April Smith and the Great Picture Show
Getting Snubbed And Hurt At The Swing House
Feb 4, 2010
Words by Sean Moeller
Illustration by Johnnie Cluney
Sound engineering by Mike Gentry
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Welcome to Daytrotter
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Terrible Things
original version appears on Songs For A Sinking Ship
I'm a huge fan of the show "Dexter" and this is sort of my love song to my favorite South Florida serial killer. I love the dichotomy of this impossible-not-to-love character and it really inspired me.
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Wow And Flutter
original version appears on Songs For A Sinking Ship
this one's actually at major labels and how some of them with take an artist, manipulate them to fit into this generic cookie cutter mold, and then swallow them whole when they're done. Everyone thinks it's about seduction and messing around and I guess it is, just not in the obvious way.
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Stop Wondering
original version appears on Songs For A Sinking Ship
Sometimes I like to channel Judy Garland - the drunken, swearing Judy Garland. This was one of those times.
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Colors
original version appears on Songs For A Sinking Ship
It's about being miles away from your favorite person and letting them know that they're on your mind, even if you're not always on theirs. IT's sort of like saying "I'll wear my heart on my sleeve and leave a light on for you, and I hope you'll come home."
The morning that April Smith and her very own Great Picture Show were making a quick swing through Rock Island's way was all the way back in August of 2009, the day following her appearance at Lollapalooza. It was, as you can imagine, sticky hot outside, clammy with perspiration and yet, there in the Chicago press that morning were glowing reviews of her set - deemed to be one of the standout performances of the day and it had the whole tired bunch walking on clouds a little bit. The outside temperatures weren't bothering anyone. The atmosphere was chill and alive. The takes that they tracked that morning with us are now evidence of what those journalists at the massive outdoor festival saw the afternoon before - caught completely off-guard by a young woman from Brooklyn singing her rickety and feisty as hell cabaret/youthful blues, still piping with swagger and confidence and the attitude of someone who's never, ever going to get pushed around - not by a stupid and gutless man. It's music that makes you cheer wildly for the no good dogs of men to get the tar kicked out of them for all their low-down transgressions and carelessness that they really thought they were going to get away with. "Oh no you don't," Smith seems to stomp, glare and wail with every single song that she lays on you, reaching for heavenly notes with a devilish grin and shooting a look that's full of sex and ice. She's both of those things when she sings, this being whose every thought and move get their instincts and their structure from an incurable soft spot for the things that not only the heart wants, but that the flesh also wants. For these songs of love's betrayal and their stiff voice of response of not needing to have to put up with any of these flashes of bullshit that flame up and cause all kinds of nasty problems almost certainly cannot be the sole expressions of a tender definition of "love" as a negotiable or sensible notion - one that so often is poorly explained away as a heart's breaking. Not here with Miss Smith and the Great Picture Show, a talented group that follows the fiery demonstrativeness of its lead singer, who seems as if with every performance she could destroy all circuit breakers in the room, just popping the lights dead with her shattering sort of powerfulness and the conviction of her emotions. She quakes with these quivering thoughts of another and they are plumbed from her, coming from the tips of her toes and the very bottom of her belly's cavity. Hell hath no fury is a phrase that comes to mind as Smith bares her pointed teeth and sends lighting cuts through the moment, airing her grievances and warning that she's got the big bad wolf at your door, knocking and bound to get in and let the fur fly. She makes us feel as if all of these hurt feelings and stunted relationships tossed around here are part of some swinging party that could again lead to the same exhilarating circumstances that got us into this mess in the first place. An early evening of fevered dancing and panting might lead to more of the same, just a different kind.
April Smith and the Great Picture Show Official Site
