She’s a sight down in the canyon stars above and hell below
Silver moon her sole companion, pours shadows on the road
She thinks on what she used to be through the haze of all she lost
Finds defeat in victory, the little engine that could not
She’s blooming through the black
— Parsonsfield
“Blooming Through the Black”
An old ax factory is an unusual place to record an album, but for the Leverett band Parsonsfield, it was the perfect choice.
The group, which was formerly known as Poor Old Shine, wrote and recorded its new album, “Blooming Through The Black” in an old factory on the banks of the Farmington River in Collinsville, Conn. Working in this setting this alt-folk band found the creative inspiration they needed to take its sound in striking new directions.
Parsonsfield, which formed when its five members met at a folk club while attending the University of Connecticut, released its self-titled debut in 2013. That album was full of foot-stomping bluegrass, folk, old-timey and rock-tinged songs that won the band critical acclaim and comparisons to bands like the Avett Brothers. Their rowdy live shows that often featured a solo or two played on the saw that cemented their status as a rising band on the Americana scene.
Parsonsfield, who records for Signature Sounds of Northampton, has a strong local following and have performed at various venues throughout the valley. They love this area so much that the majority of the band’s members moved to Leverett last year and set up Parsonsfield’s headquarters there. The band is currently touring across the country in support of “Blooming Through the Black” but will return home to play two local CD release shows at the Iron Horse Music Hall in Northampton.
The first will be on Thursday, Oct. 20, at 7 p.m and the second will be on Saturday, Oct. 22 also at 7 p.m.
Before recording the new album, the band was in Toronto where they wrote and performed the score for “The Heart of Robin Hood” for the American Repertory Theater. “I feel that the play was a big influence on the band because we were writing instrumental pieces and stretching ourselves in ways that we had never done,” said Chris Freeman, the banjo player and vocalist for the group.
“We are a better band for having done it, but after performing eight shows a week and over 300 performances, it got a bit monotonous,” Freeman said, calling from a tour stop in Washington state.
That experience, which required the band to wear in-ear monitors and to never alter the music they were playing night after night, left the Parsonsfield yearning to create music in a less restrained, more open setting. They found what they were looking for when they discovered the old ax factory in Collinsville, the area where Freeman grew up.
The band, which in addition to Freeman includes Antonio Alcorn on mandolin, Max Shakun on vocals, pump organ and guitar, Harrison Goodale on bass; and Erik Hischmann on drums, joined with producer Sam Kassirer (Josh Ritter, Lake Street Dive) and spent six months in the factory writing and recording “Blooming Through the Black.” All the band members participated in the songwriting process and the songs they have crafted here are less bluegrass influenced than the music on their debut. They experiment more with different sounds and instrumentation and also place more emphasis on the lyrics and vocals. This disc features some of the band’s most melodic music set against some of its quietest. Quiet isn’t usually a word we associate with Parsonsfield, but the band shows their slower more pensive side on songs like “Mental Remedy” and “Water Through a Mill.”
“We were realizing the power that we had in creating moods,” Freeman explained. “That was sort of our job in the play, and we realized that’s really the job of an album. So we tried to really create a vibe and mood that sounded cool to us. I think that’s why it might seem quieter because there are parts that were influenced by that.”
The band chose the album’s title from a sign they saw while on tour in South Dakota. It was in an area that had once been ravaged by forest fires, but now there were plants poking up from the ground, arising from the ashes. Freeman said the band instantly fell in love with the phrase and the symbolism it represented.
“We thought that creatively we were coming from a dark place,” Freeman said. “Not to be negative about the play, because it was an amazing thing, but toward the end of that we felt like we were kind of stuck being our former selves rather than pushing forward. So I guess that by finding the ax factory, and by sort of finding a new sound, it just felt like the right kind of metaphor for where we are at.”
The cavernous factory had such an impact on the album’s overall sound that it was almost like another instrument. But how does one duplicate this quality in rock clubs and festivals?
“Working in the factory, we knew that at times we were capturing a moment that we could never re-capture night after night,” Freeman said. “So we reworked some of the songs by playing different arrangements of some of the songs in the live setting than we do on the album.”
The band will be doing heavy touring in support of the album, but Freeman stressed that Parsonsfield never wants to be creatively stagnant.
“I love the idea of not just being a band that does tours and makes albums. While I love that life, I like seeing the different ways that music can be used,” he said.
The band recently teamed up with the Fresh Grass Foundation and are writing a score for a silent film. Their plan is to perform it at MASS MoCA in North Adams sometime this winter and perhaps eventually bring it to other art centers in the country.
“Our goal is just seeing how we can make music to fit in with other types of art and to never feel stagnant for too long,” Freeman said. “I always want to make sure that we are looking at what the next thing is and how we can use our music in other ways, to be creative not only with the music itself, but how it is used and how it’s performed.”
Tickets are $18 in advance and $20 at the door. Advance tickets can be purchased at www.iheg.com, the Northampton Box Office, 76 Main St. or 413-586-8686. All ages show. Doors open at 5:30 p.m.
Sheryl Hunter is a music writer who lives in Easthampton. Her work has appeared in various regional and national magazines. You can contact her at: soundslocal@yahoo.com