Set sail with Us and the Ship Saturday
Fans of exciting original music in Texarkana have been blessed with a new and welcome presence the past couple years in Us and the Ship.
On the cusp of self-releasing their album “Knowledge Good, Knowledge Bad,” this intense-and-sludgy, rocking-yet-introspective Southern indie rock band plays the Silver Dollar this Saturday night on a bill of four top area bands.
Keith Tubbs, whose enigmatic lyrics are part of the quintessential Us and the Ship experience, provides passionate lead vocals and guitar. He’s joined by both Daniel Thomason and Skyler House on guitar and vocals, David Jeans helming the bass and, working the drums, newest member Jordan Daley.
They’ve come a long way since living together in a trailer out in the country. In fact, this ambitious band, named for a C.S. Lewis reference, will gradually move to Nashville, Tenn., in 2014 to pursue making music for a living.
“Knowledge Good, Knowledge Bad” has been in the works for years. It survived the departure of one drummer. It also received a recent boost through a Kickstarter campaign, which raised the band more than $1,300.
When Daley joined, the album’s songs were reworked and the album became a “different beast,” Thomason explained. Finally, after working on those songs again, they decided to record.
“So we recorded the past two months and we are done with tracking now, and we’re in the process of mixing and mastering,
getting everything ready, getting the artwork together and putting it all together as a package,” Thomason said.
Though the product of a long process, they say it’s worth it. They recorded it themselves primarily at their own practice space. Kickstarter success means they’ll have copies to distribute.
“It’s turning out better, I think, than we could ever imagine,” Thomason said.
He describes this release as something of a marriage between the prettier sound of their EP and the harder, more brutal music that informed their musical heritage.
“We just started writing a little bit heavier music, and I think it’s just our old influences coming back out and mixing with the new,” Thomason said.
Look for an album release by the end of the year, perhaps as a New Year’s Eve release.
For Us and the Ship, writing is collaborative. House will bring a riff to the band. “And then we’ll write on it,” Thomason said, adding, “There’s hardly ever a part in a song that is totally controlled by one person.”
The Kickstarter success was a surprise. They expected to make it in a month. “We had two weeks left and we were almost already there,” Daley said.
One of the most distinctive aspects of Us and the Ship are the lyrics penned by Tubbs, who draws influence from classic literature and just things he sees in the world.
“It’s always different. I don’t try to write every song the same way,” Tubbs said. They’ll try fitting his words to the music.
“A lot of times I’ll have something written already and the band will have something they bring to the table, and then we’ll start writing on it,” he said. They might work a melody from there, or Tubbs may have a melody in mind.
His bandmates appreciate his artistry.
“The way I perceive it, our music has a mystique to it,” Thomason said. You can listen to a part of a song, but on the fiftieth listen there’s still something new coming at you. He likens it to looking at an abstract painting. “In his lyrics, I feel like it’s the same way.”
About this new album, Tubbs said there’s a concept with the songs. They compare the songs to book chapters.
After coming together as a band just a few years ago, they soon wrote and began creating their first release, an EP they recorded in the back room of that trailer. It sounds like an Us and the Ship live show.
“At that time we were all living in the trailer together in Genoa,” Thomason recalled. The living room was the jam room.
Daley says making music they like is both fun and meaningful. To hear him speak, they sound like brothers.
“You can feel the emotions when you watch us live and when you listen to the recordings,” he said.
Thomason says a reason they’re emotionally involved in this sort of music is that it’s not commonly celebrated here. He called it both a release and a relief to play together, something of a miracle, in fact.
“I don’t want to sound pompous but we’ve reached the peak, basically, with what we can do as a band in this town,” he said. Hence, the move to Nashville in 2014. They want this as a career.
Saturday offers a night of true homegrown Texarkana-area indie music. Joining Us and the Ship are the Jaredd Reed Band, Gentle Giants and Taken by a Hawk.
(Cover is $5. The show starts around 8 p.m. The Silver Dollar is located at 1107 East St. in Texarkana, Ark. More info: 870772-2095.)