From The Desk Of The Corin Tucker Band: The Irving Klaw Trio

The first Corin Tucker Band album, 2010’s 1,000 Years, was dominated by moody, thoughtful songcraft—quite a left-turn coming after Tucker’s last album (to date) with groundbreaking trio Sleater-Kinney, 2005’s furiously distortion-heavy The Woods. But now, 1,000 Years’ follow-up, Kill My Blues (Kill Rock Stars), is another sonic shift. The guitars are louder, the textures more extreme, and Tucker’s lyrics on the album cover an amazing gamut—from clarion calls to teenage memories to more elliptical pieces. At times, the LP brings to mind S-K’s post-September 11 album, 2002’s One Beat, a collection of rock anthems for troubled times. Throughout Kill My Blues, Tucker writes—and the band plays—like something important is truly at stake on every song. The Corin Tucker Band—which also includes drummer Sara Lund, guitarist Seth Lorinczi and bassist Mike Clark (as well as touring bassist Dave Depper)—will be guest editing magnetmagazine.com all week. Read our brand new feature on the group.

Lund: These days, fusing world music with rock seems to be all the rage. Look no further than tUnE-yArDs or members of TV On The Radio inserting themselves into Tuareg desert-blues masters Tinariwen. But 15 years before either of those phenomena, there was the Irving Klaw Trio. Don’t get me wrong, IK3 sounds absolutely nothing like either one of those bands. In fact, they sound like pretty much nobody else. Closest comparisons are probably Sun City Girls or Red Krayola. Rooted far more in experimental pop by way of early Pavement, rootsy rock a la Blues Explosion and ESG, but also heavy on the jazz—see the Art Ensemble Of Chicago or Albert Ayler. (They do an absolutely killer version of Art Ensemble’s “Theme De Yo-Yo” on their second record.) Then you’ve got the global elements of klezmer, North African and Cuban music. They took all these pieces, stirred them up and kept them danceable and engaging, even when taking improv journeys. Thanks in no small part to the funky-ass beats of aptly named drummer Jason Funk.

Active from 1993-1997, the group formed as a trio in Olympia, Wash., with Andrew Price and Jeff Fuccillo on guitars and vocals and Funk on drums. A couple of years later they moved to Portland and added a fourth member, multi-instrumentalist Ryan Poulos, on all kinds of horns, keyboards, guitars and various other noise makers. They put out two impossible-to-find LPs: Irving Klaw Trio on Silly Bird and Utek Pahtoo Mogoi on Roadcone. They also put out a handful of cassettes on Fuccillo’s Union Pole label.

These days, Funk and Fuccillo live in Tokyo and play with the much quieter, mellower, but definitely experimental Helll. Price plays with me in Hungry Ghost along with the Drags’ bass player, Lorca Wood. Sadly, Poulos passed away in 2006. Jeff whipped up this bandcamp page so you could check them out nice and easy.