The Kropotkins

Discography
Photos
History
Lyrics

to listen
here's a live version of Truckstop Girls from WFMU radio

Discography

Five Points Crawl
2000


Mulatta Records
Performers: Lorette Velvette (vocals, guitar), Charlie Burnham(violin), Dave Soldier (banjo, violin), Dog (guitar, bass), Maureen Tucker(bass drum, vocals), Jonathan Kane (snare drum)

Tunes: Crazy Hannah (Mo Tucker)
Starkweather (James Tucker (Mo's Brother), lyrics, Dave Soldier music)
Truckstop Girls (Soldier)
I Gotta Man (Charlie Burnham)
Drivin' to Spring (Soldier)
Justice Down South(Soldier)
Seconds Past Midnight (Velvette & Soldier)
Sissy Wa Wa (Velvette, Soldier, Rory Young)
Junior's Groove (Vevette)
Forever Motel (lyrics James Tucker, music Soldier)

The Kropotkins
1995

Mulatta Records
Performers: Lorette Velvette (vocals, guitar), Mark Feldman (violin), Dave Soldier (banjo, violin), Dog (guitar, bass), Samm Bennett (bass drum, vocals), Jonathan Kane (snare drum)

Koch Records, out of print, some copies available from Mulatta Records
1. Cold Wet Steel (Soldier)
2. Shake 'Em on Down Fred (McDowell)
3. Everdream (Soldier/Rory Young)
4. On This Earth (Soldier)
5. Pachman Farm (Bukka White)
6. Something Crawling Round My Bed (Velevette)
7. Good Cheap Transportation (Bennett)
8. Coal Black Wind (Soldier)
9. Some of the Dust (Bennett)
10. The Nasadiya (Soldier)
11. Crow Jane (Soldier, based on anonymous song)

Photos

from left: Lorette Velvette, Jonathan Kane, Dave Soldier, Dog (Mark Deffenbaugh), Charlie Burnham, photo by on Gott in NYC (2000?)

History

The Kropotkins occured to me was when I was on tour with John Cale in 1992. The band was John on Bosendorfer piano with the Soldier String Quartet and the British pedal steel player BJ Cole. On some numbers we had the Quartet's singers Tiye' Giraud and Sam Butler, along with Bob Neuwirth playing whenever he liked.

We traveled in two enormous tour buses full of equipment and required many hours a day to set up. One day waiting for soundcheck in Stuttgart I heard a Japanese bluegrass band playing Bill Monroe on the street. It took about a minute for them to set up and they could play anywher. Monroe's music was transcendent, many years after he created it and in a foreign country played by unexpected musicians.

Bill Monroe inspired me to learn to play and write music when I was 13 years old (my inspirations to make written music were Roscoe Mitchell & Eddie Palmieri). Bill's music, along with Howlin’ Wolf (another forever favorite since I collected his 78’s as a kid in Carbondale), hearing unreleased north Mississippi tapes by Alan Lomax at the Smithsonian, and cassettes of Junior Kimbrough and Othar Turner that the writer Robert Palmer gave me, all inspired the Kropotkins.

We asked was what would rock n' roll sound have sounded like if it went down those rural routes? Othar Turner and Sid Hemphill showed you could mix the bass and snare drum with the banjo, fiddle, and guitar and vocals. Everything can be played without electonics at a barbeque.

I called up my favorite musician for each part, and they all joined in. Locating Lorette Velvette was an adventure, the only player in the group I didn't really know and had only met once.

We've recorded three CDs worth of music, the last one in January 2005 and still unmixed at Easley Studios in Memphis. Lorette is back, and so are Samm Bennett (returning from Tokyo), Dog, Charlie Burnham, and Jonathan Kane, joined by Doug Easley and Al X. Greene. Mo Tucker couldn't come, as a new grandmother. Unfortunately, Easely Studios burned down soon after, destroying lots of classic studio gear.

It's a great group, we have a great time playing, and its the fact that a bunch of them have kids (Samm Bennett lives in Tokyo), and in Moe Tucker's case a grandson, and in my case a day job, that keeps us from performing as much as we'd like.

reviews

Village Voice
San Francisco East Bay Express
LA Weekly article about Lorette
Entertainment Weekly
Allmusic.com