photo by Brittney Bush Bollay
Every Monday through Friday, we deliver a different song as part of our Song of the Day podcast subscription. This podcast features exclusive KEXP in-studio performances, unreleased tracks, and recordings from independent artists that our DJs think you should hear. Each and every Friday we offer songs by local artists. Today’s selection, featured on the Midday Show with Cheryl Waters, is “Saying Goodbye” by The Greenhornes from their 2010 album ★★★★, released on Jack White’s Third Man Records.
Formed nearly a decade and a half ago, The Greenhornes are no garage rock novices. While drummer Patrick Keeler’s rock origin goes back to his high school band Us and Them (like Pink Floyd, much?) just outside the city, he started The Greenhornes in Cincinnati with four others. Eventually, the five-piece whittled down to the current well-known trio of Keeler, bassist Jack Lawrence and singer/guitarist Craig Fox. Together, they since went on to record one EP and four albums, eventually with the help of friends Brendan Benson and Jack White. Not coincidentally, The Greenhornes’ Jack Lawrence and Patrick Keeler went on to form The Raconteurs with Jack White during their long hiatus between their most recent and previous albums.
In 2005, the band added their efforts to indie-flick mastermind Jim Jarmusch’s understated Broken Flowers. If their resume wasn’t impressive enough, Lawrence and Keeler were also featured on Loretta Lynn’s Van Lear Rose. And let’s not leave the fact Lawrence also plays bass in Jack White’s newest concoction, The Dead Weather, go unmentioned. The hardest working men in indie show business? Probably.
★★★★, or Four Stars, is the band’s fourth studio release, their first in eight years. KEXP had the pleasure of hosting the Ohio-based trio last Saturday as they toured in support of the album. You can listen to the session here. They have a few shows left in Chicago over New Year’s before they head off for Australia. Check their Myspace page for more information. For now, you can watch today’s featured song, “Saying Goodbye,” as performed live in the KEXP studio:
2 Comments
Great post!
Thank you KEXP, for spotlighting an amazing band from my hometown of the ‘Nati!
It was 14 years ago when the retro ’60s sounds of The Greenhornes were love at first listen to my ears. Back in ’96, amidst a sea of post-grunge muckiness & teen-queen-top 40, their garage-bluesy swagger was a ray of light that warmed my soul and shook my hips!! I followed them throughout the years, and eventually I was “saying goodbye” to my hometown of Cincy en route to the emerald pastures of Seattle.
Fast forward to 2010, hearing them live on my favorite radio station in my new hometown of Seattle brought back all the memories I had bustin’ moves on the creaky wooden floorboards at the dive bar/ rock’n'roll laundromat named Sudsy’s, where the band took up an “unofficial” residency back in their early days! It was a thrill & made me feel like I was 18 again! Thanks so much, KEXP....you rock!
Then you’re going to love the live video of their in-studio we’ve got coming up real soon!