Feature

Two years ago, many music junkies would have scratched their heads if someone mentioned the Avett Brothers. This band cruised along the music scene at the underground level while developing a large, diverse cult following. Their hybridized sound appealed to everyone across the board from punks to hippies.

When 2007 hit, the Avett Brothers seemed to explode into the public eye and have remained there ever since. After speaking with upright bassist Bob Crawford, it was clear that this was only natural for this group of talented musicians.

SC: You guys have an eclectic hybrid of bluegrass, rock, punk, country, etc. How did you guys come up with your sound?

BC: You know, it was the most natural thing ever. When we started playing together, that’s what it sounded like. We didn’t really try to do anything. We just tried to play songs. That’s what the three of us sound like when we play our instruments. I think a lot of it was the limitation of our knowledge of these instruments. When we started, we didn’t really know a lot about our instruments. We weren’t really good at what we did. So, we were kinda limited in what we did in scope of utilizing the full breadth of what an upright bass, a banjo and a guitar could do.

We were like a garage band like they talk about with teenagers or even like the early days of punk music. They wrote what they could; they played what they could. The sound maybe came about because they were limited by their ability, yet they had aggression in their sound and enjoyed what they did. That’s kinda how it worked out for us, and you can really see it. If you take three or four of the records and space out like “Carolina Jubilee” then “Four Thieves Gone” and then “Emotionalism,” when you break them up and observe the evolution that’s going on, a lot of the change in sound is largely increased ability on the instruments. Learning songs for a lot of years, you get better at it. Like everything, you become more acclimated to it. It kinda solidifies and changes.

SC: You guys get lumped into that category of non-traditional bluegrass or urban bluegrass. Some of the bands in that category that I’ve spoken with claim they don’t like being grouped with bluegrass and that the only bluegrass about their band is the instruments. What do you think about that label? Is that something you liked to be associated with?

BC: Well, we don’t mind being lumped in with anything. I think the genre is in the ear of the beholder. We’re not offended to be lumped in or associated with bluegrass. I think that bluegrass is more offended to be associated with us, if I can be honest with you about it, from what we’ve seen at the more traditional bluegrass festivals. It comes down to: Does it mean if you have a banjo or upright bass in your band, then you’re a bluegrass band? I don’t hear any bluegrass, not any! I mean, in “Carolina Jubilee,” maybe it was there a little bit, and we didn’t intentionally have it, and we didn’t intentionally shed it. I think we’re in this era right now with music where genres are gonna tell where to find it in your record store or online.

Seth Avett had a great idea one time: Why don’t you have a CD store and start at one end of the store and go to the other and put everything in alphabetical order. Genres are falling away. I want real, strict traditional bluegrass. That’s a genre. Even jazz, you can break it off into five or six different sects of genres. They’re exploiting more than it needs to be. People definitely have a need to classify things.

SC: You spoke of the negative reaction some of the traditional bluegrass crowd has for you. What was it like being the band that you are coming up in an area that’s saturated in traditional bluegrass?

BC: I think we had people coming from all walks of life. Like I said, it’s all in the ear of the beholder. If you like bluegrass and you see it, you may take that part of it and latch onto that. That maybe allows you to listen to it for your own consciousness. If you like rock-and-roll, you’re gonna take that aspect and latch to it. If you like punk rock or hard rock, there’s elements of that in it. I think there’s strong elements of pop music in what we do.

We had people yell at us and criticize us as far as strict bluegrass people. We played IBMA (International Bluegrass Music Association), which was probably a mistake because we didn’t belong there. We were pretty well heckled, and people were almost violent in response to what we did and the instruments we had with the kick-drum and everything. They get pretty militant out there about that kind of stuff.

SC: 2007 was the year for the Avett Brothers. How does it feel to jump from relative obscurity into the limelight?

BC: We don’t necessarily feel that we’ve arrived at this point, but we definitely see changes. We go to towns where there was maybe a hundred people there last time, and it’s sold-out. We definitely see an influx of people. To be quite honest with you, since we began in 2001, it’s been a slow, steady climb. Now, I would say in 2007 it was accelerated. We’ve just been doing it pretty much how we’ve always done it: same attitude, same people. We’re just pressing along here. We can’t stop. It’s hard for us to stop and see how far we’ve come, because we don’t really feel like we’ve arrived.

With that being said, everything is going great. We’re happy with what we’re doing. We work better with our nose to the grindstone and just playin’ and playin’ and playin’ and writing songs and finding time to record those songs and not really thinking about what the outside world is thinking about us. It’s kind of a safe place to be. Let it happen; let it go by. There’s good and bad about all of it. Just try and keep working. When the time comes to look back and take a breath, we’ll definitely take advantage of it. It feels like there’s so much more to do!

SC: The latest album that you guys have that the critics are going crazy about is “Emotionalism.” I know that the word “emotionalism” pretty much means giving emotion too much value. How would you say that this reflects the songs on the record?

BC: Seth wrote this real nice, I don’t know if it was in the liner notes of the CD or if it was written as a promotional blurb before the CD came out. I don’t really recall what it was written for, but it was an introduction to “Emotionalism” as we see it, I guess. He really phrased it very well; I will paraphrase. What I got from reading it, everything that is played or said or whatever is interpreted by the people who hear it. We filter everything for ourselves. That’s part of being a human being. I think what Seth was meaning was that we’re kinda living in a day and age where keeping a commitment isn’t really held up in high regard.

If you look at the media and the kind of things that play on television or you read about in the paper or magazine kinda like here today, gone tomorrow. It’s better to be hip and cool than it is to be true and true to the people that you care about in this world. Maybe it’s not cool to reach out and say “I love you” to somebody or it’s not popular to do something on a real personal level like wearing your heart on your sleeve a little bit. The songs that this pertains to on the record, I think they speak to a matter of breaking with subconscious and reaching out to someone.

SC: Y’all are really good at putting records out, so when can we expect another release?

BC: We’ve got a couple of things brewing, so I’ll leave it at that.

Stephen Centanni is Lagniappe music editor. Contact him at scentanni@lagniappemobile.com.

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