Photo credit: Amanda Hartwig
The Mod Violets
Earlier this year, a great album was released in Milwaukee with little fanfare. The Mod Violets’ self-titled CD brims with sharp-angled, guitar-driven melodies and reflective lyrics veiled in an aura of psychedelia. The band name signals an era—could The Mod Violets have been a group from mid-’60s London, tinted with Edwardian nostalgia? At moments they sort of sound that way. At others, the precise origins of their music are more allusive.
The Mod Violets are a reunion for Mark Lonteen (rhythm guitar, vocals) and Mike Hartwig (lead guitar, vocals). After playing together in the ’60s-pop influenced Loons, they parted ways in the ’90s and eventually went silent. Lonteen and Hartwig regrouped in 2018 to write and record. Their first new song, “Because She Could,” is the least characteristic of the album—it could be a lost number from Buddy Holly’s catalogue—but lends a note of contrast to the otherwise yearning harmonies and minor keys.
“We had no preconceptions when we started,” Hartwig says. “It all just came out a certain way,” Lonteen adds. “We just came up with what we came up with.”
Of course, influences matter. Lonteen cites a list of songwriters: Burt Bacharach, Lennon and McCartney, Rick Nielsen, Jimmy Webb, Fiona Apple and Milwaukee’s Paul Wall (Trolley) and Brian Miller (Blarney Castle). “My tastes are eclectic. I get as much joy listening to The Tindersticks’ ‘The Not Knowing’ as The Clash’s ‘Death or Glory,’” he says.
Hartwig responds to the question with “R.E.M., The Byrds, early Dire Straits, The Ventures.” Altogether, it’s a wide roster of moody melodic music rooted in the ’60s idea of packing a story or an impression into three well-crafted minutes executed by two guitars, bass and drums.
The album was made in Hartwig’s basement digital studio with Terry Garguilo (“an intuitive drummer,” Lonteen says) and Russell Grabczyk (“a brilliant bassist,” he adds). “Originally, it was going to be a recording project,” Hartwig says. “We were so happy with the way it turned out, we decided to go on as a band.” When Garguilo’s work schedule made committing to night gigs difficult, he was replaced by Brad Beyer, praised by Lonteen for his “enthusiastic playing.”
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Lonteen and Hartwig have several songs that remain unrecorded and are writing more for a possible second album in 2020. “I want as many people as possible to hear our songs,” Lonteen says. However, aspirations for stardom are modest. “It’s about the pure enjoyment of creating songs and the joy and pleasure of playing them,” he explains.
The Mod Violets, with The Unheard Of opening, play at Club Garibaldi on Saturday, Dec. 7, at 7 p.m.
