Akron Empire is so excited to welcome back guest blogger J Hudson. J has been a regular contributor to
Akron Empire since he wrote about
The Fourth Annual Crafty Mart last November. J is a poet, short story writer, event organizer and, in a more recent venture, marraige officiant.
Fast Molasses: Contemporary Troubadours
By J Hudson
Fast Molasses is a Canton, Ohio duo that plays Americana
music; folk, blue grass, blues, country, jazz, rags and vaudeville. Even in a
time of roots revival and the pop success of Americana bands like Mumford and
Sons and the Avett Brothers, Fast Molasses stands out for embracing the full
spectrum of American musical styles and living a true minstrel life.
Fast Molasses’ core members are Christopher Smith and Shawn
Wee. Christopher is Fast and Shawn is
Molasses in the band’s name. According
to Smith, the two are “polar opposites” and thus the oxymoronic name, Fast
Molasses. Shawn Wee, who most people call Swee, is a
multi-instrumentalist. He plays guitar,
banjo, fiddle, and harmonica. Christopher plays many instruments too: banjo, piano, guitar and mandolin, and he also
designs the logo and packaging for their albums. The two met while in high
school and bonded over their shared love of roots music and cotemporary
musicians like M Ward and Magnolia Electric Company. They frequently perform
live and are mainstays of the Northeast Ohio club and festival scene. Over the years, Fast Molasses has had a
rotating caste of backing musicians. Their live performances are lo-fi but high
energy with standup bass, fiddle, trumpet, washboards, jugs and if available
piano. According to Smith, “Fast
Molasses isn't really a band. It's a partnership in which art is created; be
that music, printmaking, theatrics. We bring others on to the team to share
their on input.”
Despite being a mainstay of the Akron-Canton music scene,
Fast Molasses had not released an album until this summer
From the Sugarcane. Swee
says this is the first of three albums they plan to release as a set
highlighting about sixty songs they’ve written over the years: the next two lps are entitled
To the Still, and
At the Bottom of the Barrel.
Christopher says that the three albums highlight different
aspects of the music they’ve written but also represent “a view of the evolution
of both American music and a creative process represented by the rum making
process.” Rum starts with sugarcane that
is usually imported from another country, like the music they love came from African
and European immigrant roots. Then the
sugarcane is refined into molasses, that molasses is brought to the still and
made into rum, which is stored in a barrel and drank until it’s empty and
you’ve reached the proverbial bottom of the barrel.
Swee says From the
Sugarcane highlights Fast Molasses’ songs from a folk tradition. They were recorded in an old, chicken coop
converted to a cabin on a land preserve near Hocking Hills in southern Ohio. The Athens’ Ohio group Hunnabee & the
Sandy Tar Boys served as their backing band during the recording. The album’s producer, Spencer Martin says
that the goal of From the Sugarcane
was,” to organically capture the authenticity that defines (Fast Molasses’)
overall aesthetic.” In an a phone and email interview, Martin said, “By going
completely off the grid and isolating ourselves in a middle-of-the-woods cabin
for four days, we were able to create the focus to inspire the performances and
allow for a spatial, sonic character that would lend itself to the songs.”
Americana is a broad term and the nine songs on the album
vary greatly in style and tempo. Some
are lullabies, others troubadour songs from the plains, there are back country
drinking songs and depression era laments. The songs share an unhurried acoustic sound and
are simultaneously laissez-faire and laissez les bon temps rouler, a hard feel
to pull off. On first listen, I thought some had to be covers of traditional
tunes, but despite the old-time sound, all of the songs are originals written
and sung by Wee and Smith. Despite this
vintage sound, Fast Molasses engenders the songs with a contemporary feel that
keeps them from being derivative. The
album begins with ambient sound from the cabin and Martin uses crickets and
train whistles as segues and plaintive punctuation to the tunes. You can even hear a gulp or two before one
song and I have a feeling that more than a little drinking went on during the
recording. After listening through to
From the Sugar Cane, I can’t wait to hear the follow up albums that will
complete the set.
Now that the album is done, Christopher and Swee plan to
leave Akron and travel throughout the country.
Christopher is going to Portland, Oregon for the fall and New Orleans
for the winter. Swee works the sugar beet
harvest on the northern plains in October and then hitchhikes south to New
Orleans where he busks and is the house harmonica player at a music hall in the
French Quarter. The duo plans to return to Akron in the spring and begin
recording To the Still, which will highlight
their songs using electric instruments. At the Bottom of the Barrel will be
recorded after that in New Orleans. That
LP will employ New Orleans backing musicians and will feature rags, music in
the tradition of 1800s and vaudeville music.
If you want to hear Fast Molasses’ music, check out their
Soundcloud page:
They are on Facebook
here.
