The Skinny
I live out in the mountains of Southwest Virginia, where residents share a certain affinity for homemade liquor. White lightnin’. Hillbilly pop. Kickapoo joy juice. The white dog. Call it what you will, but pour mine from a Mason jar that doesn’t have any fancy label, and keep it clear. No apple pie or blueberry shine for me, if you please.
Considering my love of corn liquor, you can imagine my interest was piqued when I discovered The Moonshine. I thought to myself, “Well, I just might have something in common with these folks.” And I do. A love of fine acoustic music.
This Portland, Oregon, quintet gets the musical heritage of my Appalachian Mountains. I hear The Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers in their music, but the influence doesn’t end there. There is conscious blending of the old and new here, sort of like moonshine in a martini glass . . . . except this works better.
As far as Oregon’s illegal liquor scene goes, in the finest tradition of discretion, I couldn’t get songwriter Michael Gerard to spill much.
“I plead the fifth when it comes to the current state of the bootlegging business out here in Oregon. The name means a lot of different things to us,” says Gerard. “We love the DIY idea behind making it yourself if you can’t get it elsewhere, and the idea of taking care of business by cover of night appeals to us, too. We are definitely a band that likes to stay up well past most folks’ idea of late. We’re a bit like the moon that way, too . . . shinin’ high and up all night.
For Fans Of
The Head & The Heart, Elephant Revival, Spirit Family Reunion
Outside Looking In
“We decided to ask The Moonshine to do a long term residency with us because of the reactions the band was getting from the people walking by the shop on the street. There’s not much going on most Monday nights, but service people often have the night off and there are people out and about. The music would start and, over the course of the night, more and more people would wander in, excited to find this gem of a moment going on when they least expected it. These people came back again and again and, as the year progressed, became staples of our community. People who love all sorts of music really connect to the band.”
—Stephen Ferruzza, of Portland’s Al Forno Ferruzz, on The Moonshine
On Stage
A glance through The Moonshine’s tour schedule finds a bevy of dates throughout Oregon. The upcoming show at Edgefield in Troudale, Oregon, on March 17th has me contemplating a trip to the Pacific Northwest. Being a young band, they haven’t had much time to head east yet, but there is something you can do about that. Call your favorite indie record store or radio station and hassle them until they get the band’s new record, And Now . . . , on shelves or on the air.
In His Own Words
“’Never Know’ started out as a home recording on the same day it was written. Sometimes a song just comes to me fully formed, and this was one of those to some extent. That demo recording is really just this little rhythmic mandolin figure played over a sort of reggae beat that I programmed into my drum machine software. It’s really quite different from what we ended up with in the studio, although I feel like the album version retains some of the strange juxtaposition of pseudo-Cajun melodic content over the clearly pop leanings of the beat and the Beach Boys backing vocals. The song is really an ode to getting out and doing whatever this life moves you to do before it’s too l ate. It’s a bright song of hope wrapped around the dark fact of death. I think that’s what it’s one of my favorites.”
—Michael Gerard, of The Moonshine, on “Never Know”
On The World Wide Web
For more information on The Moonshine, when the band will take to a stage near you, or how you can get the new record, surf over to www.themoonshinemusic.com.
