Formed by singer-songwriter and frontman Will Sprott in 2005, the Mumlers are one of the few San Jose-based bands to have achieved success in the larger indie folk scene but have also stayed true to their hometown roots. After a months-long hiatus, the Mumlers are back in support of a worthy cause: This special fundraiser show will donate all ticket proceeds to the recovery fund for local skateboarder Gerry Juan, who suffered a severe head injury in March and has been hospitalized since. With support from South Bay-based acoustic group The Stars Misplaced and DJ Cutso, the show will also include a raffle and auction; prizes are to be announced.

The Mumlers
Sat, 8pm, $17+
The Ritz, San Jose

For singer-songwriters Paul Kimball and John Blatchford—the voices behind indie-folk group Wax Moon—making music together has always been about capturing the moment. From their tendency to play smaller, more intimate shows to their desire to explore the experiential qualities of acoustic sound, their dedication to the craft of live performance is evident in the way they harmonize with each other and their audience.

“We really built Wax Moon around the idea of harmonies and vocals once we discovered that we have a natural blend between our voices,” explains Kimball, the group’s primary songwriter. “Both our sounds have a timbre together that is pleasing, and we discovered that organically and thought, ‘Wow, that’s a good place to start. Not everybody has that.’”

Indeed, not all musicians have as deep roots in the Bay Area’s indie rock scene as Kimball and Blatchford, whose former involvement with local acts like Careless Hearts and The Mumlers  placed them in the same musical circles. It wasn’t until their individual musical ventures fizzled out that they joined together as a duo, taking on a predominantly acoustic sound from their previous “bar rock” acts. With Kimball falling into the songwriting role and Blatchford focusing on harmonies and melodies, the group recorded its first EP, Ready or Not, last winter and just released a second EP, titled Cool Blue Heat, this month.

“I’d say our new EP is more of a companion than a departure from the last record,” Blatchford says. “We didn’t try to separate the ideas behind the songs; they’ve just been flowing. Instead, we’re trying to capture them as they come.”

Wax Moon is currently gearing up for a house show and record release party in Saratoga, further speaking to their intimate and up-close musical stylings. Playing for a crowd of close friends and fans, Wax Moon will perform songs from their newest release like “Dreams Run Dry,” a somber and poignant number with hints of Americana and folk, and “My Future Crime,” which combines a bluesy guitar rhythm with the soothing confluence of Kimball and Blatchford’s vocals. The band’s preferred performance spaces—house shows, cafes, and even galleries—allow the pair to experiment with sound and feed off of the audience’s vibe.

“In terms of performing, we’re continuing to experiment, seeing what works and what doesn’t, and we may ultimately decide that the concept of a stripped-down live performance feels right for us, or we might expand things and go in a different direction,” Kimball says. “But right now, we are still supporting the idea that we started out with, which is that live performances are meant to be momentary conjurings of what we put down in recording.”

Pushing each other’s creative limits has also been central to Wax Moon’s success. Both bandmates had to expand into roles they previously never played—becoming equal halves of a cohesive sound. For Blatchford, who had never sung lead in a band before, many of the conceptual ideas about performing front and center had to be worked out individually, from choosing certain textures to incorporate into the music to simplifying chord progressions and harmonies.

“Now that I’ve decided what kinds of sounds fit the band, I’m able to focus on them deeply,” he says. “I hope to expand my musicianship and what I’ve already learned further.”

Though they’ve only played together for a little over a year, Blatchford and Kimball’s vision for their sound—and each other’s musicianship—is clear. Their ability to creatively push each other’s musical limits has expanded their audience to include types of people they never connected with before, which feels both exciting and refreshing for a duo that’s only just begun their musical journey together.

“It’s been really nice seeing the way people respond to our music, which is very emotionally open and accessible in a way that a lot of the music I’ve played before hasn’t been,” Kimball says. “I really want to keep pushing that, seeing if we can bring more people into the tent of, not just our own stuff, but of appreciating live music in general. I feel like we can help build an audience, not just for ourselves, but for live music as a whole, because we’re looking at things in a different way.”

Wax Moon
Nov 26, 7pm, $10
Visit Wax Moon’s Facebook page for event info.

On a night drive in 2013, Seattle-based surf-rock group La Luz was driving home from a show when their van spun out on some black ice. The van smashed into a divider on the highway. They were safe but rattled. After calling AAA, the four-piece were sitting in the van awaiting a tow when a semi spun out on the same patch of ice and smashed into their waiting vehicle.

There’s a photo of the mangled van on the band’s Tumblr page. It’s a testament to the lengths touring musicians go to live the life that calls to them—risking life and limb for something that many dismiss as a pastime of youth. Music is serious business.

After surviving the crash, La Luz recorded with famed San Francisco psych-rocker Ty Segall. The resulting record, Weirdo Shrine, is a collection steeped in creeping darkness—think Ventures-by-way-of-Sleater-Kinney. The logic of trauma works through echoes, repeating itself over time in often strange and unexpected rumblings. On many of the tracks, death can be heard, just hanging in the background, nodding along and waiting for the right moment to enter the frame. Even the album’s cover, a psyched-out image of a cat’s cradle against a black background, seems to evoke the fragility and transience of life. “No damn cat, no damn cradle,” says Newt.

La Luz embrace the whole ’60s surf and psych vibe quite openly on Weirdo Shrine. The music video for “You Disappear” features the group playing on a fake French program (the “Ethnic Cultural Hour”) evoking both the ’60s Yeh-Yeh girl movement, with their patterned pants and blouses, and ’80s VHS experimentation. Analog film duplicates of the girls spin into infinity as green-screened psychedelic shapes twirl behind them. The whole thing feels a bit like a collaboration between Francoise Hardy and Robert Ashley, or New York’s gonzo public access programs like TV Party.

La Luz are one of many signees to Sub Pop’s subsidiary label, Hardly Art, which has been making a case for itself as the next Kill Rock Stars, ever since the onetime label of Elliott Smith moved primarily into releasing comedy albums. With bands like Shannon and the Clams, Chastity Belt, Colleen Green, and the Julie Ruin (Kathleen Hanna’s current group), the label has been on a run of strong releases, and Weirdo Shrine is no exception. Segall’s decidedly lo-fi production style gives the album a sense of coming from some alternate past, one where the ’60s happened not in lush technicolor, but in the stark and murderous black and white of Fritz Lang’s M.

The group’s upcoming tour includes a stop at The Ritz. Joining the band is one of San Jose’s proudest indie rock sons—Will Sprott, formerly front man for local weirdo pop group the Mumlers. After spending some time in the East Bay, Sprott relocated to the comparatively cheaper Seattle a few years back, where he linked up with the girls in La Luz for a number of creative collaborations.

Sprott’s appearance at the Ritz marks one of the first times the musician has come back to his hometown for a show since embarking on a solo career. The Mumlers were one of the few bands from San Jose in recent years to garner a serious buzz and command a hefty fan base.

Since moving out of the Bay Area, the singer and songwriter released his first solo record, last year’s Vortex Numbers, which found Sprott combining elements of surf rock and country crooning with his earnest and conversational lyrical style. And if the cover art looks reminiscent of La Luz’s Damp Face EP (recently re-released by Hardly Art) there’s a reason for that: it was designed by their singer and primary songwriter, Shana Cleveland.

La Luz
Aug 13, 8pm, $12-$15
The Ritz, San Jose

Straying from it’s usual beat-orientate lineup, The Pagoda Lounge at The Fairmont Hotel presents a full rock-centered lineup for SVSX featuring Will Sprout (Mumlers), Fierce Creatures and Mike Huguenor (Shinobu) followed by an after-party DJ set by B.Lewis.

Will Sprott
11:30pm, Pagoda Lounge, Fairmont
South Bay fans may wonder where Will Sprott of the Mumlers has been. The singer/songwriter known for sparking the South Bay’s wave of freak-rock a few years ago hasn’t been nearly as ubiquitous here since he moved to the East Bay. But he’s been perhaps busier than ever. It’s been a couple of years now since the Mumlers’ second album, Don’t Throw Me Away. If the folky debut was surprising and offbeat enough to get Sprott national media attention, the follow-up surpassed it in every way with its grittier, Stax-on-acid soul.

Sprott, however, felt that in many ways he didn’t get to capitalize on the album’s strengths live, because it was just too hard to get the big Mumlers lineup on tour. In 2011, he decided to do some dates as a solo act.

He’s also been working on his follow-up to Don’t Throw Me Away, though he doesn’t yet know if it’ll be released under the Mumlers moniker, his own name or something else entirely. The upcoming album promises to be something unexpected. It’s not a revisiting of his sound on the last record—in fact, there are no horns at all. Instead, Sprott is focusing on bizarre new uses for vocal harmonies.

Fierce Creatures
10:30pm, Pagoda Lounge, Fairmont
Being a seven-piece indie-rock band gives Fierce Creatures the maneuverability to play exactly the kind of music they imagine. It also gives them plenty of room to layer in as many sounds and harmonies as they need to create gorgeous, dynamic-enriched arrangements.

They combine guitars, keyboards, drums, percussion and even some less-standard instruments like an occasional mandolin, harmonica and some bells—a tactic that creates a wall of sound larger than any one instrument. They work together to create new soundscapes, intense moods and crescendos, rather than focusing on any one member and showing off their chops.
Fierce Creatures tinker with musical styles indiscriminately, tactfully hodgepodging bits of pop, folk, soul, classic rock and experimental sounds into their songs to create something that is all their own. They dig for the most basic thread of childlike musical expression and re-interpret the standard rock & roll conventions to give new life to pleasantly familiar simple songs.

Mike Huguenor
9:30pm, Pagoda Lounge, Fairmont
“Agues,” the first song off Mike Huguenor’s solo album, Bardamu, is a solid, quirky alt-rock jam that rests nicely between the musical extremes of his various bands. There is Shinobu, his on-again-off-again neurotic jangle-pop quartet. Then there’s Hard Girls, the sophisticated, post-punk power trio. And of course there’s the Classics of Love, his old-school punk-rock group that’s fronted by none other than Jesse Michaels, the former lead singer of Operation Ivy.

Somehow, Huguenor also found time to record this solo EP and even shot a music video for “Agues,” which features him as every member of the band and every person in the audience. His solo material isn’t as overtly offbeat as Shinobu, or as complex as Hard Girls, or even as fierce as the Classics of Love. But what it does have is a newfound level of maturity that marries all of these elements and delivers them in an understated, clever way.

B. Lewis
12:30am, Pagoda Lounge, Fairmont
Producer and beatmaker B. Lewis is one of many local musicians influenced by Peanut Butter Wolf. Born and raised in San Jose, B. Lewis quickly came to appreciate Wolf’s legacy as a trailblazer once he started making music in 2009. “He definitely led the way, in the right way,” says Lewis.

Only 23 now, Lewis ironically didn’t discover labels like Stones Throw and Brainfeeder until he went away to Expression College in the East Bay. After college, Lewis moved back to San Jose. This spring, he finished the Egg Black EP, with singer Miles Bonny. What might surprise those who are only familiar with Lewis’ more experimental beats is the sleek and smooth sound of the songs’ soulful R&B.

Lewis’ newest release, A Lion’s Aperture, came out in late July, and delivers further proof of his willingness to push boundaries in a late-night groove. “Priority Number One” kicks off with spacey pinging sounds that evolve into an otherworldy wash of sound and vocal abstractions. “World Frozen Over” spins off in a swirl of sonic scat, anchored by strong keyboards.

South Bay fans may wonder where Will Sprott and the Mumlers have been. The singer-songwriter known for sparking the South Bay’s wave of freak-rock a few years ago hasn’t been nearly as ubiquitous here since he moved to the East Bay. But he’s been perhaps busier than ever, doing six tours last year. He returns to San Jose Saturday (March 24) for a show at San Pedro Market.

It’s been a couple of years now since the Mumlers second album, Don’t Throw Me Away. If the folky debut was surprising, offbeat and well-executed enough to get Sprott national media attention, the follow-up surpassed it in every way with its gritter, Stax-on-acid soul.

But Sprott felt that in many ways he didn’t get to capitalize on the album’s strengths live, because it was just too hard to get the big, unwieldy Mumlers line-up on tour. In 2011, he decided he would “say yes to everything,” which meant doing some dates as a solo act, some with the original crew, some with a whole new Mumlers group, and a few with a mix of original and new members. Touring with The Tallest Man on Earth last year, he was playing sold-out 800-seat clubs in the U.S. and Canada.

He’s also been working on his follow up to Don’t Throw Me Away, though he doesn’t yet know if it’ll be released under the Mumlers moniker, his own name, or something else entirely.

I have a whole album written, and now I’m just trying to record it,” says Sprott. “I’m really excited about the pile of songs I have.”

Once again, the upcoming album promises to be something unexpected. It’s not a revisiting of his sound on the last record—in fact, there are no horns at all. Instead, Sprott is focusing on bizarre new uses for vocal harmonies, although it turns out they’re not so new after all.

“Someone at one of my shows asked me if we were hocketing,” he says.

Don’t worry, he had to look it up, too. “Hocketing” was a medieval singing technique where two or more people alternate singing the same melody. It turns out he was in fact hocketing; the technique shows up on new songs like “Little Bells,” of which he’s especially proud.

“It’s really weird,” he says. “It’s unlike anything I’ve done before.”

Will Sprott plays Saturday, March 24, at San Pedro Market in San Jose, 9pm; free.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The Mumlers is one of San Jose’s greatest exports.  Lead vocalist William Sprott, spoke with us about his music, his escapades in Oakland and life in general. He performs next at a solo show at Swedish American Hall on February 24th as part of the Noise Pop festival.

Where can people find the covers album you and Eli did on his boat?

It’s an entire album of covers recorded over the last couple years with friends on a sailboat named “Josephine” while sailing around the bay being soft-rock pirates. We already started volume two. (Find Volume One HERE).

The band has changed from the original lineup, how did that influence your sound?

It is actually all the same people, but they had extensive plastic surgery. They sound more like women now because of certain hormonal treatments.

When’s the next tour? When’s the next show?

I’m doing a one-man, one-show tour of San Francisco at the Swedish American Hall on February 24th as part of the Noise Pop festival.

When can we expect a new album?

This year.

Where do you see your music going? Will the new Mumlers tracks sound anything like Bassnectar, or will you be going more Deadmau5?

More Ace of Base than either of those two.

How many Raiders hoodies do you own?

One. It’s a family heirloom from my Grandpa. It’s a cloaking device. When I pull the hood on I can haunt sideshows like a ghost and nobody even notices that I’m there.

What did moving to Oakland do for you musically?

It used to be wine, women and song. Now it’s beer, the old lady and TV.

You’ve got a really beautiful guitar style, which guitarists have influenced you lately?

Thank you. Pop Staples & Bert Jansch and my nine year old guitar student [are recent influences].

What did getting chosen for a Starbucks song of the week do for you guys?

People started showing up at our shows really wired on caffeine and getting pissed off when they found out we didn’t offer free wi-fi from the stage or sell pastries at our merch table.