Vetiver

Vetiver are commonly lumped into the nascent "freak folk" movement alongside the likes of Joanna Newsom and Six Organs of Admittance, thanks to leader Andy Cabic's friendship with scene founder Devendra Banhart. (Besides Banhart's musical contributions to Vetiver's first two albums, Cabic co-wrote Banhart's breakout song "At the Hop," from 2004's Rejoicing in the Hands; on the same album, Banhart paid tribute to his friend's band in the song "When the Sun Shone on Vetiver.") However, the band's roots go deeper than Syd Barrett and Linda Perhacs, encompassing the U.K. shoegazer scene and the mid-'90s D.I.Y. indie rock scene. Cabic was part of the latter, forming the Raymond Brake in his native Greensboro, North Carolina in the early '90s. The Raymond Brake's noisy, Sonic Youth-influenced take on indie rock was a natural fit with both the Chapel Hill art-punk scene and the influential Washington D.C. indie Simple Machines, which released the band's debut album Piles of Dirty Winters in 1995. After a handful of EPs and one more album, 1996's Never Work Ever, the Raymond Brake broke up and Cabic migrated westward, eventually settling in San Francisco. While studying at the San Francisco Art Institute, Cabic met fellow student Banhart and instantly established a close working relationship with the bearded sprite. While playing live gigs with Banhart, Newsom and others, Cabic started writing songs for his new project Vetiver, named for an Asian relative of lemongrass that's used in perfume making. Adding Banhart on guitar and backing vocals, Jim Gaylord on violin, and Alissa Anderson on cello behind Cabic's vocals, banjo, and acoustic guitar, Vetiver released its first, self-titled, album on the DiCristina label in 2004. (The album, produced by Thom Monahan of the Pernice Brothers, also included guest spots by Newsom, Mazzy Star's Hope Sandoval, and former My Bloody Valentine drummer Colm O'Ciosoig.) Vetiver was followed in 2005 by a stopgap odds and sods collection called Between that included two live tracks, plus a new version of a song from Vetiver and a cover of Fleetwood Mac's "Save Me a Place." For Vetiver's second full-length album, 2006's To Find Me Gone, Cabic finally added a drummer, Otto Hauser, and bassist Kevin Barker to the core trio of himself, Banhart, and Anderson. After the album was released, Cabic introduced a stable, full-time recording and touring lineup of himself, Anderson, Hauser, new guitarist Sanders Tripp, and new bassist Brent Dunne. In 2008 the band released A Thing of the Past, a collection newly recorded cover songs.