A Thanksgiving tradition in the making continues this coming weekend as Strangefolk returns to the Capitol Theatre in Port Chester, NY. The quartet will perform a two-hour set on Friday, November 29 and Saturday, November 30 before Blues Traveler takes the stage each night. This marks the second year that the Folk have assembled at The Cap after T-Day. It’s altogether fitting as the original group—Reid Genauer, Jon Trafton, Erik Glockler and Luke Smith reformed—after Capitol Theatre owner Peter Shapiro spoke with them in late 2011 and invited Strangefolk to headline the venue’s re-opening night. While that gig didn’t happen due to construction/scheduling issues, thanks to the call, the band did reunite, kicking off their March 2012 four show run at Shapiro’s Brooklyn Bowl. Strangefolk later performed at the Capitol Theatre over Thanksgiving weekend 2012 and most recently came together for four more dates this past September. In the following conversation drummer Luke Smith reflects on all things Strangefolk old and new including a tantalizing hint of what is yet to come.
Let’s walk back through your own history in Strangefolk. You continued to perform with the group after Reid departed but then you decided to leave a few years later. Can you talk about the growth of the band as well as your eventual decision to depart?
The four of us started playing together in the spring of ‘92 while we were still at UVM. It was fits and starts as we got moving and by our senior year, which was the fall of ’93, we started playing parties around Burlington. We decided to give it a go as a band and we figured we’d give it a year. We graduated in the spring of ‘94 and by then we were playing most every weekend. And then in February ‘95 I quit my job as a ski instructor because and I believe we had 22 gigs that month. So we were a full-time band in my mind in February ‘95. We then had that history of the next five or six years before Reid left the band [in September 2000]. That was a really huge deal in our world. I never totally recovered from that and it was so sudden that I couldn’t imagine stopping. Reid knew what he would be doing [Genauer entered grad school at Cornell] and when I found out I was heartbroken. I couldn’t imagine stopping at that time. We had that huge record we had just made that we were about to release, and I was totally committed. We were all totally committed. It was what I imagined we would do for the foreseeable future.
The three of us decided that even though Reid left we didn’t have to quit and first we had Scott [Shdeed] and Patchen [Luke Montgomery] and then after Scott left Don [Scott] came in and we were touring hard. There were some things in there that happened musically during that three year period after Reid left that we thought was the best music that we ever made, although it was a totally different band. It was called Strangefolk and there were parts of it that were the Strangefolk that I had gone all in for but it wasn’t the band that I had put my heart and soul into at the beginning. It was a painful process for me and I know I made it painful for other people just the pulling out but it was something that I felt I really had to do. My heart pulled me other places. My last gig with those guys was New Year’s Eve ‘03-‘04.
The final album you recorded with Reid, A Great Long While, was produced by Nile Rodgers, who has been back in the public eye as of late first through his autobiography and then through his collaboration with Daft Punk. What are your memories of working with him?
When I was in second grade “Rapper’s Delight” came out and I have older siblings and cousins and it was cool to learn the words. And I remember after I finished second grade my mom said, “I want to buy you a little a present,” so I asked her to take me to the record store and I bought Sugarhill Gang “Rapper’s Delight.” That was my first record. And that’s Nile’s riff they sampled. The tune is “Good Times,” That’s Nile and Bernard [Edwards, recording as Chic].
I first met him at Bowery Ballroom. Peter Shapiro was behind it, of course. I remember it was after the first set and it was very rare for me to ice my arm but something was going on and it was bothering me, so I had a bag of ice on my arm and this dude walks in and he has his dreads all flying around and a wild look in his eyes and he says, “I want to meet the drummer” and he came over and gave me five. And for me it was almost like I could have hung up the whole music thing after that. It was so cool that Nile Rodgers just came backstage, the guy who played guitar on the first record that I ever had, just said he wanted to come backstage and talk to the drummer. That was the coolest thing ever.
And then a year and a half, two years later he’s in my freaking house in Vermont. I made him a sandwich and the next thing I knew we were in my garage jamming. My brother came over and played bass. We were laying down this groove and Nile was just in his own world playing the funkiest music. It was just so cool and my brother Will and I were giving each other a look like, “Can you believe this is even happening?” He was playing and I’ve never seen anyone else do this, his guitar was almost levitating. On his upstroke he was letting go of the neck and the guitar would be just suspended in air above his torso.
Looking back do you have a favorite Strangefolk record?
It’s got to be the first three. The demo, Lore and Weightless in Water . I love those and the others I like a lot. There are some jams on [2001’s] Open Road that I like a lot. “Go To A Show” is one that I remember I really like.
After you left the band at the end of 2003 how much communication did you have with the other guys?
When Jon was sick I communicated with him some while he was fighting cancer. I had very little contact with Erik, and Erik can be a hard guy to reach even when you are in contact. With Reid we exchanged a small number of messages but he was busy doing his thing and I was living my life.
It was painful. I really internalized that implosion of Strangefolk. For a lot of those years I would think, “We should get back together, I know we can get the band back together.” Even though I had my hands in a lot of different things I thought, “We should get the original band back together, I know we can patch it up.” and nobody was really biting on that the few times I put it out there. So when I finally let go, the cosmic wisdom, the Zen of it is that when you finally let go there it is on your doorstep. That really is the way it went down. By the time I totally let go and I was, “God bless them all, it’s all good, maybe one day but it’s fine if it never happens again,” that’s when things started happening again.
Jon was kind enough to extend an invitation for me to play with the second incarnation of that group. Russ [Lawton] had a gig, I think he was playing with Trey, and he couldn’t play Camp Creek. So Jon called me six weeks in advance and asked if I would be up for it. He had talked to the guys in the band and they said sure. To me it was a huge deal. I told him I don’t think I can cut that because I am not in shape to play in front of people and he was very encouraging. I said, “Can I think about it for a day or two?” and he said, “Absolutely.” I hung up my phone and my wife immediately said, “Go for it.” She’s been just awesome through this whole thing. We got together not long after Reid left so she’s been with me through a lot of it. So she said go for it and I needed her support because we’ve got kids and it means a lot of hours practicing.
What it turned out to be was a lot of carrying around sticks with me. I got the biggest drum sticks I could find. I would go into music stores and say, “Show me the biggest drum sticks that you have,” and eventually I found a pair that was huge. I figured I’d do what the batters do in baseball- “I only have six weeks so I’ll just train with these logs.” That was Memorial Day 2011 and then, the call from Pete came in late August/early September 2011.
Can you share you memories of that call?
So we get on that conference call for about a minute and we all say hello and then boom! Shapiro comes on and it was just awesome. He just came in a time machine, the way he sounded the last time we were hanging with him at Wetlands, just super energetic and enthusiastic about life and music and live music and our kind of music and Strangefolk. He was talking a mile a minute. I look at it as one of the momentous conversations of my life and he’s like, “I got to step outside.” He was seeing a show in Philadelphia.
He had a spiel about The Cap: “We’re going to have the best sound system in the world, the best lighting system in the world,” and he lays it all out and I’ve already got my money’s worth of the Shapiro Show at 60 seconds and he hasn’t said a think about Strangefolk. I was just like, “This is awesome, he bought The Cap,” and then says, “This is what I want to do, the first week I want you guys to get back together and open the room and then you’re going to be followed by Steely Dan, The Allman Brothers, Black Eyed Peas…” He threw out some ridiculous names compared to us. And he’s like, “I want you guys to open the room.” He lays this gig out and says, “So that’s it” and he stops talking. I remember there was this long silence and then I said, “Thank you Pete” because it was nothing but goodness. And then when he got off, of course, Reid is the one you’re going to listen for. I was listening to what Reid was going to say and Reid was in, so I was like, “Okay I’m in.”
After those initial shows, you’ve kept it going, most recently over four nights in September. What’s your take on those shows and band’s ongoing development?
Oh man, I’m just so pleased about the run, it was just so fun. We had couple of days to get together before the run and put in a solid 8,10, 12-hour work days of hanging together, playing together, running through tunes, working through ideas and just being together. There’s a trust, an intimacy level there when you’re in a group of friends, of brothers who have known each other since let’s face it we were kids. The years are stacking up. It’s not like I’m some grand old man or anything but we’re getting older and the evidence is all around us and people were getting honest and that just seemed to facilitate strength and love. When there’s trust and love there’s going to be more patience and compassion and when all that’s in play, your gateway to fun is just huge.
So for these shows I just felt great playing, things were good and I’ve been working my ass off. I’ve had a completely different approach to drumming since that phone call with Pete. I have this simple garden shed with no heat in my back yard and I practiced through that whole winter after the kids went to bed with my gloves, hat and parka tapping a drum pad, working my high hat, just freaking out in the shed from 9:30pm until 12:30, 1am in the morning. I know that I’m better than I’ve ever been in my life as drummer and that’s a really darn good feeling.
I think the statement’s been made. I feel like I can hang my hat on the entire reunion on the “Black Peter” from the last night [9/28/13 at the State Theater in Portland]. If this is the end of the movie and the credits are ready to roll then I’m walking over to the “Black Peter,” I’m hanging it on that hook and I’m walking away.
This band can play together. We’re not everybody’s cup of tea but for us and the people who enjoy our music we have absolutely demonstrated that we can get together and play real music. In October of 2000, 13 years ago, I couldn’t tell you that. This band was broken. And it just feels incredible to be able to tell you that we’re alive. And I don’t know where it’s going. We’re going to record another record, and we’re talking about new things and we’re just talking, which is a big deal. We love the music and as long as we love the music it’s alive.
