Eclectic Alt-Country Outfit Brings Stellar Side Project To Bay Area

By Dave Pehling

SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) -- Members of revered gospel country/punk outfit Slim Cessna's Auto Club come to the Bay Area with their stripped-down side project DBUK for two shows in Oakland and San Francisco this week.

Delivering it's mix of boozy gothic country and fervent gospel punk for the last quarter century, Slim Cessna's Auto Club was founded by lead singer and principle songwriter Slim Cessna in 1992 after his association with pioneering Colorado-based Americana group the Denver Gentlemen (members David Eugene Edwards and Jeffrey-Paul Norlander would start like-minded outfit 16 Horsepower). The group introduced religious themes and the intense frontman's fire-and-brimstone Baptist delivery to the regional style of modern alt-country. Alongside his longtime vocal and songwriting foil Jay Munly and guitarist Dwight Pentacost, Slim and company would build a rabid local following.

The group self-released several recordings between the mid-1990s and the turn of the century, eventually coming to the attention of San Francisco punk icon Jello Biafra, who described the group as "the country band that plays the bar at the end of the world." In 2000, Biafra's Alternative Tentacles label would issue the band's third album, Always Say Please and Thank You, its first to receive global distribution.

The album featured Slim's plaintive country balladry ("Cheyenne," "In My Arms Once Again")  balanced against raucous odes like "Last Song About Satan," "Pine Box" and the transcendent epic "Hold My Head"  that approximated what Celtic punk band the Pogues might have sounded like if they'd hailed from the Appalachian Mountains instead of London. The release was met with widespread critical acclaim and the band's kinetic live performances earned them equally ecstatic notices on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.

SCAC would remain with Alternative Tentacles through the decade, putting out a reissue of their studio debut as well as four more celebrated albums. The band eventually started putting out it's own music again in 2012, releasing a series of archival EPs that collected demo and live recordings to mark the 20th anniversary of the collective. While the members of the group are also involved with a slew of other projects -- most notably Munly's various solo and band recordings with the Lee Lewis Harlots and his own outfit, the Lupercalians -- in 2015 the quartet of Cessna, Munly, Pentacost and more recent addition keyboard/lap steel player Rebecca Vera released their debut album Songs One Through Eight under the new moniker DBUK.

Offering up a more spare and atmospheric style of storytelling gothic Americana that still touches on the SCAC cornerstones of religion, redemption, dark absurdist humor and vividly detailed character sketches, the album featured moody tunes written and recorded over the previous decade that focus more on Munley's songs and sepulchral vocals backed by acoustic guitar, cello, autoharp, banjo and left-field instruments including bird calls, mouth organ and bullhorn.

Earlier this year, DBUK released it's second effort, thematically entitled Songs Nine Through Sixteen, to another round of enthusiastic reviews that have praised the group's echoes of Nick Cave and Tom Waits. While the Auto Club passed through the Bay Area early this summer, playing two local dates on the inspired tour that paired the powerhouse band with legendary garage-punk hero Kid Congo Powers and his band the Pink Monkeybirds, this current West Coast jaunt by DBUK brings the quartet to the region for only the second time ever. The band plays the Starline Social Club with SF punk songwriter Mayya on Wednesday night before coming to SF to headline the Lost Church on Thursday. Local singer-songwriter Zachary Blizzard opens that show.

DBUK

Wednesday, Oct. 23, 8:30 p.m. $15
Starline Social Club

Thursday, Oct. 24, 8 p.m. $15-$20
The Lost Church