The Jar Family – Live & To The Letter EP
- Written by Ben Macnair
The Jar Family - a band of fast-rising “industrial folk” musicians - have released an action and energy packed EP of live recordings in their EP release Live & To The Letter.
These are five musicians, who thought they would have more success as a collective, than as individuals. After forming in Hartlepool, and building a rehearsal room in Cambridgeshire, they painstakingly bought their sound and style together.
Fusing elements of the punk aesthetic with folk influences, to form their own “industrial folk” sound, the quintet have slowly been building a name for themselves on the live circuit. Support slots for acts such as Jake Bugg, Alabama 3, Babyshambles and The Charlatans cemented the quality of both their sound and live performances. Their debut album The Jar Family Album was released in 2012 to immediate critical acclaim, whilst the follow up Jarmalade helped to further their reputation as performers, musicians and songwriters of the first order.
Combining rough vocals, with a lo-fi sound, that brings to mind the sounds of early Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, The Pogues, and more recent names such as Jake Bugg, and many other punk fuelled bands. The four tracks on this release pack passion and song craft between the grooves. We have wah-wah drenched guitar solos, and acoustic guitar that sounds both direct and enigmatic, whilst pin sharp bass and drums stop these songs becoming leaden and predictable.
Opener ‘Moya Moya’ is a punk backed shout-along, whilst ‘Getting Better’ finds time for a melodic, twisting guitar refrain that sounds similar to Television at their best, whilst ‘She Was Crying’ starts with the breathy harmonica style so redolent of Dylan and Springsteen, before becoming something of a lost song from The Smiths, and the EP closer ‘Tell Me Baby’ is another working out for wah-wah and harmonica, and is an upbeat ending to a release that may find itself filed under folk, but is so much more than that.
But then, why only take my word for it. The EP is available on one of those pesky CDs for the quite reasonable price of nothing, and available from HERE.