Rising from the snowdrifts and frozen lakes of St. Paul comes
Molly Maher & her Disbelievers. Carving out a place for themselves
with cinamatic visions of love lost and found, landscapes filled with
REAL TIMELESS ROOTS music.
Using Molly's plaintiff vocals and HONEST writting, she makes the
highway seem lonesome at first, but armed with lush guitar hooks and
driving rhythms, she'll never let you lose your way.
Born with the affliction of being left handed she's adapted her playing style by flipping a right handed guitar upside down;ala Elizabeth Cotton.
Just looking at her gear gives a pretty good idea of her sound.
'38 Regal/Dobro resonator
'62 ToneMaster/Valco
"32 Martin 0-17
THE DISBELIEVERS
Maher's backing band is made up of a stellar crew of musicians. It's
a sweet blend of folk, bluesy, elecric-organfied and county-fried rock.
Disbelievers include but are not limited to:
Erik Koskinen,Steve Murray,Paul Bergen,Richard Medek,Noah Levy, Brad Mattson,Frankie Lee,Jon Rodine,Nick Johnson,Paul Odegaard,Matt Novachis,
"You may know St. Paul native Molly Maher if you frequent Nye's Polonaise Room in Northeast Minneapolis. She has had a gig every Wednesday night at Nye's since February 2006. You may also know Maher from Willie's American Guitars in St. Paul, where she is in charge of the "acoustic room," a corner of the shop where Maher sells very valuable antique guitars and practices her craft by day. Molly Maher's latest release, Balms of Gilead, was mixed, mastered, and produced by friend and performance partner, Erik Koskinen. The disc features guest performances by Jessy Greene, Tina Schlieske, and members of the Jayhawks, along with her backing band, the Disbelievers. Maher's Americana/alt. Country/roots sound has been compared to Lucinda Williams, Bob Dylan, Calexico, and Los Lobos. Her honest, heartfelt lyrics are poignant in their simplicity and emotional evocation. Being left-handed never stopped Maher; she continues to play guitar by flipping a right-handed guitar upside down in the style of Elizabeth Cotton. She sings of the everyman's troubles, such as falling in love in a poorly lit bar under the influence of alcohol. Jim Walsh wrote of Maher's lyrics in his City Pages article, "[Maher] sums up the bittersweet plight of anyone who has ever tried to balance the black magic of the neon night with the healing hush of the drabby day."
the Electric Fetus
More about Wed. at Nyes:
Capsule review: Nye’s polka bar is like that scruffy uncle who spikes the punch at family gatherings. While the fancy-schmancy Polonaise Room next door is a magnet for all of those out-of-town gawkers who anointed it America’s Best Bar in Esquire magazine, it’s this beer-and-a-shot dive bar — shoehorned in on the corner — that feels more like home on a bleak midwinter night a couple days before payday, when there’s little but lint in your pockets. Every Wednesday you can drown your sorrows with charming/tough rootsy rocker Maher, whose album “Balms of Gilead” was one of the best local discs of 2007. Tim Campbell
Balms of Gilead PRESS:
"One of the 10 best local cd's."Chris Riemenschneider-Star and Tribune
Molly Maher paints a picture of life's trials in 'Balms'
By John Ziegler / For the News Tribune
Duluth News Tribune - 09/18/2008
Molly Maher, with producer Erik Koskinen, has put together a recording of tunes, new and old, that have a haunting beauty and a rural wistfulness. Listening to “Balms of Gilead” is kind of like revisiting your childhood home after many years away.
The project started with Maher’s curiosity about and eventual involvement in the Twin Cities community of artists called House of Mercy. She began paging through a Bible and wrote the title track.
It, like the overall theme of the record, is about healing. It’s about picking yourself up and moving forward without self-pity or regret. And it presents an unapologetic portrait of the pain and the liberation a soul endures going through the portal of life’s trials. “…I hope for the best but surrender to what can happen when you’re running for the Balms of Gilead.”
Maher’s band, live and on this disc, is made up of some of the finest Twin Cities artists (Paul Bergen, Steve Murray, Noah Levy, Marc Perlman, Marc Anderson, Javier Trejo, Peter Sands, Tina Schlieske). This crew fleshes out the skeletons that Maher and Koskinen lay down, and augment the disc’s haunting quality that is prominent throughout.
“3200 Mile” opens with the mixed sounds of trains, truck horns, and a string orchestra tuning up. Its title references the breadth of this country and began germinating as a piece of art when Maher lived for eight years in a warehouse that overlooked a train yard. It has an almost bossa nova buoyancy. It’s about moving onward after a difficult relationship “…I’m gonna leave here in the morning. I’m gonna head out there in a huff. All your good things have taken up all my best.” The starkness to the lyric contrasts nicely with the musical canvas and adds to the power of the separation.
Maher spent time living in an underground Quonset hut/greenhouse (long before everyone talked about a green way of living) in the high desert of Oregon. She works a day gig in the Twin Cities at a guitar shop and knows her stuff when it comes to vintage guitar gear.
She played for years in a duo with Thomas “Hookhead” Case called Hookhead and Mare. She has, in various aggregations, “shared the stage” with the likes of Ralph Stanley, Marc Cohen, Los Lobos and the Waco Brothers. She’s a musician, not just a front man, and she seems happiest just being part of a good group.
Her new disc is full of pain and pleasure, of healing and growth, of running and finding. Maher and Koskinen strike a kind of Gillian Welch and David Rawlings stride with “Balms of Gilead” where the lyric, the musical performance and the production come together beautifully."
"Her music is a window to the lonely world of a nomadic spirit, someone who has loved and lost at love, someone who has lived the existence of a vagabond dreamer.and then there's her voice, the apparent lovechild of Ricki Lee Jones and Bonnie Raitt." Richard Thomas - Reader Weekly
Maher steps out from the pack of Americana/alt-country songwriters
"With this month's release of her second record, "Balms of Gilead," Maher steps out from the pack of Americana/alt-country songwriters in the Twin Cities. Never mind that she already stood out by being a woman with a previously all-male band in a mostly male-dominated genre.
As the album title suggests, "Balms" is awash in healing-powered songs and desert-y soundscapes. Lucinda Williams is the most obvious comparison it deserves, especially with wounded-poet songs such as "Let's Pretend We Never Have Met." But the disc's many different moods also show traces of Daniel Lanois-produced Bob Dylan and the Latin-ish acoustic work of Calexico and Los Lobos. Like Bonnie Raitt, Maher clearly can play guitar but seems more focused on being a singer/songwriter." Chris Riemenchneider - Star Tribune
Sets them apart from other artists.
"Molly Maher and her Disbelievers command the stage with their rootsy charm but it's their ability to perform haunting low-fi ballads and whip them into full blown rockin' epics that sets them apart from other artists." James "Taco" Martin - E Company
All hail the new honky-tonk heroine
"Maher's got a lived-in voice whose weariness is bouyed by a fierce underlying ambition and an obvious love of music and people." Jim Walsh - City Pages
Review of Balms of Gilead
As a songwriter, Maher brings a fine feeling of restlessness to tunes like "3200 Miles" and also wonderfully puts a personal stamp on Blind Willie J Johnson's "Soul of A Man," making wholly her own. The Onion
