If it's slow, it's Low

Duluth trio shares distinctive sound with worldwide audience

Mark Earnest, Duluth News-Tribune. August 18, 1996

The audience is transfixed.

The two men and one woman on stage have been riding the same three-note drone for almost five minutes now. The sound comes in waves, alternately beautiful and raucous as it swells. The expressions on the musicians' faces are pained but determined as they press on with this "music."

The 300-plus crowd of mostly young listeners stands still for most of it. At about 10 minutes, some fans near the front start to sway — either dancing to the beatless drone or trying to stay alert. It's hard to tell. Some near the back choose to sit down on the club's moth-eaten couches for a breather.

The song ends, totaling almost 15 minutes. After about 10 seconds of nerve-wracking silence, the room erupts into applause and hoots of approval.

And this catharsis is just the first song in a 60-minute set at Chicago's Lounge Ax: Business-as-usual for the groundbreakers in Low, the Duluth band that has done two important things in the national rock scene — create a fresh sound in the stale world of alternative rock, and prove that influential bands can come from smaller cities like Duluth.

If any year would be the one to bring guitarist Alan Sparhawk, bassist Zak Sally and drummer Mimi Parker to a higher level, it would be 1996.

After three national releases on Vernon Yard, a strong new CD "The Curtain Hits the Cast" and a tour this fall, the time is ripe for even more people to submit to Low's quiet power.

Challenging style

But Low's not an easy sell. It plays very slowly. Think of the slowest ballad currently on alternative radio. Now slow it down some more. This isn't the kind of music a punk fan would love, and Low knows it.

"We've been playing around for awhile and we always have a few extreme reactions out there, but people have come to see us for the most part and they know what to expect," Sparhawk said.

"We had a couple of 'good' reactions in Europe" this summer, Parker said. "A surf band opened up for us in Denmark so we didn't go over that well."

This supports one of Sparhawk's acknowledged goals for Low when it started: To "annoy people" as he put it, to startle audiences used to loud, guitar-driven, fast rock.

Now that it has a core following used to the sparseness, Low doesn't intend to challenge them by making a bunch of noise, even though it does that on occasion.

"I don't see noise as a direction we're going in," Sparhawk said. "As we continue to experiment with these boundaries we've set for ourselves, we do end up pushing against the wall a bit, like with distorted (guitars). But it's more an experiment than starting a new direction."

"If we're noisy, it's got to be in a non cop-out way," Sally said.

"In our song 'Waltz,' if the crowd is really chatty and loud, we make the distorted part even longer," Parker said.

"But that's never satisfying to do," Sparhawk added. "To say, 'They don't like us' and end up playing louder. That's why we think about it more and we're really careful not to play like that all the time."

The big break

Most bands suffer in obscurity for years before getting their big break. Low was together less than six months before the tape it sent to noted producer Kramer fell into the hands of Vernon Yard, sending the band on its newfound career.

But it's not like Low just picked up instruments overnight. Sparhawk — and briefly Sally — were in Zen Identity, a Duluth band formed in 1988 that was one of the few alternative bands in town for awhile.

Where it fell apart was when Zen Identity moved to Minneapolis, hoping to make it big. Instead, Sparhawk quit the band soon after moving. Zen has since reformed in the Twin Cities.

"There are two ways you can be in a Duluth band: Either you're happy with playing in your hometown, or you try and play out of state. Moving to Minneapolis isn't the answer."

Instead, Low built its audience in other cities. In fact, if Low's rise means anything, skipping Minneapolis altogether may be the way to go for some.

Time for progression

Now is a crucial time for Low. It's a chance for the band to continue building a devoted following and to jell even further with newest member Sally.

Sparhawk and Parker — married for six years now — formed Low with original bassist John Nichols, who quit the group after the first album. Sally is a high-school chum of Sparhawk's who also did the live sound on West Coast tours. While living in Oakland in 1994, Sally got the call from Sparhawk to join Low.

Sally and his Low bandmates are at a crossroads, reaching a third album, a rarity in an alternative music climate that dumps bands off major labels as soon as six weeks after the record comes out (the band Extra Fancy) or doesn't release a record at all before terminating a contract (Brenda Kahn or Run Westy Run).

This probably won't be the case for Low, even if "Cast" doesn't double its usual sales figures, which is what David Levine expects.

Levine is an artists and repertoire director and head of video for Vernon Yard, Low's label. He said "Cast" will get a bigger push than Low's previous records.

"The plot at radio is to go where we've had success in the past," Levine said. "The band has done especially well at college radio. Our goal is to be in the top five or 10 there."

Levine said he'll then pitch the band to more commercial outlets, especially the softer adult alternative (AAA) stations. But he believes it'll be a harder sell to commercial rock or alternative stations.

"Modern rock stations where Pearl Jam and Stone Temple Pilots are the big players... no, Low doesn't fit into that," he said. "Though where I think they would do well is in the back-door places like NPR or AAA radio."

While Levine said the company has high hopes for Low, he emphasized the band wouldn't be thrown off the label if "Cast" doesn't break them into the mainstream.

"Low is not an easy thing for people to digest," Levine said. "It will take a little time, and we're willing to wait. As long as they keep developing musically and going forward, which is what they've done in the past, I think we'll continue working with them."

Low as example

Although it may seem like a new form of rock, there is precedent for the Low sound. Bands in the '80s like the Cowboy Junkies, Mazzy Star and Galaxie 500 paved the way for what is alternately labelled "slowcore" or "sadcore."

This type of music features slow tempos, rudimentary drum-beats, and a hushed singing style. Some slowcore bands like Codeine, Bedhead or Spectrum will punch through the torpor with bursts of noise and guitar feedback.

But it's Low that is being used more often than not as a benchmark for this movement. Alternative Press said the band Siddal looks "toward the sparse harmonies of Low," for its sound. Siddal, from Washington, D.C., used that quote in an advertisement for its latest CD.

College Music Journal said in its latest issue that the Texas band Comet "also traffics in the gentle guitar washes of so many bands (like) Low, Luna or Bedhead."

And although Rolling Stone or Spin haven't acknowledged Low, the magazine Raygun did a lengthy article on slow-rock bands last year, with a prominent chunk featuring the Duluth trio.

What? A cultural reference from Duluth? Which doesn't have a full-time alternative venue?

As befitting their personalities, Sparhawk, Parker and Sally gently toss off any claims they are the originators of a sound.

"There seem to be a lot of different bands that sound like us, but most of them stop short of sounding just like us," Sally said.

"Most of them take either the slowness or the harmonies, but never both," Parker said, with Sparhawk adding that "it's nice not to have Low clones everywhere."

The band and the fans

They may not have clones, but Low does have devoted fans. The only problem Low has with this is the members' own shyness. During this interview, a young fan in a Cure T-shirt noticed the band, came up to the table, and simply said "You're Low, huh? Cool."

This kind of softer acknowledgement happens a lot to Low, but Sally still said "the attention is... bizarre."

"We're still really surprised when it happens," said Spar- hawk, with Parker adding that "it happens to us in the weirdest places. When we were in New York, someone spotted us on the subway. And in London at this record store, although that kid was from Florida."

Sparhawk said the band's reluctance to draw attention to its position in the "scene" is "very Northern Minnesotan. It's the way we were raised, to not have a big ego about things.

"And the whole ego thing is just... why? Why do that? We may have done some interesting stuff here, but we're really the same losers you went to school with, you know? And we shovel our walks, too. It's nothing, really."

This self-effacing view extends to the band's promotional image, too. Parker said Vernon Yard "talked about doing a billboard in Minneapolis for the new record, and they wanted it to be pictures of all of us. We were all saying, 'No, no.' So now they're going to do the cover of the re- cord."

"The record company has been very good to us, and understands how we feel about things like that," Sparhawk said. "There are some labels that really torture their bands."

Low may be humble, but it isn't lazy. The band is planning a full year of promotion for the new record. The band reconvenes in New York for a September-October national tour with the popular college-rock band Versus. Another jaunt to Europe follows in 1996.