Jason Sandford
Jason Sandford is a reporter, writer, blogger and photographer interested in all things Asheville.
The Mothlight in West Asheville will host a special concert on Thursday – a concert that will pay tribute to the music of influential singer-songwriter Jason Molina, who died last year. Molina made music with two bands of rotating musicians. The bands were Songs: Ohia and Magnolia Electric Co.
Members of those bands are playing four shows in Durham, Indianapolis, Chicago and Asheville. Songs: Molina will pay tribute to Molina. From Molina’s New York Times obituary:
Before bearded banjo bands like Mumford & Sons and the Avett Brothers rode a folk-rock revival to mainstream success, Mr. Molina was constructing spare songs about 19th-century heartbreak and the despair of blue-collar workers, about loneliness and bad weather and scarred landscapes in a fading Midwest. …
Mr. Molina’s songs, however bleak, were meticulously executed. Even critics who needled him for wallowing in gloom — four of the seven songs on his 2002 album “Didn’t It Rain” had the word “blue” in the title — might go on to declare a song spellbinding or magical.
Here’s more about the show from The Mothlight’s website:
In May of 2013, less than two months after the untimely loss of Jason Molina, his bandmates from all eras of his career – the Spineriders, Songs: Ohia, and Magnolia Electric Co – met in Bloomington, IN to pay tribute to the life and songs of their fallen brother. While the absence of Molina’s unmistakeable voice weighed heavily on the crowd of fans and friends, the power of the songs – voiced, that night, by contemporaries who had been, in one way or another, a big part of Jason’s life – shone brightly. Following in the footsteps of his idols Bob Dylan, Townes Van Zandt, Willie Nelson, and others, Molina often wrote songs with others in mind.The Magnolia Electric Co LP features two songs – “Old Black Hen” and “Peoria Lunchbox Blues” – sung by folks Jason hand-picked to bring them to life. The bonus disc to the recent reissue features Jason singing them himself. Despite the differences in the readings of the tunes, the song rises above as the central, stirring work of art. This particular tribute happened one night in May, but the ties of those musicians, brought together by one very determined and talented man, led many of them to decide that such an event might need to happen again.
It is with the spirit of Molina’s incredible and unforgettable songwriting in mind – and the memory of his friendship and generous nature at heart – that the members of Magnolia Electric Co will hit the road for four days this coming January playing the songs of Jason Molina, from both his career in Magnolia Electric Co and Songs: Ohia. In addition to those musicians who traveled with Jason from 2002-2009, M.C. Taylor of Hiss Golden Messenger – a friend of Jason’s since before his band Court and Spark toured with Magnolia in the mid-2000s – will join as another voice and guitar player for the group.
“Songs: Molina – A Memorial Electric Co” will find its way to Durham, NC, Asheville, NC, Indianapolis, IN, and finally to Chicago, IL, where the members of Songs: Ohia who recorded the classic Magnolia Electric Co LP will also play a set of Molina’s songs. Jason Molina’s voice stands out as one of the most unique, urgent, and beautiful of songwriters from the last twenty years, and while it cannot be replaced, “Songs: Molina – A Memorial Electric Co” will attempt to pay tribute to it and help coax it out of the amazing songs that Jason left with us.
