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I’ll be there tomor
The Sumner Brothers on their latest record and the timeless a
B
ob and Brian Sumner have been making music together for years. Their love of traditional music led them to start a band, a project that has carried them from their home in Vancouver to the furthest reaches of North America. Since 2006 they have released four albums, including a pair of hardscrabble garage recordings. The brothers’ songs evoke a time when the high gloss of commercial radio was decades away and the only things that mattered were strong melodies and compelling stories. Drawing on a range of influences, from outlaw country and early rock and roll to folk and bluegrass, the Sumner Brothers have spent the last ten years carving out a niche on the fringes of the roots music scene. And they wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. The Sumner Brothers subscribe to the traditions that defined so much of the music they love. Their songs are simple yet effective, regardless of what form they take. And there are a lot of forms to choose from. The group’s latest album, I’ll Be There Tomorrow, covers everything from blistering rock and roll and brooding country weepers to tender folk and delicate, almost ethereal gospel. The record opens with “Toughest Man In Prison Camp,” a searing rock cut as ragged and raw as the screaming guitar tones, before fading into a haunting country ballad called “Going Out West.” There are also a pair of covers: a tender interpretation of Townes Van Zandt’s “Colorado Girl” and a raucous punk-injected version of Arthur Crudup’s “It’s All Right.”
The Sumner Brothers have listened to nearly everything, and remembered most of it. But while their songs span the breadth of traditional roots music, they are linked by the brothers’ ragged voices and uncanny sense of melody and pacing. I’ll Be There Tomorrow is the strongest album they have ever made. It generated a slew of effusive reviews. It also earned them a tour with the Deep Dark Woods, the reigning kings of haunting folk-rock. But when I spoke with Brian Sumner earlier this month, it became clear that I’ll Be There Tomorrow is only the beginning.
AJM: Do you and Bob write together or separately? BS: We write on our own. It’s usually kind of a three-stage thing. Bob and I write our own songs, and then usually he and I will get together and we’ll start arranging it, coming up with ideas. Then we’ll go to the band and they can put their stamp on it after that. AJM: How do you differentiate between the two as far as songwriting is concerned? BS: I think the stuff that doesn’t make it onto the quote unquote studio
…we experiment, and if it works, it works, and if it doesn’t, it doesn’t. Someone else can be the judge of that. brian sumner
Alex J MacPherson: You’ve made a couple of different types of records, these garage collections and then studio albums. Brian Sumner: That’s what we’re doing and we plan on doing it for awhile. The In The Garage stuff is kind of more for fun, but it kind of keeps us on our toes. We’re always jamming and having buddies over and recording everything and then we just sift through it and put out those records.
records — they’re not really done in studios — sometimes those songs don’t get arranged with the band, because maybe they’re not working live or we don’t think they’ll work live, and so they get an opportunity to be heard on those records. AJM: Not quite in a studio? I know you made your 2008 debut in a cabin. Is that what you did for I’ll Be There Tomorrow, too? BS: It was also recorded in a cabin. It was up in Merritt, B.C. We were up behind Merritt, up in this mountainous
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