Trampled By Turtles
Website: www.trampledbyturtles.com
MySpace: www.myspace.com/trampledbyturtles
@ The Bottleneck
Tuesday Oct 05, 2010Trampled by Turtles is an acoustic quintet from Duluth, MN. Based on their instrumentation, the initial instinct is to view the band as a bluegrass or new-grass outfit, but spend more than a cursory moment with their music and it’s clear this tag doesn’t really fit.
For those who are simply fans of music, not bound by rules or forms, Trampled by Turtles take pieces of it all and just play from the heart. Call it alt-bluegrass, nontraditional string, indie-folk, rock-grass, punk-grass or anything else, they don’t care what name you put on it, just show up with an open mind and it won’t be long until you fall under their spell. Like all of us, where they were raised has influenced what they are and these guys didn’t grow up in southern roots country, they come from way up north where folks do it a little different.
TBT came together in 2003 when several local bands fell apart around the same time. Bandleader/vocalist/songwriter/guitarist Dave Simonett began playing with mandolin player Erik Berry as an acoustic duo at which point they met banjoist Dave Carroll. Soon they picked up bass player Tim Saxhaug and “just kind of started jamming in living rooms and playing for fun” explains Simonett. “It was kind of like a side project, and then eventually everybody else’s band split up so we started doing this one full-time.”
Here’s the key to understanding Trampled by Turtles: This is their first string band. “The instrumentation was different. None of us had played in an acoustic group before” says Simonett. And that’s why this isn’t a bluegrass band, all those other groups they came from were rock bands and they still play with that plugged-in intensity, only now they’re doing it with acoustic instruments and beautiful, high-lonesome vocal harmonies.
Beyond their raucous, genre-bending live shows, TBT are dedicated to songcraft and have released four albums. They recorded their 2004 debut, Songs from a Ghost Town, in an old Catholic church in Duluth. 2005’s Blue Sky and the Devil was also recorded in Duluth, and in 2006 they dropped their first live album, Live at Luce. Come 2007 TBT had laid a solid foundation, now they wanted to build on it.
In order to do so they brought in highly respected local producer/musician Rick Mattson. Mattson implemented drums, electric guitars and helped the band learn to use the studio. The result was Trouble, their most impressive album to date. The effort not only garnered the band more attention than ever, they also gained a new member with Ryan Young officially joining the group.
All of this brings us to Duluth. Self-released in 2008 on TBT's label Banjodad Records, the album shot up to number eight on the Billboard Bluegrass Chart. Again produced by Mattson, the majority of the tracks were laid down in Sparta, MN, the abandoned mining town Mattson calls home. Combining TBT’s live energy with their growing facility in the studio and Simonett’s inspired songwriting (think strains of Townes Van Zandt, Dylan, Wilco and you’re on the right path), Duluth is a high watermark for the band and has proven capable of bridging gaps between fanbases.
