Band of Siblings: Maddy Wyatt en famille

WYATT is five mostly-related people - three siblings and a couple of intrepid friends - centered on New York-based singer-songwriter Maddy Wyatt. On its recent self-titled EP, the group makes much use of layered vocals over rhythmic guitar strumming and the usual rock instrumentation, along with quirky harmonic structures and equally quirky phrasing. Quirky is good when it’s also catchy, as WYATT’s songs are.

Maddy has a nimble, clear voice. She employs no vibrato except when she injects a jazzy tremolo at the end of lines on held notes. This habit makes a little gap, a detachment, between the singer and the import of the words. This hipsterish “cool,” as it used to be called, is a way of signaling that the horrors and rage and sorrows of the world haven’t conquered the singer or player in question. 

I’m sure there are lots of jazz singers who would disagree, but I think that in jazz this can sometimes be excessive, so that the knowingness, the ironic tone, does a disservice to the song’s emotional intent. Maddy doesn’t go that far, but she does keep a bit of insulation between her and strong feeling. Of course, it’s possible to go too far in the other direction and end up in maudlin insincerity of the kind available on American Idol and other stairways-to-the-stars. Thankfully WYATT is in no danger of going there.

Given that WYATT produces pop music, and is thus relatively cheery, I’m also grateful that their lyrics are not oversweet; but I can’t exactly tell what they’re about. This non-specificity is a tricky position to maintain. On the one hand, I like my lyrics to be solid. Let’s know what the emotional situation is, and what attitude the singer brings to it. And let's hear some beautiful images that concretize the feeling. 

On the other hand, speaking in generalities allows for wide flexibility of interpretation. And I do love lyrics that make unusual word juxtapositions or obscure references, as in most of Steely Dan's oeuvre.This is one of the reasons I'm also fond of the kind of snark Elvis Costello and his descendants dish out.

So a little ironic detachment and a modicum of verbal opacity is just fine with me.

Maddy's snark is nowhere near the pH of Costello or Steely Dan – her version, as here in “Octopus King,” is awfully mild:

You don't always disappoint me 

Sometimes you just let me down

 And I do like these flipped clichés, particularly since the octopus forms the song’s central image:

 There is ink in the water
There is blood on my hands

The catchy “Leonah” brings to mind 1980s pop like the Go-Gos. Other tunes, such as “Up and Up Sketch” and “Palacyum” (not on the EP but posted at Soundcloud) are more experimental in aspect, with stranger chord progressions and odder melodies. I don’t know whether the odder material was excised from consideration for the EP because it wasn’t strong enough, or whether the band experienced pressure from somewhere to sound more conventional. If the latter, the pressure wasn't irresistible -  it's unlikely that the band will ever sound really homogenized.

Maddy will be appearing solo on July 10 at Room 5 in LA.

Note: As I learned while googling the word “Wyatt,” this WYATT is different from another band called WYATT, a four-piece group that hails from Joni Mitchell’s home town of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Come to find out, the Canadian WYATT is also quite a good band with a very different sound in the country rock vein – or, as the band apparently prefers to call it, “rock country” – packing a hefty dose of animal magnetism and strong songwriting. These two groups may have to battle it out for the name...an unfortunate problem that arises when bands puncture the local ceiling and begin to have national and international appeal.

In the meantime, enjoy! Numerous WYATTs, all good!

Jack McMahon

I’m pleased to launch this blog with a piece about one of my old colleagues, Jack McMahon. Jack’s been a fixture of the singer-songwriting scene in Portland for many years and is well-respected in that pocket of musicians. Originally an East Coaster, Jack migrated to Portland with a couple of Jersey pals and has performed in a variety of contexts ranging from solo with acoustic guitar to full rock instrumentation.

Jack mostly fits into the country/country rock genre, which is how I’ve thought of him if I had to pick a niche, but I was surprised to hear a wide streak of R&B/soul on the most recent of his three albums, “The Man that Love Forgot.” This streak is highlighted by producer Ron Stephens, who adds quite a bit of guitar and vocal bling. For example, Jack covers the 1966 Johnny Rivers hit “The Poor Side of Town” with an R&B flavor, and his original “Angel of Mine” goes even deeper, helped along by Mark Spangler’s fabulous lead guitar.  The soulful streak in Jack's music comes naturally, though, because early in his career he sang many demos for the Brill Building songwriter Gerry Goffin and other NYC songwriters providing material to both black and white pop singers.

Instrumentally, Jack reflects a value Portland songwriters seem to hold in common: clean, crisp guitar work (of which I’ve always been envious, because I cannot seem to flatpick or fingerpick with much accuracy). Also unlike me, as a songwriter Jack doesn’t try to do too much and then get swamped by the details, preferring simple but solid song structure and a direct vocal style. His voice has an angular resonant depth that melds perfectly with the same quality in the acoustic guitar, showcased nicely on the dark story song about a freeway murderer, “All the Way to Hell.”

Jack can definitely put words together. In the musically straightforward country two-step “License to Drive Me Crazy,” Jack offers up one of those perfect phrases:

I know there’s no use trying to convince her

It would not do to make my concerns known

‘Cause in the end I fear she’ll only leave me

Crying on the shoulder of the road

“Crying on the shoulder of the road”! So obvious, and so perfect, yet it had never occurred to me. I wonder how many songs there are out there with that phrase in them (hopefully only one).

It is always a joy to hear an artist achieve proper representation of his/her creative self. This happens much less often than we’d like, even to really good artists. Getting good players helps a lot, and on Jack’s recordings you can hear a goodly number of Portland’s talents, who are as good as anybody anywhere. But you also can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear; the artist has to have a glowing core to propel the songs. Jack’s core burns with a steady glow like coals banked up in the fireplace against a chilly morning.