015.
Raised on a small Midwestern dairy
farm, Perry put himself through nursing school while working on a
ranch in Wyoming, then wandered into writing. He lives with his
wife and two daughters in rural Wisconsin, where he serves on the
local volunteer fire and rescue service and is an intermittent pig
farmer. He hosts the nationally-syndicated "Tent Show Radio,"
performs widely as a humorist, and tours with his band the Long
Beds (currently recording their third album for Amble Down
Records). He has recorded three live humor albums including Never
Stand Behind A Sneezing Cow and The Clodhopper Monologues.
Learn more about Michael and where
to get his publications at www.sneezingcow.com.
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