Far From Skid Row

Who says beautiful things can't grow out of Skid Row? With its debut album “Self Help Serenade” recorded in 2002 and now out on the streets in the U.S., the Los Angeles-based band Marjorie Fair has come a long way from its roots in Skid Row and will soon embark on a tour, opening for Sheryl Crow and John Mayer.

According to Evan Slamka, vocalist, guitarist and primary songwriter of the quartet, he and his band mates - Dain Luscombe (keys), Scott Lord (bass) and Mike Delisa (drums) - once lived in a loft in what the city technically deems as Skid Row and what Slamka calls “one of the strangest neighborhoods” in town.

“Living in L.A. is great, the weather can get kind of boring,” said Slamka, who now lives in Echo Park, “But as a musician you have to live in a city because it's hard to stay focused and busy when you're not around other musicians and art. It's pretty lively and vibrant here.”

In fact, Slamka, now in his early 30s, was born and raised in New Jersey and tried his luck in the New York City music scene before relocating to Los Angeles where he had always felt a much better vibe during past trips. Capitol Records soon came knocking on the band's loft door (literally) in the less-than-glamorous part of Los Angeles where some representatives with the label chatted and heard a few songs by a group whose name is a kind of rose. Since then, the group has developed close ties with a few quintessential L.A. clubs like Spaceland, Genghis Khan and the Fold - all of which it mentions in the album's liner notes.

“I know a lot of artists and musicians, and where I came from, it's just not as encouraged or something like that. I think a lot of people come to L.A. to express themselves for their art and there are a lot of outlets here,” said Slamka. “Comparing it to other cities, I couldn't really say, New York is the same way, too. L.A. is very creative and small in terms of everyone knows everyone else and it's more sociable in that way because the weather is so inviting.”

Rob Schnapf, who has worked with Beck, Elliott Smith and the Foo Fighters, produced the album, which boasts a list of talented session musicians like Jon Brion, Joey Waronker, Billy Preston and Jim Keltner, and received much critical acclaim in the United Kingdom (MoJo magazine called it a “candidate for debut of the year”) before being released in the States in mid-July of 2005.

“Working with Jon was great, he is such a smart guy and very musical and a lot of what we worked on didn't make the album because of a time issue. We sort of went off on some tangents that didn't work with the record,” recalled Slamka of the recording sessions.

Slamka is surely influenced by the likes of Neil Young, Dusty Springfield, the Beach Boys, the Beatles and John Lennon. The work mostly comprises midtempo folk-based songs (Slamka seems to have a deep passion and nostalgia for the 1960s despite the fact he was born in the 1970s) transformed into rich, expansive, dramatic compositions, some with melodies like golden streams of light flowing over textures of guitar grit and melancholy harmonic lines that like to linger around.

“The songs are kind of what we were doing at the time and what our live show was comprised of. In general, I'd say it's more kind of what we do,” said Slamka about the group's sound. “I used to pretty much have all of the song 100 percent written because for me I don't feel confident in the studio and I feel like I have a lot to learn there. But what I would do is bring a song to rehearsal and the guys would play behind me and come with parts if ones weren't working out or improvise on those that did work. These days the parts have come up so much more naturally and now what I'll do is bring a sketch to the guys and it gives them a chance to be more proactive in a song. I consider it like we are writing together.”

As for the lyrics, Slamka is able to identify with his listeners, expressing to them an underlying theme that they are not alone and to find comfort in a collective consciousness of the trials part of life - lyrics such as, “He lives in a halfway house/his mother doesn't tie his bootstraps down/they found him by the highway side/with bloodstained boots and glass in his eye,” the opening lines of “Halfway House,” or “I don't want to go, but if I die young/Fill my empty room with the sun,” from “Empty Room.”