Jagged Leaves
Row, row, your boat with Jagged Leaves’ own Dan Penta.
Fairfax County, VA by D.C. by NYC artist Dan Penta is Jagged Leaves, who readies album Nightmare Afternoon available now from Yellow K Records, and delivers the world premiere of “Low & Wet” with us today. A song about scrapping, surviving, and rising above meager means and not-exactly-always-escaping the downpour of the elements; Penta finally finds a home with Yellow K for his songs that for years were sequestered to CDRs shared among friends, family, and fellow luminaries. Among these colleagues and fans are folks like Diane Cluck, Moldy Peaches, Jeff Lewis, Langhorne Slim, and Regina Spektor who recalls the artist’s entrance into the NYC anti-folk-folds from back in 1999:
I remember hearing Dan play when I began going to the Sidewalk Cafe open mic. He had interesting lyrics and passionate delivery and always stood out as one of the unique voices in that scene.
Adam Green also described Dan’s humble beginnings from the Sidewalk Cafe days, and the honesty of his music:
Affecting poetic songs about frustration and depression, with a voice that shreds beautifully. It always feels genuine.
But it was a chance meeting with New God’s Kenny Tompkins that would get the Yellow K ball rolling, and began a tale of timeless friendship that would lead to Dan recording his Jagged Leaves album with Vincent Cacchione somewhere near Woodstock in a wintry cabin. As a result, the natural essence of the Jagged Leaves sound was born like a reborn Greenwich Village nu-folk decade that seeks for something greater beyond the stool pigeon bowler derby-wearing sets of trust fund strapped so-called vagabonds. Dan delivers without affectation or posturing, delivering honest songs ripped from the heart and soul of the human struggle for survival with arrangements fit to be pressed on vintage Vanguard wax.
“Low & Wet” begins at first simply with guitar strums, right before Dan shines the Jagged Leaves vision along with a full arrangement of organs, drums, strings, and epic accompaniment. In a masterful presentation of the two and a half-minute pop song format, the Jagged Leaves sound spells out a vibe and feeling that fits into the scene of a vibrant independent cafe or an anarchic DIY space or dive. Penta drives home the working class troubadour sentiment with vocals untreated but backed up with warm accompaniment and an arrangement that provides a kind of kindred companionship for all listening lonely hearts. With an earnest attitude and a memorable voice that rings with resolve; we had a chance to learn more about the histories of Jagged Leaves in our following interview with Dan Penta.
We’re big fans of Kenny Tompkins and his rad band New God with his brother Curt, tell us about that fateful meeting in Athens, Georgia at the Flicker Theater to your latest correspondences, conversations of interest, and interactions.
The first time I met the Tompkins brothers, they were opening for Circa Survive at Bowery Ballroom. As much a I’d love to, I’ve never played a show in Athens. The gentleman whom Kenny and Curt heard playing my song at Flicker Theater was Colby Carter, who has a band down there called Mouser. I’ve never met Colby, but we have a mutual friend named James Colvin, who plays bass currently in a band called Blankus Larry. I believe it was James who put Colby on to my music, and Colby contacted me some time back, and we exchanged some CDRs and letters and such.
Kenny and Curt are amazingly supportive. They make fantastic music. And they’re two of the sweetest sweethearts you could ever hope to meet. They’ve been nice enough to get us on some out of town bills with New God. And they’ve come up to the city a couple times to play with us. Once at Sidewalk and once at Bowery Electric. Curt’s actually coming up to play drums in Jagged Leaved at Palisades on February 5th, because Patrick Curry is touring with Air Waves right now.
One of my funnest memories is reciting a cappella Wu-Tang raps with Kenny late one night after a show in Frostburg, where Yellow K is based, and then passing around a guitar for a Hank Williams sing-a-long!
How did the jump from DC to NYC impact you creatively, and how do you describe your own type of songwriting process that you employ sometimes/always/or on occasion?
I’m not exactly from DC. I spent my teenage years in Fairfax County, VA. I drifted around there for a while after high school. It was a cultural wasteland, at least for me at the time. If you were all about hardcore punk then there was definitely something happening, something to be a part of. That was never really my thing, not in any major way. So when I came to NYC and found all these like-minded freaks, it was a revelation. I’m talking about the Moldy Peaches and Jeff Lewis and Regina Spektor and Diane Cluck and Langhorne Slim, and a couple dozen others that most people have never heard of. It changed my trajectory and my concept of what is possible.
As far as my writing process, I don’t imagine that it’s incredibly unique or exceptional. Like many writers, I feel like an intermediary, between ‘the form and the flame’, as it’s been said. Not that the songs aren’t informed by my experiences and impressions. But as far as how it actually goes down, I just strum some chords and vocalize a melody, until the mumbles become words.
Nature dwelling adventures with Dan Penta of Jagged Leaves.
Describe how Vincent Cacchione’s production assist impacted the album, along with being up in the mountains that tower over Woodstock.
I have a mass of recordings that have never really seen the light of day, and a lot of them are crap, probably because Vin didn’t produce them. He gets the music intuitively, and he has the skills and vision to make it blossom. He uses good mics, and he knows how to use them. I can get controlling and nit-picky about mixes, but I was able to just step out of that, and let Vin work his magic without my interference. Vin is also the only one besides myself who plays on every song on Nightmare Afternoon.
The Jagged Leaves album Nightmare Afternoon will be available February 5 from Yellow K Records.
