Listening Party: Bote And The Van Dangs

Here’s the gimmick: Each week, we’ll pick two local bands — an opening act and a headliner — link to a site where you can listen to their songs for free, then ask you to spend a few moments of your precious time to tell us what you think about them. Some may be great, others may be mediocre or awful — that’s for you to decide — all we ask is that you listen with an open mind.

Opening Act: Bote

While Bote is technically a Greenville-based band, they’ve been playing quite a lot around Spartanburg in the last few months, and I thought I’d give them a quick listen. While billing themselves as an “eclectic Celtic folk/rock fusion” band doesn’t exactly work as a selling point for me (the word “eclectic” in a band descriptions rarely bodes well in my experience), the band actually has a lot going for them.

In fact, while there’s a consistent return to some Celtic themes — the original “Barnacles on the Hull” is a good example — the band’s range is actually quite broad, with blues (“Stormy Monday”), country (“Folsom Prison Blues”), and even semi-modern pop (an almost disco take on The Pretenders’ “500 Miles”) entering into their set list. And while I’d argue that their performances are often uneven, on the whole all of their recordings demonstrate a fundamental musical flexibility.

I suggest giving their “Drunken Sailor Medley” a listen, since it showcases that flexibility and their considerable range and skill. My biggest issue with the group is that they don’t really seem to have found their own sound yet, and are still at that stage where they’re trying on different musical costumes in search of just the right fit. I’d be very curious to hear more of the group’s original recordings as they find their own distinct sound.

Headliner: The Van Dangs

For the last decade or so, it’s been the cool thing for hip white kids to be into old-school rockabilly and outlaw country music, if in a mostly ironic way. This is working-class music being co-opted by kids firmly rooted in the intelligentsia, and part of the thrill is that this is the very kind of music they’re not supposed to like. It’s a variation on liking things like ’80s pop or disco; it’s so wrong that it’s right. While I’d like to pretend that I’m above such petty trends, the truth is that I’m not at all. In this case, I’m just a few shades away from being an ironic hipster myself.

In fact, one of my earliest experiences in music journalism was in a basement bar, completely surrounded by ironically dressed hipsters in boots and Stetson hats, for a party celebrating Hank Williams’ 78th birthday. It was a great party and a memorable experience, even though most of the people in attendance mostly liked the idea of this raw, unpolished blue-collar music much more than they actually liked listening to it. It was as much a themed costume party as it was a tribute to the life and music of Williams, and it could just as easily have been a Sid Vicious birthday party, with the crowd swapping safety-pinned jeans for Western shirts.

But here’s the thing: Somehow, I started to actually like honkytonk and outlaw country, which I’d never really listened to prior to that night. Generally speaking, I still found most country music to be bland and cater to the lowest denominator, but there were little things — a Merle Haggard song here, a Waylon Jennings tune there — that managed to squeeze through my own musical prejudices.

In the beginning, just like at the Hank Williams party, I was enjoying them ironically. I liked these stories of hard-luck protagonists, with their binge drinking, failed loves, epic personal defeats, minor triumphs and tales of an only half-regretted life of crime and excess. Like gangsta rap (which, on a thematic level is remarkably similar to outlaw country in a good many ways), it was a window into an American subculture I would never have otherwise experienced.

By the time Johhny Cash released American IV: The Man Comes Around in 2002, however, my appreciation for the style was no longer a half-joke. Ironic honkytonk had been my window into actual enjoyment of an entire subgenre of country music, and it made it much easier to get into both bluegrass and alt-country music a few years later. Had I never been on that hipster fringe, I’d probably never have been able to enjoy bands like The Avett Brothers, for instance.

That said, I’m not a true country fan by any means. In fact, it’s a total struggle for me to listen to mainstream Nashville county at all. But when it comes to that rockabilly, outlaw, cow-punk, honkytonk style that was so popular with hipsters earlier this decade, I have a definite soft spot.

I’m telling you all of this background because, to understand what I’m about to say about Spartanburg’s The Van Dangs, you’ll need some context. I won’t go so far as to say that they’re approaching the music ironically or sarcastically — they obviously love the genre too much for that to be the extent of their interest — but I think it’s safe to say this is at least an element of their musical equation.

Why? Well, covering the Ween song “Piss Up A Rope” was a dead giveaway. In fact, it was arguably Ween’s 1996 album 12 Golden Country Greats that started this whole hipster-meets-country thing (and with the irony built right in since the album only had ten tracks, rather than 12). If the Van Dangs are listening to Ween for inspiration, chances are they aren’t taking themselves all that seriously.

Their cover of Roger Miller’s “Dang Me” is another indication of their sentiments, since Miller is widely remembered as a writer of novelty songs from the early days of the honkytonk movement. Even their take on Johnny Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues” pulls from the upbeat live version from At Folsom Prison, rather than more somber recordings.

Since my approach to this music is from the novelty angle — that ironic, semi-hipster interest in outlaw county being my first experience — I’m definitely able to get into the Van Dangs. The playing is solid, and I completely understand where they’re coming from. While I assume that they are completely into this music and performing it out of an actual passion for the subgenre, they’re also doing it with enough of a wink-and-a-nod to make it friendly for people who may be less serious fans. And that’s valuable, because it makes the music fun.

That said, while their recordings are fun, and while they obviously know their instruments, don’t go in expecting too much. There’s nothing here that’s going to blow your mind, no reinvention or reinterpretation. It’s entertaining stuff, but not innovative.

Now, it’s your turn. I’ve put my views out here on the digital page, but you can correct, amend, disagree, refute and rebut any and all of it by commenting in the field below. Notice something about the bands that I missed? Write a comment. I’ve had my say, now it’s all about you.