Jacobs: Bands who dress the part, rock the scene

‘ ‘ ‘ The spectrum of bands-dressing-like-other-professions is wide and varied, thanks in no… ‘ ‘ ‘ The spectrum of bands-dressing-like-other-professions is wide and varied, thanks in no small part to The Village People. ‘ ‘ ‘ But while most examples, including The Decemberists-as-librarians and Judas Priest-as-bikers, are more circumstantial, a new trend of bands-as-railroad-workers carries a good bit more significance than we’re used to in this world of Kisses and Gwars. ‘ ‘ ‘ Call me normal, but most people don’t wear suspenders, ragged plaid shirts, leatherwork boots and tight workpants on a daily basis. But for a growing number of bands, this railroad worker aesthetic, if you will, has as much to do with style as music. Let me explain. ‘ ‘ ‘ For bands like Dr. Dog, Limbeck and Delta Spirit (which played a thunderous show at Brillobox Tuesday night), music and fashion are paired together with one long thread ‘mdash; both hark back to a time long, long ago when none of the modern Internet hype mattered and’ the word ‘indie’ didn’t exist. ‘ ‘ ‘ The bands’ dress and music reflect a denial of today’s music industry. Not in lyrics or attitude, but rather in their shedding of any adherence to trends that bog down so many bands today. ‘ ‘ ‘ Dr. Dog sounds like a rock band from 1967 playing a concert on a cloud, with floating melodies and a toy piano matched with garage drums, punchy guitar riffs and lyrics about friends. The band’s got no fewer than four songs with the word ‘old’ in the title, and its members dress to match ‘mdash; Dr. Dog’s iTunes page even features members in overalls covered in railroad grease. ‘ ‘ ‘ Delta Spirit even employs back-in-the-day imagery to its name ‘mdash; the spirit of the Mississippi Delta supposes itself in each tune with the band’s swampy Southern stomp, even if it is from San Diego. ‘ ‘ ‘ But the metaphor to run with here is that of the railroad worker ‘mdash; both bands look like they could put down their instruments and pick up a shovel or a big axe and go lay out some tracks. Through dressing like railroad men, the notion is that these bands live like vagabonds, going where the music takes them. ‘ ‘ ‘ In that way, the sound and the look meld perfectly into something timeless. ‘ ‘ ‘ Both Delta Spirit and Dr. Dog, which have toured together in what surely would’ve been a show for the ages, sound and look like they could exist decades ago or decades in the future, thereby casting aside any genre or trend labels, any push to categorize them. ‘ ‘ ‘ Whether either band did so willfully, or if I’m overanalyzing this completely, is irrelevant ‘mdash; the bottom line is that when a band becomes all-encompassing, as in the music matches the image matches the attitude, the band becomes all the more believable. ‘ ‘ ‘ Are Delta Spirit or Dr. Dog actually made of dudes who used to build railroads in the 1930s? Of course not ‘mdash; Spirit’s lead singer Matt Vasquez looks like he’s no older than 25 ‘mdash; but the audience buys it without a second thought because the whole package is there. ‘ ‘ ‘ And when a band is believable, when the audience can sense that the musicians believe themselves, the music, no matter the genre, can blow you right over.