The Lobster Quadrille is a nine-piece Southern Gothic rock outfit that combines elements of punk, klezmer, bluegrass, gospel, and more. Their distinctly unique sound is reminiscent of the music of Tom Waits, Jon Spencer, Nick Cave, Dame Darcy, Johnny Cash, and the Handsome Family. The illustrations of Dame Darcy and the written works of Flannery O’Connor provide a deeply influential foundation for the band’s musical and visual appeal. It is moody, atmospheric, dark, and humorous with a turn-of-the-century flair.
Their live shows are a high-energy mix of thundering rock-n-roll with the laid back, folksy charm of a travelling Deep South carnival. Performances reflect the band’s influences and showcase their cross-genre sound as they frequently, seamlessly shift between styles; from deadly serious to humorous banter.
The Lobster Quadrille is the brainchild of Georgia born and bred Solomon Blaylock. He is the main creative force, drawing on his own experiences in the South to create a genre all their own. The other members of the band include Mark Berends on drums, Kevin Farrell on bass and trombone, Pam Keebler on viola, percussionist Lauren Manitsas, Amber McAlister on accordion and saxophone, Amy McDonald on clarinet, organist Keith Rosengren and Chris Veazey on trumpet. The Lobster Quadrille is based out of Rochester, New York.
Purveyors:
Mark Berends—Drums
Solomon Blaylock—Guitar/Vocals
Kevin Farrell—Bass/Trombone
Pam Keebler—Viola
Lauren Manitsas—Percussion
Amber McAlister—Accordion/Saxophone
Amy McDonald—Clarinet
Keith Rosengren—Organ/Percussion
Chris Veazey—Trumpet
For booking information, please contact Elissa Sundman.
Manifesto of the New Southern Gothic
Since its inception in 2000, the Lobster Quadrille has performed under the banner “Purveyors of the New Southern Gothic.” This has caused a good deal of head-scratching over the years, and it is time, we think, to make plain exactly what we mean. This brief document will serve as a public declaration of the structure, scope, and intentions of the aesthetic movement called the New Southern Gothic.
Aesthetic
“Southern Gothic” is a literary term. It is a genre that deals with the American South, employing many of the familiar conventions of gothic fiction—a focus on the dark, the supernatural, the tragic, the grotesque, the violent, the lacrimose. Preeminent among the authors of the Southern Gothic movement is Flannery O’Connor, a Georgia-born writer whose
body of work, life, and correspondence have informed the New Southern Gothic of the Lobster Quadrille to an unrivaled degree. O’Connor’s work is visceral, mystical, clear-eyed, and often jarringly violent. The South was, for her, the lens through which she projected her views of humanity and the cosmos. Far from being the cartoonish and warped landscape it becom
es in the hand of so many non-native artists, the South simply is for Flannery O’Connor.
For the purposes of the New Southern Gothic, the South is a background element, and as such, partakes of two dimensions. It is a South that has ne ver quite existed as such, being a compressed, single frame comprising elements diverse in their timing and placement. It is at once arid and boiling under the sun at midday, as well as bleak, barren, and marshy. It is hilarious and it is terrifying. It is possessed by demons and madness and it is utterly normal. It is marked, invariably, by a wry sense of humor. Rage is omnipresent, almost always masked. The players wear black suits and dresses, ever on their way to church, to the funeral parlor, to the den of iniquity. Why? Silly question.
Religion
Religion is woven into the very fabric of Flannery O’Connor’s work, and it looms large in the Southern Gothic literary movement as a whole. As O’Connor herself stated: “While the South is hardly Christ-centered, it is most certainly Christ-haunted” (Mystery and Manners, 44). Religion also holds a place of peculiar importance in the Lobster Quadrille’s songs and aesthetic, the primary songwriter having been raised in a fundamentalist, evangelical household. While individual members of the LQ hold beliefs and philosophies uniquely their own, the Quadrille as a band is radically atheistic and humanistic, and is often hostile (humorously or not) to religion as a force of institutionalized falsehood and oppression.
Additionally, religious imagery (drawn from a host of traditions) figures prominently in the band’s lyrics, as does that of Western philosophy and the occult. This stuff is all very interesting to the primary songwriter. This brings us naturally to another overarching theme of the New Southern Gothic:
Transgression
The Lobster Quadrille cites the Marquis de Sade as an enduring influence, along with William S. Burroughs, Oscar Wilde, and Aubrey Beardsley, as well as, to a lesser extent, Georges Bataille, Arthur Rimbaud, and J.K. Huysmans. Each of these artists demonstrates a distinct transgressive strain, and it is the LQ’s invocation of this venerable aesthetic tradition that is perhaps their most misunderstood attribute. We feel that transgressive expression is fundamental to the artistic rejection of oppression in all its forms and especially that of religion, popular morality, and unconsidered, reverenced social normative structures. This expression may manifest brashly or subtly. We reserve the right to employ contradiction and other shock tactics with a view towards explicitly rejecting any and all comfortable illusions philosophical, social, and “spiritual.”
Death, Sex, Drugs
Given the foregoing, as well as the existential, ontological, and epistemological obsessions of the primary songwriter, the prevalence of these topics should not be confusing. We will, additionally, not deny an occasional prurient delight in dealing with such matters—no mean ascetics, we.
In conclusion…
Our objectives as purveyors of the New Southern Gothic are, then, as follows:
To thrill and titillate, to provoke thought and discussion, to move to dancing, to motivate further expression, to encourage individuals to dress up and groom distinctively, to make money, to confess, to exorcise, to feel alive, to feel free, to feel fulfillment, to rankle those in need of rankling, to leave a mark on the musical landscape. May we be successful. Or not. In spite of what this document might suggest, the Lobster Quadrille does not take itself overly seriously.
