Monroe Mustang - Neighborhood Porch Music

Monroe Mustang were a band of five guys from Austin, Texas who, in a little over four years, roughly from 1996 to 2000, recorded two albums and a handful of EPs and singles that went almost unnoticed by critics and audiences alike. Unknown then as now, their music was a shy but highly original attempt to merge the sounds of a languid, dreamlike strain of psychedelia with the intimate, understated attitude of minimalist folk — hardly fashionable at the time — and the then-underground slo-core scene.

Born almost by chance out of the friendship between Taylor Hollard, Brian Barry and Jason Stout, later joined by Michael and Chris Linnen, the project moved from the outset within very precise coordinates, with the various members taking turns on instruments and songs being written together before being recorded at home, mostly on a four-track, without the help of sound engineers or outside contributors.

This attachment to a "lo-fi" aesthetic and ethos, however unostentatious or understated, and the primacy given to a "domestic" dimension of making music, became for them a kind of creed, one they stayed true to throughout their brief, fleeting career.

They debuted with the singles "I Was Eighteen, It Was Hate" (1996, Framed! Records) and "Wusses" (1997, Ata-Glance Records) — both of which would later appear on their first album — two tracks that already showcased the band's qualities, able to absorb the lesson of early Pavement while transfiguring it into something more intimate, leaning from the start toward a far more subdued, melancholy sound.

Their full-length debut came the following year with Plain Sweeping Themes For The Unprepared, released by Trance Syndicate, a cult label — also fated to fold prematurely — based right in Austin, which in those years was putting out invaluable albums by acts such as Bedhead, Windsor For The Derby and My Dad Is Dead.

A collection of home recordings dating back to the previous four years, the music on this first album sits extraordinarily poised between tender psychedelic ballads ("The Bees", with its reverb-drenched guitars; "Overplayed", almost a Barrett-esque dirge; the languid "Incredibile Eagle") and slow pieces that betray the influence of the more subdued Califone (the opening "Waking Up") or of the aforementioned Bedhead, as in the splendid "Candidate" and "Veronica", where faint organ melodies accompany a handful of deeply felt guitar chords. "Elephant Sound", arranged for piano and cello, with a vaguely western-tinged trumpet echoing in the distance, is perhaps the manifesto of their art of building memorable songs out of almost nothing, as well as the track where they take the biggest risks.

The only concession to a heavier sound, with insistent drumming and "noisy" guitars, is "Vinyl", a track that nonetheless remains an outlier. But more generally, what dominates is the slow, reflective pace of slo-core, as proven by "TN (Spirit Of The Wild)", a track Low could well have written.

Only a year later came The Elephant Sound, this time on Jagjaguwar. Eight tracks running a little over half an hour, the album heightens the psychedelic streak already present on the debut, but whereas there it was mainly reflected in the songs' structure, here it's the overall atmosphere that takes on liquid, rarefied tones, thanks above all to subtly spacey arrangements. The band arrives at a more defined sound, with tracks settling into the slo-core ballad mold, where at times it almost seems the sonic backdrops prevail over the songs themselves. But that's purely an impression, because the songs are very much there, and are in fact among the finest the band ever wrote.

That said, "Dee", the opening track, is about as jarring as one could expect, showcasing a fairly muscular country/blues riff and a compelling melodic drive. Then comes the gentle pop of "Been Choppin That Mountain A Thousand Year", and "Uninspired", one of their high points, a lullaby for drunkards sung in an anemic voice over guitars so distant they'd make early Mercury Rev envious. The tempos grow, if anything, even slower and more rarefied with "Lie", carried along by a handful of organ chords and exquisite vocal interplay, as happens too with "Bottle Rocket", which literally drags itself out for six minutes. Here we're truly in Codeine territory, though never quite reaching their peaks of desolation and incommunicability — one can nonetheless glimpse the sonic devices through which they gave shape to sadness and defeat.

The band paints a series of ballads made for slow heartbreak, dominated by an idea of resigned peace, as borne out by the lyrics, steeped in a melancholy mood and a generally depressed frame of mind — take "Uninspired", for instance, where the band confesses: ⟦Q1⟧.

There's room for little else, with a "Cat/Moth" that keeps pace with alt-country, and two reworked but essentially similar versions of "Veronica" and "Elephant Sound", both already heard on the debut.

That same year the band took part in the Crossing Borders festival in the Netherlands, and for the occasion recorded an entirely acoustic live session for the local broadcaster Vpro. This gave them the chance both to play outside their familiar, if "narrow", Texan borders, and to experience, for the first time, a real recording studio — no small thing for a band accustomed to rather different circumstances.

Recorded and produced by Berry Kamer, Jan Hiddink and Maurice Woestenburg, De Avonden 091099 (2000, again on JagJaguwar) tones down the psychedelic hues of their previous work, opting instead for a delicate, fingerpicked folk that foregrounds subtle guitar and keyboard arrangements while keeping drums to a bare minimum.

The tracklist offers some of the finest songs from their previous records, three unreleased pieces (four, if we count the ghost track tucked at the end) and a dazed rereading of “Mountain” by Pete Townshend. The whole thing floats in an ethereal, almost intangible dimension, no doubt helped by the live, direct-to-tape recording. So bare and essential, the songs on this live album are the best proof of the genuineness of a music that needs very little to stand on its own two feet.

A few months later came the EP I Am The Only Running Footman (Emperor Jones, a sister label to Trance Syndicate). Five tracks that confirm all the good things already found on the two “full-length” records, with only the opener, “F.L.N.W.K. (Funny Little New Wave Kid)”, retaining a touch of acid edge – this time bringing to mind the languid, ecstatic Spacemen 3 of “Perfect Prescription”.

For the rest, as in the companion live album, what prevails are the acoustic, barely-whispered pieces: “Weren't Gone”, a dark ballad in the vein of Will Oldham; “Spirits Of Unfreedom” and “Your Shapeless Head”, light and at peace, excellent examples of their skill at carving out perfect, fully-formed folk miniatures; and the closer “The Ford Chevy Debite”, melancholy mid-tempo pop.

With this mini-album, Monroe Mustang bowed out on a minor note, fittingly so, given how minor and underground their brief trajectory had been.

From this point on, nothing more was heard of the five-piece: no reissue, no rediscovery, not even in more recent times when far less gifted bands would attempt to walk the same path, paradoxically with far greater success.

“Neighborhood Porch Music” (one of the few, and most fitting, labels ever applied to the Monroe Mustang sound), a soundtrack for contemplating moods that drift past in slow motion, psychedelic slo-core: these are just some of the possible tags for a music that, then as now, remains unknown to most, but whose timeless charm endures unchanged, making it, in its own way, unique.

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