MEETING CUTE: Their songs are “all about dying — they have nothing to do with love!” |
Sarah Cronin and Tommy Allen have just opened a box of T-shirts sent by their record label. The colors aren’t quite right, and the logo is too small and off-center, not emblazoned across the chest as Cronin had envisioned. Such are the minor nuisances with which Drug Rug must now contend.But it’s all worth it for a band who began as a folky, acoustic duo with little or no following. In the past year, as they’ve added members, Drug Rug have become Internet darlings, all without setting foot in a club outside the Boston/New York axis. Much of their notoriety can be attributed to Apollo Sunshine’s Jeremy Black (see correction, below), who gave the band a profile boost when he signed them to his fledgling Black and Greene label and initiated a promotional push long before their Drug Rug debut dropped on September 18.
Allen remembers the night Greene approached them. “It was the first show we played with the full band behind us. Just as we were wrapping up our guitar cables, Jeremy was like, ‘Hey, I really want to put your record out,’ and I was totally like, ‘This kid’s joking.’ ”
“And then he bought me a Shirley Temple,” adds Cronin, “and we knew he meant business.”
By the time Greene came into the picture, Allen and Cronin had taken steps to bolster their rootsy blues songs with drums and bass. And producers Carter Tanton (Tulsa) and Julian Cassanetti (Frank Smith, Lot Six) were instrumental in helping Drug Rug flesh out their material. Allen: “Most of those songs weren’t really rock songs until Carter and Julian got involved. They added the drums and bass and brought them to life and gave us a good lesson in how we should continue.”
Allen and Cronin have done their best to deflect the attention they’ve received as a cute indie-singer-songwriter couple. Cronin: “We’re in it to have fun and not just have this display of affection for each other. It’s more just to have a good time and make good music.”
Allen adds that their relationship and the musical collaboration began at the same time. “It all happened when we started dating.”
“We went to the Other Side and then we went back to Tommy’s place and we played,” Cronin continues. “We had traded demos before that, and it was kind of before we had hung out, so all we really knew of each other was this demo that we had of each other’s music.”
When they played their CD-release show on September 21 at P.A.’s Lounge, backed by bassist George Lewis Jr. and Allen’s older brother John on drums, the songs came first, showcasing their Stonesy guitars and rootsy vibe. And yet their relationship is integral to the Drug Rug experience — as they trade lead vocals, harmonize, or spar in urgent, banshee call-and-response choruses — and they realize that it’s part of the appeal. Cronin: “I think that’s why initially everyone was like, ‘Let’s make it the cute-couple thing,’ because that’s something anyone can grab onto. But that’s not us; there’s more going on. It might work in our favor that people have that image of us as this cute love duo, and then they come to a show and see that this is sort of a face-ripping rock thing.”
“Face-melting,” Allen corrects her. “I think it’s a little misleading, but George was saying he had bumped into a bunch of people in town who said, ‘Oh Tommy and Sarah are so cute, they sing those love songs to each other.’ I’m like, ‘They’re all about dying, they have nothing to do with love!’ ”
“Yeah they’re definitely all about dying,” Cronin concurs.
“And it’s not like I’m singing to Sarah or she’s singing to me,” Allen continues.
In fact, collaboration was one of the band’s biggest challenges. Cronin: “At first it was just a lot of sitting there and getting frustrated and trying to figure out where whose input should be coming from what direction. I’ve never had this sort of collaboration before. I’ve always been very guarded about my songs. I used to be very stubborn about that, and I still am, to some extent, but I’ve learned that if you let someone else you trust have their way with it, it ends up being so much more special than if you just kept it to yourself.”
And the revolving-door membership of the past year has given way to a more stable line-up. Lewis and drummer Michael Hutcherson will be the rhythm section as the band hit the road this fall on several short tours before a big national tour in the spring. The CD-release show out of the way, they did weekend jaunts to places like Chicago, as well as a week opening for the Fiery Furnaces in the Midwest, before playing the Bowery Ballroom in New York for the CMJ Music Marathon. There are other support slots in the works, and the band have a residency at New York’s Mercury Lounge set up for November. (Their next local gig is on this Sunday at the Milky Way.)
