The Great American Novel

The Great American Novel makes its Maxwell's debut, one of the last bands to enjoy that milestone
Jim Testa/For The Jersey Journal By Jim Testa/For The Jersey Journal
on June 07, 2013 at 10:09 AM, updated June 07, 2013 at 10:13 AM
greatamericannovel.jpgThe Great American Novel will perform at Maxwell's on Friday, June 14, one of the last bands to make its debut there before the club closes in July.
For decades, bands have looked at their first Maxwell’s show as more than just another gig. It’s been a rite of passage, a milestone, a valedictory event, a long-cherished goal. And with the news that Hoboken’s most venerated rock club would be closing at the end of July, only a handful of bands will ever have that experience again.

Once of them is the Great American Novel, four New York City kids who will get their shot on Friday, June 14, opening for the reunited Miracle of ’86 (featuring Brooklyn singer/songwriter Kevin Devine.)

“Maxwell’s is one of those legendary venues that every kid in high school knows about,” said Layne Montgomery, 21, GAN’s lead singer, bassist, and principal songwriter. “I saw a lot of my favorite bands play there, and it’s one of those venues that are just super intimate. The sound is great, they treat the bands very special. When you’re a young band in New York City, most of your first shows are at some terrible bar where they act like they don’t even want you there. Maxwell’s has always been different.”

Montgomery, who grew up in Las Vegas before moving to Manhattan as a teenager, recalled, “I missed the chance to play CBGB’s by a couple of weeks. So I’m glad to get in on this one before it’s gone too.”

Montgomery, guitarist J.R. Atkins, keyboardist Devin Calderin, and drummer Aidan Shepard came together a few years ago and have been playing the usual round of Manhattan and Brooklyn clubs. The band made its New Jersey debut a few weeks ago at Groove on Grove in Jersey City. “I really like playing in New Jersey, I feel like New Jersey likes us,” said Montgomery. “It’s going to be a long summer so hopefully we get around a little bit and keep playing as many shows as possible.”

Montgomery admitted his first Maxwell’s show seems a bit embarrassing in retrospect, but was really important to him at the time. “The first band I ever saw there was the Mooney Suzuki, I loved them in high school,” Montgomery said. “They were an amazing live band and they really shaped my stage persona and my music to some degree. Seeing them at Maxwell’s was one of the best shows ever.”

Mooney Suzuki’s retro-garage rock and flamboyant stage presence might be out of fashion with the current wave of chilled-out hipster Brooklyn bands, but Montgomery insisted they were an important part of New York City’s musical history. “It’s funny now because I feel like they were one of my geeky high-school infatuations, and people today are like, them, really? But they were a huge influence on the Strokes. I had their first two singles and they were definitely doing the Strokes’ sound before the Strokes came along. The Strokes just put it all into a sexier package.”

The Great American Novel definitely follow in the footsteps of Mooney Suzuki’s energetic stage presence and the Strokes’ angular riffs, but add a nerdy charm with songs about Layne’s literary inclinations and his reputed failures with girls. The band released “Kissing,” its first full length, last year and is planning its second album for this summer.

“We’re going to call it ‘The Frown Album,’” said Montgomery, although the title will actually be a frowning face emoticon. The band’s about to finish recording the album at Mama Coco’s Funky Kitchen, the DIY studio in Brooklyn that’s become the nexus of an exciting collection of musicians, artists, and engineers who are creating their own music scene.

“This last year was a pretty magical year for all of us,” enthused Montgomery. “I’m so thankful we are a part of the Mama Coco’s family. Especially in New York, bands can be so stand-offish and aggressive and dog-eat-dog. It’s been amazing to have a community where you know people will listen to your records, you know they’ll be giving you good feedback, and they’ll be coming to your shows. In a way we can be really mean to each other, but in a loving way - a mixture of admiration and competition, where you’re like, nuts, why didn’t we think of that first? Why didn’t I write that song?”

The Great American Novel will be appearing at Maxwell’s on Friday, June 14 with Miracle Of ’86 and Year of The Dragon. Showtime is 9 p.m. and admission is $17.50 for advanced tickets, $20 at the door.

© 2013 NJ.com. All rights reserved. - NJ.com

The Great American Novel makes its Maxwell's debut, one of the last bands to enjoy that milestone
Jim Testa/For The Jersey Journal By Jim Testa/For The Jersey Journal
on June 07, 2013 at 10:09 AM, updated June 07, 2013 at 10:13 AM
greatamericannovel.jpgThe Great American Novel will perform at Maxwell's on Friday, June 14, one of the last bands to make its debut there before the club closes in July.
For decades, bands have looked at their first Maxwell’s show as more than just another gig. It’s been a rite of passage, a milestone, a valedictory event, a long-cherished goal. And with the news that Hoboken’s most venerated rock club would be closing at the end of July, only a handful of bands will ever have that experience again.

Once of them is the Great American Novel, four New York City kids who will get their shot on Friday, June 14, opening for the reunited Miracle of ’86 (featuring Brooklyn singer/songwriter Kevin Devine.)

“Maxwell’s is one of those legendary venues that every kid in high school knows about,” said Layne Montgomery, 21, GAN’s lead singer, bassist, and principal songwriter. “I saw a lot of my favorite bands play there, and it’s one of those venues that are just super intimate. The sound is great, they treat the bands very special. When you’re a young band in New York City, most of your first shows are at some terrible bar where they act like they don’t even want you there. Maxwell’s has always been different.”

Montgomery, who grew up in Las Vegas before moving to Manhattan as a teenager, recalled, “I missed the chance to play CBGB’s by a couple of weeks. So I’m glad to get in on this one before it’s gone too.”

Montgomery, guitarist J.R. Atkins, keyboardist Devin Calderin, and drummer Aidan Shepard came together a few years ago and have been playing the usual round of Manhattan and Brooklyn clubs. The band made its New Jersey debut a few weeks ago at Groove on Grove in Jersey City. “I really like playing in New Jersey, I feel like New Jersey likes us,” said Montgomery. “It’s going to be a long summer so hopefully we get around a little bit and keep playing as many shows as possible.”

Montgomery admitted his first Maxwell’s show seems a bit embarrassing in retrospect, but was really important to him at the time. “The first band I ever saw there was the Mooney Suzuki, I loved them in high school,” Montgomery said. “They were an amazing live band and they really shaped my stage persona and my music to some degree. Seeing them at Maxwell’s was one of the best shows ever.”

Mooney Suzuki’s retro-garage rock and flamboyant stage presence might be out of fashion with the current wave of chilled-out hipster Brooklyn bands, but Montgomery insisted they were an important part of New York City’s musical history. “It’s funny now because I feel like they were one of my geeky high-school infatuations, and people today are like, them, really? But they were a huge influence on the Strokes. I had their first two singles and they were definitely doing the Strokes’ sound before the Strokes came along. The Strokes just put it all into a sexier package.”

The Great American Novel definitely follow in the footsteps of Mooney Suzuki’s energetic stage presence and the Strokes’ angular riffs, but add a nerdy charm with songs about Layne’s literary inclinations and his reputed failures with girls. The band released “Kissing,” its first full length, last year and is planning its second album for this summer.

“We’re going to call it ‘The Frown Album,’” said Montgomery, although the title will actually be a frowning face emoticon. The band’s about to finish recording the album at Mama Coco’s Funky Kitchen, the DIY studio in Brooklyn that’s become the nexus of an exciting collection of musicians, artists, and engineers who are creating their own music scene.

“This last year was a pretty magical year for all of us,” enthused Montgomery. “I’m so thankful we are a part of the Mama Coco’s family. Especially in New York, bands can be so stand-offish and aggressive and dog-eat-dog. It’s been amazing to have a community where you know people will listen to your records, you know they’ll be giving you good feedback, and they’ll be coming to your shows. In a way we can be really mean to each other, but in a loving way - a mixture of admiration and competition, where you’re like, nuts, why didn’t we think of that first? Why didn’t I write that song?”

The Great American Novel will be appearing at Maxwell’s on Friday, June 14 with Miracle Of ’86 and Year of The Dragon. Showtime is 9 p.m. and admission is $17.50 for advanced tickets, $20 at the door.

© 2013 NJ.com. All rights reserved. - NJ.com

Rock ‘n’ roll is due for a comeback; not even the most effete hipsters can listen to Bon Iver all the time.

Nowhere has that been more apparent than at Mama Coco’s Funky Kitchen, the small studio in Brooklyn that’s nurtured a community of talented twentysomethings whose bands infuse classic blues, garage, and Sixties pop tropes into contemporary indie-rock. The Harmonica Lewinskies focus on sweaty, greasy soul and R&B, Ghost Pal (which features Mama Coco’s house producer, Oliver Ignatius) tends to be more cerebral, while The Great American Novel set out on their sophomore full-length Kissing to reclaim the golden era of Stiff Records power-pop for lovesick bookworms.

Frontman Layne Montgomery’s pitchy, yelping vocals may be an acquired taste, but his engagingly self-deprecating sense of humor (try to imagine a Brooklyn wunderkind like Brad Oberhofer singing “I’m so bad with girls”) and uncanny knack for hooky choruses is downright irresistible. While Montgomery’s vocals can’t be avoided, the rest of GAN – guitarist JR Atkins, guitarist Peter Kilpin, keyboardist Devin Calderin, and drummer Zac Coe – shines here, with each member getting at least one chance to really kick out the jams and display their impressive chops.

The band can whip out ecstatic party jams (try not standing still to the exuberant “American Weekend” or the fuzzed-out garage-stomp of “Are You Sure You Don’t Wanna Hang Out?” ) or flesh out melodies with ear-tickling textures (like the barrelhouse piano and doo-wop harmonies that kickstart the opening track, “Sleeping Alone.” ) And at Mama Coco’s Funky Kitchen, no one understands the words “we can’t do it.” So throughout this album, you’re constantly impressed by extra little touches - Springsteen-esque peals of glockenspiel, lush Pet Sounds-like vocal harmonies, Stax/Volt style horns. Besides the “Born To Run” glockenspiel, Calderin contributes a bit of Roy Bittan-like piano tinkling, but the E Street comparisons end when the band kicks into giddy high gear and mashes up equal parts of Eighties Stiff Records-era power-pop and Nineties Pavement-esque squall.

On GAN’s sloppier, less compelling first album You & I, the hooks were there but the band didn’t own its own style yet. On Kissing, the name of the band makes perfect sense: Montgomery revels in his inner geek, resulting in sparkling wordplay on tracks like “Raymond Carver,” “Does This Train Stop At 57th Street?” (with its frank appraisal of parent/son relationships,) and especially “All The Sad Young Literary Men” (“she asked if I read Nabokov, I said no but I loved Philip Roth.”) Just as Conor Oberst emerged a decade ago as the poet laureate of socially retarded teenagers, Layne Montgomery might just be the J.D. Salinger of twentysomething angst, churning out refreshingly honest laments about crushes and kissing and going to bed alone; this record’s not so much about post-adolescent sex and romance as it is a treatise on obsessing over how nice it would be to have a girlfriend. - Jersey Beat

Rock ‘n’ roll is due for a comeback; not even the most effete hipsters can listen to Bon Iver all the time.

Nowhere has that been more apparent than at Mama Coco’s Funky Kitchen, the small studio in Brooklyn that’s nurtured a community of talented twentysomethings whose bands infuse classic blues, garage, and Sixties pop tropes into contemporary indie-rock. The Harmonica Lewinskies focus on sweaty, greasy soul and R&B, Ghost Pal (which features Mama Coco’s house producer, Oliver Ignatius) tends to be more cerebral, while The Great American Novel set out on their sophomore full-length Kissing to reclaim the golden era of Stiff Records power-pop for lovesick bookworms.

Frontman Layne Montgomery’s pitchy, yelping vocals may be an acquired taste, but his engagingly self-deprecating sense of humor (try to imagine a Brooklyn wunderkind like Brad Oberhofer singing “I’m so bad with girls”) and uncanny knack for hooky choruses is downright irresistible. While Montgomery’s vocals can’t be avoided, the rest of GAN – guitarist JR Atkins, guitarist Peter Kilpin, keyboardist Devin Calderin, and drummer Zac Coe – shines here, with each member getting at least one chance to really kick out the jams and display their impressive chops.

The band can whip out ecstatic party jams (try not standing still to the exuberant “American Weekend” or the fuzzed-out garage-stomp of “Are You Sure You Don’t Wanna Hang Out?” ) or flesh out melodies with ear-tickling textures (like the barrelhouse piano and doo-wop harmonies that kickstart the opening track, “Sleeping Alone.” ) And at Mama Coco’s Funky Kitchen, no one understands the words “we can’t do it.” So throughout this album, you’re constantly impressed by extra little touches - Springsteen-esque peals of glockenspiel, lush Pet Sounds-like vocal harmonies, Stax/Volt style horns. Besides the “Born To Run” glockenspiel, Calderin contributes a bit of Roy Bittan-like piano tinkling, but the E Street comparisons end when the band kicks into giddy high gear and mashes up equal parts of Eighties Stiff Records-era power-pop and Nineties Pavement-esque squall.

On GAN’s sloppier, less compelling first album You & I, the hooks were there but the band didn’t own its own style yet. On Kissing, the name of the band makes perfect sense: Montgomery revels in his inner geek, resulting in sparkling wordplay on tracks like “Raymond Carver,” “Does This Train Stop At 57th Street?” (with its frank appraisal of parent/son relationships,) and especially “All The Sad Young Literary Men” (“she asked if I read Nabokov, I said no but I loved Philip Roth.”) Just as Conor Oberst emerged a decade ago as the poet laureate of socially retarded teenagers, Layne Montgomery might just be the J.D. Salinger of twentysomething angst, churning out refreshingly honest laments about crushes and kissing and going to bed alone; this record’s not so much about post-adolescent sex and romance as it is a treatise on obsessing over how nice it would be to have a girlfriend. - Jersey Beat

Among the great city DIY acts caught in perpetual motion, The Great American Novel delivers a single from their upcoming June 19th release, Kissing. ’American Weekend‘ is a sharply lit punk rock track toned back to the timbre of speedy Arcade Fire that feels as good as ‘King of the Rodeo’. With the driving force that awlways ironically defined the band, their newest is a constant reminder that they are indeed in control. - Dingus on Music

Among the great city DIY acts caught in perpetual motion, The Great American Novel delivers a single from their upcoming June 19th release, Kissing. ’American Weekend‘ is a sharply lit punk rock track toned back to the timbre of speedy Arcade Fire that feels as good as ‘King of the Rodeo’. With the driving force that awlways ironically defined the band, their newest is a constant reminder that they are indeed in control. - Dingus on Music

Pull down the sun roof to your car, add a little bit of lime and ice to your drink- The Great American Novel has released another excellent summery album, Kissing. From the first second the opening song (Sleeping Alone) comes on, you can’t help but smile and get addicted to its great vibe. Kissing is one of those fantastic albums that seamlessly encompasses many different tunes and types of sounds within it’s 35 minute duration. Yet, when listening to it in completion, there is a certain sense of finality about it. It transitions from one song in such a way that it brings you along for the top-down, music-blasting road trip right along with it. It screams non-stop summer, yet each song has something different to bring.

If I could suggest anything, it would be to sit down in the sun and listen to it in order from start to finish. At first listen, you might be thrown off a bit by the tone of the vocals, but the album grows on you, becoming a great summer companion.

Eighth track (Are You Sure You Don’t Wanna Hang Out) adds an excellent unexpected British-Punk tune, but is followed closely by a song that helps crescendo the album to it’s close - energetic tenth track (Layne Montgomery is Bad at Girls) has some awesome work in it.

This album is stock full of fun riffs, catchy tunes, lots of summer anthems, and no doubt after listening to it you’ll agree that The Great American Novel is the most fun you’ve had in a long time, too. - Indecent Xposure

Pull down the sun roof to your car, add a little bit of lime and ice to your drink- The Great American Novel has released another excellent summery album, Kissing. From the first second the opening song (Sleeping Alone) comes on, you can’t help but smile and get addicted to its great vibe. Kissing is one of those fantastic albums that seamlessly encompasses many different tunes and types of sounds within it’s 35 minute duration. Yet, when listening to it in completion, there is a certain sense of finality about it. It transitions from one song in such a way that it brings you along for the top-down, music-blasting road trip right along with it. It screams non-stop summer, yet each song has something different to bring.

If I could suggest anything, it would be to sit down in the sun and listen to it in order from start to finish. At first listen, you might be thrown off a bit by the tone of the vocals, but the album grows on you, becoming a great summer companion.

Eighth track (Are You Sure You Don’t Wanna Hang Out) adds an excellent unexpected British-Punk tune, but is followed closely by a song that helps crescendo the album to it’s close - energetic tenth track (Layne Montgomery is Bad at Girls) has some awesome work in it.

This album is stock full of fun riffs, catchy tunes, lots of summer anthems, and no doubt after listening to it you’ll agree that The Great American Novel is the most fun you’ve had in a long time, too. - Indecent Xposure

Last time The Great American Novel made an album it was a group of guys singing their lungs out, having fun, and probably in a garage. Now with Kissing, the group’s second album, that fun in the garage is still there but now it has heart.

Hand claps and bouncy piano chords begin the album with “Sleeping Alone,” a song that perfectly introduces the album, the band, and what the listener is about to hop into. The songs found on Kissing give a feeling of a friend opening up to you, about stories dealing with loved ones or how confused they are about a certain subject. And the one thing that the listener will soon find out about Kissing is that it is extremely hard to not sing along with. The choruses to the songs “American Weekends,” “You’re Probably Good at Kissing,” and The Strokes-like “Does This Train Stop at 57th Street?” pack a middle-of-the-album punch filled with catchyness and melodies that’ll be stuck in ears for days.

The last few songs on the album visit a different side of the band. Right after the loud Hold Steady-sounding “Are You Sure You Don’t Wanna Hang Out?” and the slow tempo “I Want You,” Kissing opens up a little bit more once “Layne Montgomery is Bad at Girls” starts playing. The hats come off right when the horns begin, the solos start, and the organ is pounded in “Bad at Girls,” most likely the album’s best song. It’s one of those songs that tells the listener that the album is about to end, but it’s alright.

The title track “Kissing” starts up and the album suddenly has a new life to it. “Kissing” is the perfect closer to its album, having a drum solo, electronic sounds, and lyrics from the opening track making the listener want to hit play once again. Which is really what Kissing does (the album and the actual action, at least I hope) it makes the receiver want some more of the same thing.

Grade: A- - Based on Nothing

Last time The Great American Novel made an album it was a group of guys singing their lungs out, having fun, and probably in a garage. Now with Kissing, the group’s second album, that fun in the garage is still there but now it has heart.

Hand claps and bouncy piano chords begin the album with “Sleeping Alone,” a song that perfectly introduces the album, the band, and what the listener is about to hop into. The songs found on Kissing give a feeling of a friend opening up to you, about stories dealing with loved ones or how confused they are about a certain subject. And the one thing that the listener will soon find out about Kissing is that it is extremely hard to not sing along with. The choruses to the songs “American Weekends,” “You’re Probably Good at Kissing,” and The Strokes-like “Does This Train Stop at 57th Street?” pack a middle-of-the-album punch filled with catchyness and melodies that’ll be stuck in ears for days.

The last few songs on the album visit a different side of the band. Right after the loud Hold Steady-sounding “Are You Sure You Don’t Wanna Hang Out?” and the slow tempo “I Want You,” Kissing opens up a little bit more once “Layne Montgomery is Bad at Girls” starts playing. The hats come off right when the horns begin, the solos start, and the organ is pounded in “Bad at Girls,” most likely the album’s best song. It’s one of those songs that tells the listener that the album is about to end, but it’s alright.

The title track “Kissing” starts up and the album suddenly has a new life to it. “Kissing” is the perfect closer to its album, having a drum solo, electronic sounds, and lyrics from the opening track making the listener want to hit play once again. Which is really what Kissing does (the album and the actual action, at least I hope) it makes the receiver want some more of the same thing.

Grade: A- - Based on Nothing