Photo courtesy of the artists
Jon Langford and Sally Timms
Did you hear the one about two Mekons coming to Milwaukee? That’s right. Jon Langford and Sally Timms, Chicago residents and members of the legendary English post-punk group, are headed to town as a duo.
Langford says the smaller configuration makes “economic sense for us” especially considering the Mekons are an eight-piece collective living all over the world. Listening to their work together outside the Mekons, you’ll find it also makes artistic sense.
They paired most prominently on 2000’s Songs of False Values and High Hopes, a well-received EP that appeared on Chicago’s Bloodshot Records and Shock Records in Australia. The effort leads off with the lovely, Timms sung “Horses,” a song co-written by Timms and Langford along with auxiliary Mekon Brendan Croker that has also been recorded by Will Oldham, Chris Mills and others.
Timms’ last solo album, 2004’s In the World of Him on Touch & Go, featured mostly songs written by men and sung from men’s perspectives, including the memorable dark lead-off track, “Sentimental Marching Song,” penned by Langford. AllMusic’s Thom Jurek called the album Timms’ masterpiece: “skeletal, slightly out of kilter, timeless, eerie, and utterly beautiful.”
Yet another notable Timms/Langford pairing is on The Executioner’s Last Songs, a collection of murder ballads by the Pine Valley Cosmonauts, on which they team to tear up Lonesome Bob’s deadly “The Plans We Made.”
For their shows together, the duo will be joined by guitarist John Szymanski, who also performs with Langford as part of the Four Lost Souls, a Chicago-based group that also includes Tawny Newsome and Bethany Thomas, and one that plans to record a new album in March, says Langford. Szymanski’s presence will be very helpful, says Langford. “Sally doesn’t play an instrument, and I play guitar like a drummer,” he says.
Return to the Studio
The Mekons returned to action in 2019 after an eight-year absence from the studio. Deserted, the group’s 22nd album, recorded in a studio outside of the Joshua Tree National Park, received great notice far and wide. Timms’ filmmaking talents are displayed on the fantastically atmospheric video for one of the album’s standout tracks, “How Many Stars?”
“It was a no-budget video,” Langford says. “We like those.”
It’s quite likely the Mekons’ next effort will take much less time to appear. The band plans to meet up in Valencia, Spain, in April to record—and vacation, one benefit of band members living far apart. “We are all on different continents, so it doesn’t matter where we get together,” Langford says.
A 2013 documentary about the band, Revenge of the Mekons, was the start of a “regeneration” for the Mekons, according to Langford. The documentary by Joe Angio covered the history of the band from the Mekons’ start in 1977 in Leeds, England.
Even though he didn’t really enjoy being documented, Langford says it’s a great introduction to the band. The documentary is not pointless, he explained, or one that shows a band’s rise and fall amid forays into debauchery.
“It’s more of a road map of a band with a different way of working,” he says. “One that doesn’t play by the rules or cow down to the industry.”
The documentary continues to win the group new fans and has life beyond its initial release; Langford says he was invited in 2019 to attend of a showing of Revenge of the Mekons at a film festival in Holland.
Langford recently participated on Bloodshot’s 25th anniversary compilation, Too Late to Pray: Defiant Chicago Roots, with Jon Langford’s Hillbilly Lovechild, which included Steve Albini. He used the same moniker for Bloodshot’s very first release, For a Life of Sin, in 1994 on his classic “Over the Cliff.”
For the recent compilation, Langford’s “I’m a Big Town” pays tribute to his adopted hometown of Chicago. It was a song he had been unable to finish for some time, but Hillbilly Lovechild brought it to life with a “noise-punk meet country” approach. “Once I thought about it in that context, it made sense,” he says.
Langford’s other longtime musical partner, Dean “Deano” Schlabowske, a West Allis resident and fellow Waco Brother, will also perform at the show.
Jon Langford and Sally Timms with Deano Schlabowske perform at Anodyne Coffee Walker’s Point Roastery, 224 W. Bruce St., on Saturday, Jan. 18, at 8 p.m.
