The Felice Brothers: Yonder Is The Clock

It says a lot about these desperate times that a band that quotes Mark Twain and makes records in converted chicken coops feels very much of the moment. Such is the case with upstate New York folkies The Felice Brothers, who survey a nation trapped between poverty and prosperity (in both the past and the present) on the terrific Yonder Is The Clock. “Sometimes the things you do, they come back at you,” sighs turpentine-swilling singer Ian Felice on the war-torn ballad “All When We Were Young”—and isn’t that something we’ve all learned the hard way lately The burden of survival is living to regret everything you’ve had to do in order to endure, and it weighs heavily on the people who populate Yonder Is The Clock, whether it’s the “Boy From Lawrence County” selling out his friend for a job, or the lovelorn loser singing to a woman he can’t provide for in “Katie Dear.” These are all-American songs of devastation and alienation; they’re also loads of fun and damn hilarious much of the time. Maybe reliving the Great Depression won’t be so bad after all.