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- Date Released: January 27, 2009
- Genre: Country/Folk
- Style: Americana
- Label: City Salvage / Kindred Rhythm
Brooklyn singer longs for the glory days of country
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We Say...
As country singers go, Brooklyn's Andy Friedman makes for a pretty good RISD graduate with a bunch of cartoons published in The New Yorker. Which is to say — as he admits himself in his second album's live, disc-closing blues stomp, "The Friedman Holler" — his "voice ain't pretty." In fact, it's pretty darn flat. But he has ideas regardless: About bohemia forfeited to growing up and to gentrification, about how being a painter is like being a singer, about being a rambling man in an age when there ain't no more hobos.
In "Idaho," he yearns for the open road and "land of the Sinclair gas station sign," not to mention for that torn sweatshirt he forgot in a diner near Spokane once. And then in "Road Trippin'" he's updating the same Kerouacky theme, first as a gruff sort of rockabilly-chug and later in a sleepier reprise. He sees romance in his own fatigue, too (follows his "Weary Things" title track with a "Weary Apology"), but he's more alive when his new son is poking him in the eye, waking him up from a 5am nostalgia dream about his old bar-hopping nights. That's in "Freddy's Backroom," an eight-minute shaggy-dog eulogy for that Brooklyn dive-bar and Hank's Saloon, both about to be displaced by a basketball stadium. He laments a lost scene that reminds him of the communal LP cover of Jerry Jeff Walker's 1976 It's a Good Night For Singin'. And he makes you wish you'd spent more time there yourself. -
They Say...
On his second album since he picked up a guitar and began making the transition from an illustrator and cartoonist to a singer/songwriter, Andy Friedman still isn't taking himself or his new profession too seriously, and his music is all the better for it. The title Weary Things signals that much of the material is taken at a loose, easy pace, as if performed during a well-lubricated second set in a nightclub near closing time. And "nightclub" may be too nice a word; Friedman's music, played by a backup band called "the Other Failures" that seems to consist of a revolving cast (six different people are credited for drums on the album, for example), might best be called "roadhouse," a combination of folk, country, blues, rockabilly, R&B, and rock, by turns, intended to be heard in a place where people are drinking hard. Friedman himself (or the persona implied by the first-person lyrics, anyway) may be doing some of that drinking, or may just be reflecting nostalgically on when he could. The basic story of the songs is one about a man who used to be a rover, but has reformed due to marriage and fatherhood, yet longs for the old days and returns to them by hitting the road as a performing musician. Thus, the proceedings begin with "I Miss Being Broken, Lonesome, and Alone," and they conclude with "Friedman Holler," recorded live, in which the artist leaves little doubt about his identity or intentions: "My name is Andy Friedman/I'm from Brooklyn City/I just learned guitar/And my voice ain't pretty." Actually, his voice isn't bad, at least for this kind of music, and he would do well not to bother with so much echo in an attempt to augment it. But he is still at his best when speaking in rhythm, as he does in the lengthy talking blues "Freddy's Backroom," which goes on for eight minutes and could easily go on another eight without losing interest.
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| 01. |  |
I Miss Being Broken, Lowdown And Alone |
4:22 |
|
| 02. | |
Idaho |
3:34 |
|
| 03. | |
Locked Out Of The Building |
5:35 |
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| 04. | |
Road Trippin' |
3:07 |
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| 05. | |
Backstage At A Small Hotel |
1:41 |
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| 06. | |
Pilot Light |
4:00 |
|
| 07. | |
Freddy's Backroom |
8:01 |
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| 08. | |
Road Trippin' Daddy |
3:36 |
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| 09. | |
Weary Things |
4:37 |
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| 10. | |
Weary Apology |
2:06 |
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| 11. | |
The Friedman Holler |
6:05 |
|
11 Total Tracks, 46:44 Total Length
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Credits
- Andy Friedman - Guitar // Andy Friedman - Harmonica // Andy Friedman - Guitar (Electric) // Andy Friedman - Guitar (Rhythm) // Andy Friedman - Vocals // Andy Friedman - Artwork // Andy Friedman - Art Direction // Andy Friedman - Design // Andy Friedman - Photography // Andy Friedman - Lettering // Andy Friedman - Collage // Andy Friedman - Cover Art // Devon Sproule - Vocals (Background) // Devon Sproule - Photography // Paul Curreri - Organ // Paul Curreri - Guitar (Acoustic) // Paul Curreri - Banjo // Paul Curreri - Percussion // Paul Curreri - Piano // Paul Curreri - Drums // Paul Curreri - Guitar (Electric) // Paul Curreri - Keyboards // Paul Curreri - Programming // Paul Curreri - Vocals // Paul Curreri - Vocals (Background) // Paul Curreri - Producer // Paul Curreri - Engineer // Paul Curreri - Guitar (Classical) // Paul Curreri - Mixing // Paul Curreri - Photography // Paul Curreri - Lap Steel Guitar // Paul Curreri - Portraits // Paul Curreri - Guitar Feedback // Paul Curreri - Guitar (12 String Acoustic) // Pete Caigan - Drums // Pete Caigan - Engineer // Ben Parker - Photography // Matt Curreri - Engineer // Joanie Mendenhall - Piano // Caleb Stine - Vocals (Background) // Owen Roberts - Drums
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