w/Carissa's Wierd, the Decemberists, In Praise of Folly

Sat Feb 8, Department of Safety, 1011 12th St, Anacortes, $5; Fri Feb 14, the Crocodile, $8.

Depending on your age, when considering a live set led by a guy sitting behind a piano, you may think of Elton John, Joe Jackson, Nick Cave, or Ben Folds. If he could just figure out a way to get the right sound out of his favorite writing tool, though, the name of the local man most associated with performing behind a piano might soon be the Prom's James Mendenhall. "I wish we did use a real piano," says Mendenhall. "We tried it at the Paradox once, but it just got drowned out by the drums."

Many bands incorporate piano into their live performances, but most of the time its sound is created via an electronic keyboard. As someone who once had a nun as a piano teacher--but now barely remembers how to pick out a dumbed-down version of "Fur Elise"--I hold a special affinity for any artist who needs to feel felt hammers pounding on tightly stretched strings cased in wood. The piano is an evocative instrument, capable of swelling one's chest with wistful memories--for me, that's sore, ruler-slapped wrists ("Wrists up!"), and my grandma, who played melancholic standards in the middle of the night whenever she drank further into the darkness than usual. (She played a 100-year-old upright that had, in the '40s, been tuned to honky-tonk--she and Grandpa owned a bar. It was restored to its crisp original sound when I began the loathsome daily practice sessions that made me feel, at age six, like I had an after-school job.)

Mendenhall claims it was his ego that drew him to the piano. "I wanted to be a more well-rounded musician so I bought that monstrosity we used to haul on stage. It was one of those acoustic electric things from the '70s. I was told Herbie Hancock and Stevie Wonder used them. I loved that thing. It didn't always sound good, but it was real." Fate kicked Mendenhall in the gut when the band hit the road with Death Cab for Cutie, though. "The first show of the tour, the fucker stopped working during the first song. We had to rush out and get a keyboard, and I have been forced to join the modern age ever since. We just couldn't trust the old one to always work. We've added a Fender Rhodes, too, which is a lot of fun."

Essentially, however, it's the allure a piano holds, its aesthetic and communicative ability that drives Mendenhall as a musician. "I really wish we could take a piano [on the road]. Actually, I wish I could sleep in a piano. God, wouldn't that be great. I can't write on keyboards--they're too stale. Under the Same Stars was written mostly in Japan in the basement of my ex-girlfriend's hotel and in the basement of the old Prom house. For me it's quiet rooms that help me write--or at least a place where people don't speak English."

Released on Barsuk, 2002's Under the Same Stars is a beautifully packaged CD; a stark image of a piano is surrounded, as if framed, by aged matting and filigree. The songs within have simple lyrics, but are elegantly arranged as brass, violins, and cellos waft seductively or aggressively around Mendenhall's bittersweet stories--calling to mind Zumpano's great, magnificently arranged second album, Goin' Through Changes. An instrumental opening tune serves as an overture, introducing each of the instruments that will be used on an absorbing record that blends the grand with the moody guitars and drums that figure deliberately in the band's uniquely lush, emotive sound.

"I wanted to write more thoughtful and emotional songs," explains Mendenhall, "and the piano is the only instrument that holds the deeper emotions." Song titles like "Living in the Past," "Guarantees Aren't Easy," and "A Note on the Kitchen Table" let the listener know that Mendenhall's struggling with some pretty heavy stuff. "I know I have a long way to go with my songwriting, but the piano is the only instrument that has gotten me this far. I like to think I have inspired other bands to be more keyboard- or piano-based, but only a few people have said anything to me about that. It's really difficult to rely solely on a piano for a band; when you see bands use them, it's always just one part of their repertoire."

Mendenhall is as restless as the songs on Under the Same Stars suggest, and he's having a hard time carving out his creative process. "I need to be away from all kinds of music for a long period of time and just see what comes out, because it's hard to be inventive with a piano," he says. "You'll be working on some song and think it's really emotional or it's going to be the one that will save someone from jumping off a bridge, and then you realize it sounds just like this other song and it becomes a comedy. But I guess that's just life."