[Introducing] – The Rutabega

The songs are heavy, not instrumentally, but with the weight of the experiences and raw feelings of their writer. The arrangements seem pretty sparse, yet I’m hearing an orchestra. Joshua Wayne Hensley’s voice backed by an emotion and sincerity so poignant, it translates louder and clearer than a marching band ever could crammed into my tiny bathroom.

It was a complete coincidence that when I heard The Rutabega for the first time, it was eight years to the day Elliott Smith passed away. I don’t mean to immediately draw comparisons to Elliott Smith, as that can sometimes seem lazy and disingenuous.  It doesn’t cheapen the Rutabega’s own musical integrity, but instead makes it shine brighter. It’s one thing to sound like an artist, which can be a bad imitation, but wholly another to evoke the spirit born out of the artists own integral and unique voice.

Hensley has been releasing music under the name for nearly a decade out of South Bend, Indiana, and most recently re-released a few songs for the album “Cursed”. His first release in almost six years, it comes from a longer length 2005 CD-R “It’s You”, now split in half after realizing the duality of the songs (the track “Cursed, No -> Blessed” kind of explains it). “Cursed” is the glass half-empty part.

Though some songs do bring to mind Smith in maybe his most confident voice, the instrumentation itself is more akin to the lo-fi 90′s recordings that I’ve come to love so much–minus the bad quality: Lou Barlow’s Sentridoh “Home Recordings” or the painfully lo-fi Eric’s Trip, as well as one of my favorite songwriters Jeremy Enigk of Sunny Day Real Estate . In this spirit, the Rutabega’s very minimalist instrumentation serves as backup to his vocals, which are deceitfully soft, warm and delivered with steadiness, sometimes leaving an echo, as if recorded in an empty house. Piano serves as percussion and when there is guitar it is understated.

“A Slow Death – Really Slow” has a distorted, screaming guitar backing up Hensley’s vocals, something you’re more likely to  hear from J. Mascis of Dinosaur Jr. Toward the end, the song mellows out into a very melodic couple of bars of release, sounding like both giving up and accepting some fate, when the distortion fades back in and the song ends. On “I Don’t Believe In Crocodiles”, as Hensley wails “Nobody … nobody dies” my heart is a puddle in the soles of my feet. Unexpected arrangements like these or very slight additions of a keyboard, layered vocals in the heightened parts of the songs, really bring it home. These aren’t buildups and releases, but stories that you get so sucked into that become bolder because of small additions.

The second half of the journey “Blessed” will be released toward the end of this year. Meanwhile, buy the album “Cursed” on the Rutabega’s Bandcamp.

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The Rutabega – A Slow Death – Really Slow
The Rutabega – Dead Deer
The Rutabega – I Don’t Believe In Crocodiles