Mekons' Sally Timms & Jon Langford join Freakwater for Freakons project

What better way to deliver grim tunes about the horrors of coal mining than the sweet voices of Catherine Irwin and Sally Timms.

Mekons + Freakwater = Freakons

The Mekons and Freakwater have been friends for decades, forged in the punk rock/art school crucibles of late ’70s Leeds and mid ’80s Louisville respectively. Both bands mined British folk and American classic country music for three-chord songs whose lyrics fit the nihilism or political rage or outlandish joy of the moment. Many of these songs were about coal mining. Traditional songs about heroic union organizers, deadly mine disasters, wailing orphans, or mining's grim history of economic and ecological devastation fit seamlessly alongside each band's original material. And so it is with FREAKONS. 

Deep pit mines, strip mines, mountaintop removal, collapsing slag heaps. Deadly work, poisoned water, and fantastic songs. Always fantastic songs. 

This is where the FREAKONS were born, from the very bowels of the earth. 

The Mekons’ Jon Langford & Sally Timms and Freakwater’s Janet Bean & Catherine Irwin are joined here by the stellar string and vocal harmonies of Jean Cook (Ida, Tara Jane O’Neil, Skull Orchard) and Anna Krippenstapel (The Other Years, Joan Shelley, Freakwater), along with special guest, the beloved guitar genius Jim Elkington (Richard Thompson, Eleventh Dream Day, Horse’s Ha, Skull Orchard, Freakwater, The Zincs). 

Belgian painter Jo Clauwaert created the album’s intricate gatefold cover. Images from song lyrics and related history emerge and recede again in this gorgeously illustrated artistic fever dream. 

Pre-order the debut album from Freakons (out March 25th) via Bandcamp right here or directly from the label, Portland's Fluff & Gravy Records right here. 

Check the release trailer and the video for "Blackleg Miner" following the tracklisting below.

Freakons – s/t

1. Dark Lords Of The Mine

2. Chestnut Blight

3. Abernant 84/85

4. Judy Belle Thompson

5. Canaries

6. Blackleg Miner

7. Phoebe Snow

8. The Mannington Mine Disaster

9. Never Thought I'd See The Day

10. Dreadful Memories

11. Coorie Doon

12. Blue Scars Of A Miner

"Phoebe Snow"

Interestingly enough, the Freakons debut includes a song about the fictional Phoebe Snow, not the popular 70s singer/songwriter – born Phoebe Ann Laub – who voiced numerous commercial jingles. The character "Phoebe Snow" was a white dress wearing Victorian traveller who appeared in a series of Delaware, Lackawanna & Western Railroad posters at the turn of the century (see below) as part of a popular advertising campaign to create the impression of cleaner railroad travel with anthracite coal. 

Earnest Elmo Calkins' advertising campaign used "Phoebe Snow" to sell the concept of cleaner railroad travel with anthracite coal.