Alli's Articles
INTERVIEWS, REVIEWS, CULTURE PIECES, MUSICAL RAMBLINGS.
Standing in the middle of a deli, Jack Salzman was eyeing down a kale salad on one of the prepackaged food shelves. He and his fellow bandmate, Brendan Bartow, decided to stop in this nondescript bodega for some pre-gig food as they were struggling to come up with a quirky name for their new musical project. “Shark,” “Bagel,” “Sandwich” … nothing was sticking. But as he was staring at the leafy greens, inspiration hit: New Paltz’s newest jam-band sensation, Kale, was soon to be born, as fresh as the produce that spawned it. Rising from the ashes of two local jam bands — Man’s Mother and Dephcat — Kale has made their mark locally in their mere six months of existence. With Salzman on bass, Bartow on vocals and keys and Sam Kirschner on drums — the band is scoring gigs from outside of its hometown, hitting legacy bars in Manhattan, Long Island and Vermont and opening for bands they’ve looked up to for years. In New Paltz, they help to break capacity records at the places where they got their start — such as their ol’ reliable, Snug’s. “I wanted to do drums, bass, guitar and keys to have that really big sound,” Salzman said, regarding the band's formation. “I realized after a couple of days of playing that that was definitely what I wanted my main focus to be.” After Depchat's last show in February of 2022 and a few months of jamming, Kale performed their first live show in May at New Paltz’s Blueberry Fields. The moment they got on the platform and played to their first audience, they knew it was fate. “It was like a flower blooming,” Kirschner reflected. Spring was starting, and a new hope for a blossoming band was coming into fruition. Kale slowly started to develop original songs through jams and onstage improvisations. In their earliest shows at the Blueberry and Snug’s, they focused on spinning songs from the Grateful Dead, Phish and other classic rock and jam-band acts into versions of their own. With Salzman’s powerful, driving bass, along with Bartow’s passionate vocals and key melodies — that made them stick out amongst other jam-bands — they were already establishing a unique sound to the new crowds rolling in to hear them. As the band progressed, they acquired gigs at The Bitter End — New York City’s oldest rock club — as well as Garcia’s, an iconic hotspot for deadheads, in Port Chester. Opening up for fellow jam-band up-and-comers Eggy and Baked Shrimp, Kale was starting to acquire fanbases in other pockets of the Northeast. Using the previous experience he had with booking Dephcat shows, Bartow took the reins on marketing and advertising — turning Kale from a band into a brand. Using programs such as Illustrator and Photoshop, he designed colorful and descriptive show posters and graphics for each gig. The band is also big on merch — stickers and shirts with their logo — “kale” in bright, green bubbly letters — were a must and developed as quickly as their career took off. After facilitating the rise of two of his own musical projects, Bartow has learned that the process of “growing” a band is far more than just playing an instrument onstage. Attending jam-band concerts has always been a hobby of his, and later became his design inspiration — enticed by the collectability of gig items such as posters that are custom-made for each date. “People go on to buy them and then put them on their wall,” he said. “You can always relive that memory just by looking at the poster.” In jam-band culture, every show is a memory — which is something Kale values through each set: making sure the crowd remembers the date. “There's more to the show than just going and seeing music. There's outfits they have on; there's a whole show they put on and you can go buy merch. You can listen to their stuff after; you can look up interviews and feel personal connections with the musicians. It’s a lot more.” This year’s Halloweekend was monumental for the band — on Oct. 29, along with fellow New Paltz bands What? and Kablamo, the band forced the already-packed bar to deny entry to anyone else trying to get in. A line stayed stagnant at the door all night while the three acts rocked the house until the early hours of Sunday morning. Coming off of their 2022 fall tour, the band feels confident and flexible, drawing new inspirations from covering electronic noughties and 2010s hits — Aviici’s “Levels” and even Drake’s “One Dance.” They are looking to experiment past their jam origins and take an indietronica approach to their sets, taking notes from synth-pop group Cut Copy — whom they’ve recently discovered — and Daft Punk. “We have no boundaries at this point,” said Bartow. “We can make our own space; we don’t have to follow a jam-band circuit.” Kale’s next gig is a dance-party postgame for Vermont-based rockers Twiddle at Paramount Theatre’s Spotlight Bar in Huntington, NY on Jan. 20. After that, they plan to retreat into the remaining frigid Winter months to record — with the hopes of finally putting out songs on streaming platforms. Months of hard work, thoughtful branding and eating their leafy greens has gotten the trio this far — and it continues to be an easy ride to reach their firmly-rooted goals. If you don’t already have Kale in your musical diet, make sure you get them on your plate before they swim to the Phishes at the top. Follow Kale on Instagram to stay updated on future shows and releases!
2 Comments
Kalefan02
1/19/2023 09:46:27 pm
KALE YEAH!
Reply
Dave
1/19/2023 10:47:14 pm
Get your Kale on!
Reply
Leave a Reply. |