Getting in Tune

"Right now, the single most interesting thing is the song itself, and songwriting as a whole," he adds. "I used to write songs that needed noise, or all kinds of embellishments, or needed to be put into a certain context to work. Now I write stuff that can be played with drums, or cellos and violins, but more importantly, can sound good on just one or two guitars. It can stand alone, stripped to a primitive structure."

Context isn't the only clearly appreciable difference between Crooked Fingers and any of Bachmann's previous works. First, he sings on the album. Not with the restrained, range-wary quality of his Archers days, but with a confident and full voice. Bachmann's vocals change throughout the album to better match the melodic theme of each song. On "Crowned in Chrome,'" the album's first track, it's clear that he's not afraid of high notes, but then he assumes a masculine growl on "New Drink for the Old Drunk" and "Man Who Died of Nothing At All." And throughout, his vocals invite an unlikely, but undeniable, comparison to Neil Diamond. "People say that to me apologetically, like, 'I don't want to offend you, but...'" he says. "I'm not offended at all. I like old Neil stuff. I would say he's less of an influence than other people, like Dylan or Nick Drake -- I don't own any of his records or anything -- I just know so much of it from simply being alive in America."

Crooked Fingers also finds Bachmann showing a serious interest in narrative lyrics, another departure from the Archer days. Whereas Loaf seemed to relish in non sequitors ("I wish I could say that they were meant to be suggestive and open to interpretation," he admits, "but a lot of times I was just trying to make things rhyme"), the ten songs on the new album weave tales of sadness, of broken lives and people. And while most songwriters will pull from personal experiences to make composite images for songs, Bachmann says most of his songs are odes to specific people in his life -- sometimes bitter ones at that ("She Spread Her Legs and Flew Away" is a case in point).

"The songs are definitely more focused," he says. "In the past things were so loose, people would ask me what something was about and I didn't have an answer. Now, if someone were to ask what a Crooked Fingers song is about, I feel like I could tell them. They are about specific people, and a lot of them are not exactly happy songs about people. They might not want it to be known that a certain song is about them. They're not hostile, though; they're just more therapeutic for me, which I think is a healthy way to deal with feelings. I've done quite a bit of learning in writing these lyrics."

Crooked Fingers was released on the Athens-based label Warm Electronic Recordings, which also handles fellow Southerners Empire State, a band that features Lambchop's Alex McManus (who sometimes plays guitar with Vic Chesnutt, yet another Southern boy). The two bands are sharing bills across the country, including an upcoming gig in Denver, and Bachmann says the arrangement can lead to interesting onstage play. (Also on the bill is former Man...or Astro-Man? guitarist Brian Causey, who contributed electrochime and percussion to Crooked Fingers.) The Southern-themed tour isn't some attempt to make the South's profile as a seat of music culture rise again, but a natural result of the spirit of collaboration between many of the region's like-minded artists.

"There's basically just a lot of people down here who like to play together," he says. "People have similar interests, but we're all doing different things. I mean, sometimes you'll get together and it's just kind of boring but it's still fun, and other times something really interesting comes out of it. A lot of us believe that there's still a lot of good stuff to be done with music. I am not so cynical that I'm tired of music, so we get together when we can and see what happens.

"It would be a very good thing if it was cool again to know how to play your instruments," Bachmann adds after a pause. "The whole thing with punk rock and indie rock was that if you had a lot of personality, you could be in a band. That's fine. Everyone who wants to should be in a band, I think. But not everybody can make a goddamned record and put it out. There's so much crap, it's hard to get to the stuff that comes from a place of talent. But when you do get to it, it's just obvious. It's so easy to tell when something is genuine when you pit it against what's out there."