Talbot Tagora seem perpetually out of place—as a band, on a
stage, in a club, in Seattle, even just in general. They don’t look
like much of a rock band, even by punk standards. They wear plain
jeans, flannels, and generic, monochromatic
sweatshirts—thrift-store more in the style of St. Vincent de Paul
than Red Light. The trio—Chris Ando, Mark Greshowak, and Ani
Valley—range in age from 17 to 21, and they still have a trace of
adolescent anxiety about them; Ando and Valley still show it in their
complexion.
All three of them grew up in the sprawling, quasi-rural suburbs of
the Eastside. Valley is still growing up there, in Fall City, where the
year-and-a-half-old band practice at her mom’s house. Ando works at the
Old Fire House Teen Center, where he and Greshowak first started
attending punk shows. Ando and Greshowak moved to the city a year or
two ago, sharing a room in the now defunct SS Marie Antoinette
warehouse space; they currently live in a house in the Central
District, where they worry about their part—as young, white
artists, originally from the suburbs—in gentrifying the
neighborhood.
A band named after a defunct make of automobile, Talbot Tagora are
without their own permanent set of wheels. In fact, they missed their
slot at last year’s Capitol Hill Block Party because they couldn’t find
a ride in time. Ando’s old band, Mikaela’s Fiend, had a van, but they
sold it. Their current tour van is a big, shining SUV, borrowed from
Valley’s very supportive mom; it’s pretty plush, but it might also be
just a little embarrassing for a scrappy, upstart punk band. At the
very least, Ando has a little trouble fitting the thing into a parking
space.
One place in Seattle where Talbot Tagora really fit is the Healthy
Times Fun Club, a basement venue/art space that aspires to be for this
city’s weirdo art-punk kids what the Smell is for L.A.’s. The band
describe Healthy Times as “really supportive” and “the best place” in
the city to play. At a recent show there, the band played in the
corner, on the floor, to a few dozen teenagers and young
twentysomethings, all politely bobbing their heads to Talbot Tagora’s
off-kilter rhythms.
Onstage, the trio are reserved, even shy. Valley drums with a
staccato energy that only extends to her arms and legs; her face stays
totally blank, eyes focused on some empty middle distance, mouth often
agape. Greshowak and Ando play dueling guitars with their heads low,
and when they do step up to their mics to sing, it’s through a safely
obscuring haze of reverb and echo.
In person, they’re just as soft-spoken and obscure. Before an
interview, Ando warns that Valley won’t talk much, which is an
understatement—she says exactly five words the entire night. Ando
and Greshowak are more forthcoming, but they’re still nervous about
interviews; they’re hesitant and careful expressing themselves, and
their best ideas still sometimes come out only half-formed. It’s rather
a lot like their live show, which is to say it’s endearing and
promising even when it’s inscrutable or a little off.
“When we sing, we try to talk about a lot of family-oriented stuff,”
says Ando. “Gender politics, gay politics, queer kids, weird religions,
or at least ones that people think are cults.”
“The politics of patriarchy,” adds Greshowak.
Valley looks on in presumably approving
silence.
“In America, you’re supposed to get married and have kids and buy
stuff,” says Ando.
“That’s how we grew up, too,” Greshowak continues. “We all grew up
in families with the whole patriarchal structure and we try to
deconstruct those ideals.”
“You can’t really understand the lyrics, though,” says Ando. “But we
think it’s fun to sing about.”
They’re also concerned about the culture they see influencing kids
growing up in suburbia now, particularly the culture of aggressive
military recruitment, to which Talbot Tagora hope to suggest some
alternatives.
“Kids need to know that you can find different ways to go to college
or express yourself,” says Ando, “instead of feeling scared of society
and fighting another country to feel stronger.”
Their righteous if still developing politics almost prevented the
band from playing last week’s Young Ones showcase, a benefit for
Real Change.
“We thought [The Stranger] targeted us because we
were from the Eastside and we’d bring kids and rich people,” says Ando.
“I don’t think that’s true anymore. Mark and I live in a gentrifying
neighborhood right now, and we were worried people might think that we
don’t know what we’re doing when it comes to class, that we don’t
understand gentrification—artists coming in and the property
value going up. So we were confused, but we decided that it would be
good, because the money would be going back to people that were trying
to raise awareness about this stuff.”
With perfect comic timing, a homeless man interrupts the interview
to ask for $1.50. Nobody has money for him, but Ando and Greshowak seem
sincere when they say they’re sorry.
The young band’s sound is just as inspired, muddled, and gestational
as their politics. Ando and Greshowak’s vocals and guitars layer into
echoes and drones as often as they do catchy melodies, and Valley’s
rhythms turn sharply from tense grooves to jerking arrhythmia. Like
Smell standard-bearers No Age, Talbot Tagora often submerge insanely
poppy punk songs underneath a protective layer of noise. At their best,
as on the song “You Look Like a Human,” their pogoing energy just
breaks the surface, drums and guitars interlocking in tight formation,
chanted vocals emerging more or less intelligibly out of drone and
peripherally swirling delay.
When everything comes together, when their nervously ticking energy
meets their amorphous, well-intentioned aims head on, it’s pretty
inspiring. Even when it doesn’t quite spark, it’s still full of
exciting potential.
At the Young Ones showcase at Neumo’s, Ando took a moment between
songs to make a speech about gentrification and how “we’re all
responsible.” Through the heavy reverb, it was all but
incomprehensible. 