Sawtooth Taps Into Its Americana Roots

Some music exists deep in the soul of a person or a culture. The music which, these days, is called Americana is such a music–the music deep in the American soul.

All popular music has its roots in the folk, blues, gospel and bluegrass, which fall under that label; and when you get a group of musicians who grew up on that music, so that it is rooted in their souls, and they come together to play it, you have something special. In Long Beach, that something special is the band Sawtooth, who are releasing Band in the Woods, their first album.

The core of Sawtooth came together, appropriately, at a an open bluegrass jam at the dog park on 7th St., which takes place every other Saturday. A variety of musical roads brought them there, where they discovered their mutual love of this music, plus their chemistry playing together.

The band was put together by Ray Echlin, who plays upright bass. Echlin is originally from Detroit, where he had been a part of the music scene, including touring with Kid Rock. When he moved to Long Beach in 2005, “I started going to the bluegrass jam,” he explains. “I took the experience of the down and dirty playing club gigs to the outside bluegrass jam and said, ‘We’ve got to get these two worlds together.”

At the jam, Echlin met Sean Blake, Ted Smith and Hannah Mitchell. Blake, one of the primary songwriters in the band, plays guitar and sings.

“My music came from the church,” he says. “For me, belief is a big thing. I don’t like singing songs I don’t believe in.” The church he attended when he was young played a lot of old bluegrass hymns. “Music was a communal thing.”

Many years later, Blake was on a camping trip with his mother and they ended up at a campground near a bluegrass festival. As they set up camp, he heard people all around him singing the old songs he knew from his childhood. At that point, he became hooked on bluegrass.

Mitchell, vocalist and “onstage charisma and charm” (according to the liner notes), grew up in bluegrass country, North Carolina, “forty-five minutes from Doc Watson and forty-five minutes from Earl Scruggs.” Her family were all music fans; she was surrounded by all forms growing up.

“Music was an escape for me. Singing was a release, and developed into a spiritual vehicle. It’s the way I express my essence.” She had participated in bluegrass jams in North Carolina, and when she moved to L.A. she searched for something similar, not really expecting to find it. But she found the Long Beach group. “I thought it was just going to be jamming. Then Ray started getting gigs. Now we have a CD and are getting all sorts of gigs. I still can’t believe it.”

After years of playing guitar, Smith moved over to banjo. He started going to the jam because, “Music is a social thing. You can just hang out in the park and play.”

Echlin had played with Lu Urquidi in several combos, including a folk/blues group called Glorious Drunk. He brought Lu into the group as lead guitarist, vocalist, and songwriter. Lu’s introduction to bluegrass came early. “My dad used to listen to a lot of bluegrass.” He played in a rock band as a teenager, but “I got sick of loud music.” He played solo acoustic shows for a while, before connecting with Ray.

With a core group together, they placed an ad for a fiddle player. Steve “Dusty” Hartnell answered the ad. As Ray tells it, “Steve showed up for the fiddle audition, and he was a monster on the mandolin.” So he mainly plays mandolin in the band, although he does take a turn on the fiddle now and then.

Steve started out playing rock music. In the early 80s he played in a band called The Corsairs, a regular feature on the Sunset Strip. “Red Hot Chili Peppers opened for us,” he relates. “Fishbone opened for us.” In 1984, their bass player had a heart attack onstage at the Roxy. “I didn’t play again until I was forty,” he says, when he picked up the mandolin “because Jimmy Page played it.”

Drummer Hobey Echlin is Ray’s brother. He also played in Glorious Drunk. “Ray and I have been playing in bands since we were in high school back in the suburbs of Detroit but come from very different musical backgrounds…. Ray was in harder rock/funk bands while I played in shoegaze dreampop bands.” He goes on, “I was always a fan of Sawtooth – I used to take my kids to the Bluegrass Meetup where they all played. Bluegrass music isn’t exactly known for its drummers or having drums at all for that matter, …but that gives Sawtooth its uniqueness – traditional bluegrass fans can respect it, but we’re also bringing a more developed rhythm section that lets us encompass a Bluegrass/Americana/Roots aesthetic that, for me at least, keeps it fresh.”

Sawtooth takes their name from the Sawtooth Mountains in Idaho, where Ray often vacations. Ray also explains, “It takes saws to make all of our instruments.” Everyone in the band agrees that the name fits their sound.

When Ray moved to Long Beach, he immediately set up a performance and recording space in his garage. Almost from the beginning, three years ago, Sawtooth recorded their songs. When they had an album’s worth of material, the decided they needed another ear, so they took the recordings to Antoine Arvizu at The Compound Studio in Signal Hill. He did the final mix of the album.

Band in the Woods combines original compositions with classic folk, bluegrass, and gospel tunes. Perhaps the most remarkable thing about the album is how hard it is to tell the originals from the covers. The originals all have the timeless quality of classic folk songs. They sound like they must have existed forever.

Still, Sawtooth consider themselves primarily a live band. They describe it as “music as a spectator sport.” Sawtooth will be performing at their album release, 7 pm, Saturday, Jan. 25, at 4th Street Vine (2142 E. 4th St.). The album is also available on iTunes.