There's a reason Yonder Mountain String Band has released an equal number of live albums to studio albums — you haven't really experienced the bluegrass quartet until you've seen it on stage, or at least heard what goes down. After all, a night with Yonder Mountain is bound to consist of a rock and roll cover (like Ozzy Osbourne's "Crazy Train"), a "Yee Haw Factor" check (when everyone on the count of three screams out "yee haw" as loud as they can), and an interruption in the middle of "If There's Still Ramblin' In The Rambler (Let Him Go)" so the band can take shots of Jagermeister. According to mandolin player Jeff Austin, this wild, fast-pickin' energy is a direct result of the band's philosophy on live performance.
"From a personal standpoint we consistently say, you know, this song might be the 200th time we've played it or this might be the sixth show we've played in a row but the people there that night, it might be their first show," Austin said. "Our approach is to keep that in mind, because there might be people out there who haven't seen us. I see a lot of live music, and you can tell when the musicians are just going through the motions."
Based out of Colorado, Yonder Mountain String Band — Adam Aijala (guitar), Dave Johnston (banjo), Ben Kaufmann (bass) and Austin — undoubtedly fits into the bluegrass genre, yet its extended jams — that often reach upward of 11 minutes — have earned labels such as "progressive bluegrass," "newgrass," or "jamgrass." Austin believes the band's sound has been so readily embraced by the "kinfolk" — Yonder Mountain's adoring fanbase — largely because of the recent acceptance of country as a viable listening option.
"Everyone had the O Brother Where Art Thou? album," Austin said. "And when everyone was answering that question, there was a banjo on pop radio — that's pretty damn crazy.
"It used to be if you said, 'I listen to country,' you were immediately labeled a redneck. But now people are like, 'Oh yeah, I love Faith Hill. I love Clint Black.' When popularity hit in a real mainstream sort of way people didn't have to be afraid of it anymore. You could say you liked bluegrass. I'm grateful for that."
Yonder Mountain is currently in the process of recording its next studio effort with producer Tom Rothrock (Beck, Elliot Smith). Whereas in the past the band has taken at the most two and half weeks to record an album, Yonder Mountain has planned at least five different sessions to put together the new disc; the projected release date is March 2006.
"We want to take our time with this record. I listen to our other two (1999's Elevation and 2001's Town by Town) and it's like a coffee addiction going on," Austin said. "So we're taking our sweet-ass time." As for what fans can expect, the band is "trying to keep it pretty tight under wraps," Austin said. "We are writing all of the music together. It's a really unique experience, we usually write individually. We're bringing in very few old pieces of music. We're trying to create everything right there, in the moment. It's very spontaneous.
"We're being very open to experimenting with sound and still have it be us. We know the music still needs to be presented on stage."
In the meantime, Austin said the band will probably release the fourth installment in its live "Mountain Tracks" series this fall, and the quartet is scheduled for a slough of festivals, including the Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival, High Sierra Music Festival, Telluride Bluegrass Festival and its own Northwest String Summit.
Yonder Mountain will also play with Leo Kottke, String Cheese Incident and Willie Nelson among others this summer, and it will even open one night for Dave Matthews Band in June, a gig that confuses and excites Austin all at the same time.
"What kind of a freaky trip is that?!" he said.
Call it experimentation.
Yonder Mountain String Band will perform at The Rave, 2401 W Wisconsin Ave, Wednesday at 8 p.m. More information is available by calling 342-7283 or by visiting www.therave.com.
This article appeared in The Marquette Tribune on April 21 2005.