Dimestore Troubadours

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Dimestore Troubadours:
Barring all constraints of space, time and shear reason, if Jean Renoir had directed a proto version of Swingers set in the depressed Los Angeles of 1935, and it starred Vincent Gallo rather than Vince Vaughn and ended not in a sunny day coffee shop but in a filthy midnight alleyway where the only shining object was the blade of a knife, no doubt the soundtrack would have been eerily similar to this six-song set from the Dimestore Troubadours. The eponymous record amounts to an unapologetic and barely lucid waltz through traditional vaudeville forms co-opted into noir fables from the smoke-ring mind of Joe Kees' woozy cabaret caller. Slide trombone from guest Fred Starling wails and wobbles a moody enough backdrop for the band's enchanting brand of cutthroat jazz and loose-knit jump blues.
•ESSENTIAL TRACKS: Low Down Me, Buried Room • RECOMMENDED IF YOU LIKE: Charlie Parker, Tom Waits, speakeasies.