Knockin' Boots with Marika Hardcore Anti-Folk "Did I tell you about my circle jerk this weekend?" -James of Ffui Aaron Wilkinson with Ffui @ The Sidewalk Café , NYC Thursday June 19, 2002 Storytelling ; how music originally began. Stories the lyrics of our lives. Gliding with the storyteller along on the sustenance of notes spinning yarns of dreams, tales, and foibled fables. Aaron usually plays slow, and aloneat least that's how I had first/last seen him at Artland (with Turner Cody) in Williamsburg Brooklyn, circa November 2001. He sang in a twangy way that was definitely not of New York, Arkansas (which I found out later) seemed to fit. He played a twangy guitar too, strumming like a road moving beneath his fingers. I felt his words, and maybe it was the mood I was in or perhaps the mood of the city, but when he sang "Haystack"( off of "Dry Season", Weathered Records) about the loss of a good friend to the grasp of a heroin addiction, I actually cried. Like my face was wet, cried. His phrases brought me into a world that I knew of, I was wondering if I had knew that friend he had spoke of. Maybe even had been that friend, but that couldn't be, I had never met him before, and I probably wouldn't again. Never say never. Upon my arrival back into the beautiful city, carousing with my friends around the bars, I run into Aaron again. The sole patron in the X-bar (next to The Sweetwater), hair haystacked on top his head, cradling a Corona. "Remember me?" I ask. "I had a big 'ol cowboy hat on the last time we met." "Yeah! How are you?" We banter. It turned out he knew all the people I was with. "So I'm playing at the Sidewalk ( lower east side) with a kinda punk set up." He sounded a little nervous. "I'll be there." "Just another needle in a haystack." -Haystack Sidewalking with a sidewinder. Hearing Aaron play before had the intimacy of a campfire and a secret thought shared. He is comfortable in that context . It seems that that is the place they are written from. A thought also occurs, "Why does Bruce Springsteen sound like he is from Arkansas?" Now watching him play his songs in a different format, you wonder what Eddie Cochrane would be like with a punk band behind him? He's not really used to it. At first, not this context, and you can tell his band members were coaxing him into it. "This is the first time anyone has ever heard these songs this way." He seems to apologize. That always makes me wince. Someone from the previous band leans over to me, "It's Spicolli!" "What?" "It's Spicolli, five years later." "You mean Fast Times At Ridgemont High?" "Yeah." Aaron does look like a cross between Spicolli and the lead singer of Soul Asylum. You can see that screaming isn't his forte, in fact being angry isn't his forte. Storytelling is. Someone besides the band is coaxing him now, helping his mood with a light show. I think the buzz of lights with the loudness of the rhythm section, helps a great deal. They are his songs after all. The second half of the set, this appears to dawn on him and he sits into the songs like a rumbling Camarro. I hear songs from the previous self titled album, in a fuller context. Fuller musically but it's not a needed change. Something changes in him now though, realizing he has hijacked his own car, he becomes more comfortable driving again. Like this was the intention he had had from the beginningand maybe it really was. The songs stand wonderfully all by themselves, and they sit in this Camarro that Aaron's driving like well behaved hostages, that are secretly into the adventure. Copyright Labor Of Love 2002 |
AARON WILKINSONreviews |
Knockin' Boots with Marika Hardcore Anti-Folk "Did I tell you about my circle jerk this weekend?" -James of Ffui Aaron Wilkinson with Ffui @ The Sidewalk Café , NYC Thursday June 19, 2002 Storytelling ; how music originally began. Stories the lyrics of our lives. Gliding with the storyteller along on the sustenance of notes spinning yarns of dreams, tales, and foibled fables. Aaron usually plays slow, and aloneat least that's how I had first/last seen him at Artland (with Turner Cody) in Williamsburg Brooklyn, circa November 2001. He sang in a twangy way that was definitely not of New York, Arkansas (which I found out later) seemed to fit. He played a twangy guitar too, strumming like a road moving beneath his fingers. I felt his words, and maybe it was the mood I was in or perhaps the mood of the city, but when he sang "Haystack"( off of "Dry Season", Weathered Records) about the loss of a good friend to the grasp of a heroin addiction, I actually cried. Like my face was wet, cried. His phrases brought me into a world that I knew of, I was wondering if I had knew that friend he had spoke of. Maybe even had been that friend, but that couldn't be, I had never met him before, and I probably wouldn't again. Never say never. Upon my arrival back into the beautiful city, carousing with my friends around the bars, I run into Aaron again. The sole patron in the X-bar (next to The Sweetwater), hair haystacked on top his head, cradling a Corona. "Remember me?" I ask. "I had a big 'ol cowboy hat on the last time we met." "Yeah! How are you?" We banter. It turned out he knew all the people I was with. "So I'm playing at the Sidewalk ( lower east side) with a kinda punk set up." He sounded a little nervous. "I'll be there." "Just another needle in a haystack." -Haystack Sidewalking with a sidewinder. Hearing Aaron play before had the intimacy of a campfire and a secret thought shared. He is comfortable in that context . It seems that that is the place they are written from. A thought also occurs, "Why does Bruce Springsteen sound like he is from Arkansas?" Now watching him play his songs in a different format, you wonder what Eddie Cochrane would be like with a punk band behind him? He's not really used to it. At first, not this context, and you can tell his band members were coaxing him into it. "This is the first time anyone has ever heard these songs this way." He seems to apologize. That always makes me wince. Someone from the previous band leans over to me, "It's Spicolli!" "What?" "It's Spicolli, five years later." "You mean Fast Times At Ridgemont High?" "Yeah." Aaron does look like a cross between Spicolli and the lead singer of Soul Asylum. You can see that screaming isn't his forte, in fact being angry isn't his forte. Storytelling is. Someone besides the band is coaxing him now, helping his mood with a light show. I think the buzz of lights with the loudness of the rhythm section, helps a great deal. They are his songs after all. The second half of the set, this appears to dawn on him and he sits into the songs like a rumbling Camarro. I hear songs from the previous self titled album, in a fuller context. Fuller musically but it's not a needed change. Something changes in him now though, realizing he has hijacked his own car, he becomes more comfortable driving again. Like this was the intention he had had from the beginningand maybe it really was. The songs stand wonderfully all by themselves, and they sit in this Camarro that Aaron's driving like well behaved hostages, that are secretly into the adventure. Copyright Labor Of Love 2002 |
