The Low Anthem keep things fresh

The Rhode Island three-piece of Ben Knox Miller, Jeff Prystowsky and Jocie Adams, craft haunting Americana – sublime folk-rock with plenty of bite, but without the twang. And, admits Jeff, if there’s one thing that matters most, it’s keeping things fresh.“We play American spiky rock and roll, but switch around the instrumentation to keep it unique,” he says.“When you play every night you have to stay ahead of yourself.”Jeff is talking to me from his flat in Providence, Rhode Island. “It’s an apartment full of books and old typewriters with paper strewn all over the floor,” he says deliberately, in that ultra- cool, laid-back, almost stoned, kind of way that only Americans can carry off.By staying ahead of themselves, Jeff is talking not just about the band’s music – but the places they chose to make it. Their second album, Smart Flesh, released this year, was recorded with former member Matt Davidson in both a cavernous disused pasta sauce factory and a reptile breeder’s garage – a place they nicknamed ‘the gator pit’.“We drive around and look for enormous mill buildings,” says Jeff. “I’m always interested in what they sound like. And when I went into the pasta sauce factory, I instantly fell in love.”For The Low Anthem, the space becomes an instrument to be played.“As musicians, we play in unorthodox environments,” he says. “We integrate sound and different instruments, and this time created the warmth of a quartet playing live in a giant space.“You can tell by the nature and quantity of reverb which space each song was recorded in.“The mill was very cold, while the garage was warmer and slowed the tempos, making things sound swampy.”But it’s not just the space which gives their work its standout charm, it’s also what they use to make it. Each member plays a range of instruments – which range from the conventional (guitars and keys) to the traditional (Jew’s harps and dulcimer) and eccentric (musical saw, stylophone, oversized drum kit and hand-restored antique pump organs).“We are always trying to find new sounds and ways in which we can use music as a blank canvas,” Jeff says.So how on earth do the band learn all these instruments? “Slowly,” he laughs. “One note and one scale at a time.“It’s a matter of knowing a few basic things and trying to apply them to new instruments – and not worrying about the squeaking and squawking for the first few months.”The band are currently preparing for a typically eccentric tour which takes them from Pennsylvania, to Germany and next Sunday to the Wilderness festival in Charlbury. The set, among the lakes and forests of Cornbury Park, is one of just six UK dates, packed in before they resume their tour back in the US Mid West.Having won over audiences on both sides of the Atlantic, I wondered whether the band had noticed any differences between playing to us and to their countrymen. “You can tell cultural differences,”

says Jeff. “Our audiences are attentive everywhere, but in the UK they were attentive faster than in the US, where it took people a while to understand us. We’d play bars in America where the televisions were on, food was being served and glasses were clinking. It is hard to break through that.”

So, having dabbled in practically every musical instrument, what next?“We are now experimenting with hypnotic sounds,” he says. “It’s in its infancy, but we’ll see what it comes to.“And we already have our special hynotic machine.”So can we expect them to try and hypnotise their fans?“Yes!” he laughs. “We’ll be saying ‘come to the show… come to the show!’”

The Low Anthem play Wilderness festival, Cornbury Park, Charlbury, on August 14. Wilderness takes place at Cornbury Park, near Charlbury, from August 12-14. Tickets start at just £60. Go to wildernessfestival.com