"Parking garages sound really pretty," says Trials and Tribulations singer, songwriter and guitarist Jameson Lavo when asked how his band, whose fluid roster at times numbers over 20 members, finds time and space to rehearse.
"We've practiced in living rooms, extremely cramped bedrooms, kitchens, music stores, around campfires and underneath sketchy bridges. We agree on a time and place, and everyone who can come shows up. The songs are so easy that some members don't even get to practice. They just show up to the show and kick a whole bunch of ass regardless."
Lavo and chief collaborator Ben Roney-Yeager started The Trials and Tribulations in 2002 as a "Middle Eastern experimental noise band." In 2006, after years of recording material and evolving into an "ambient sludge metal project," Lavo says the group took an entirely different turn. "For no conceivable reason, I completely scrapped everything I had done over the four years, did a complete 180, learned how to sing—barely—and started writing three- and four-chord folk songs, songs about the beauty and the horrors of living in this exciting and absolutely terrifying time in history."
The Trials and Tribulations' inclusion of so many players and instruments at times creates an undulating, even confusing, wall of sound, particularly when almost two dozen musicians are free to go off on their own during the course of a song. Yet Lavo describes the band's music in simple terms. "It's really just folk music with a lot of sound and emotion behind it," he says. "We have traditional instruments like guitar, banjo, flute, fiddle and trumpet, to completely batshit crazy ones like omnichord, glockenspiel, saw and a laptop player. That's just in its current form, though. I'll never allow it to remain the same for too long. It becomes too, quite frankly, boring."
Lavo cites musicians and his environment as major songwriting influences: "For me personally, Tom Waits, Molasses, Muslimgauze and random folk and protest songs that I've come across over the years now [are influences]. Really, sounds, any sounds, beautiful and repulsive, excite me. I'd also name many local bands, but I don't like to leave anyone out, and I know I will if I try."
Over time, The Trials and Tribulations' roster has continued to swell, creating temporal and spatial challenges not limited exclusively to rehearsals. When the troupe plays live, there is the not-so-inconsequential matter of fitting everyone onto the stage.
Lavo recounts one of the most trying examples of this physical jigsaw puzzle: "We opened for one of my all-time favorite bands, Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra, a seven-member band with a lot of equipment. We easily doubled them, and then some. It was terribly embarrassing. They just wanted to set up and play, but no! We had to fuck their day up. There was so much equipment and people; we actually had to put the two drum sets in front of the stage. Still, we barely had enough room on stage, and ran out of microphones. On the other hand though, we have set up before in less than 10 minutes. I've seen three-piece bands take longer. So go figure."
The Trials and Tribulations have yet to go on tour, but the prospect of coordinating so many travelers does not intimidate Lavo. "So far, we've only carpooled in small groups at a time," he says. "We'll go down that road when we get there. I think it'll be fun, but who knows? It could be a disaster, but a glorious one, I'm sure."
When asked why the band swelled to such an overwhelming number of members, Lavo responds with a simple but emphatic "Why not?"
He contends that each musician is as important as the next, no matter what the role or instrument, a philosophy borne out in his band's mission statement: "Stay warm and take care of each other."
Lavo's designs for his musical future and that of The Trials and Tribulations are ambitious: "Recording, and plans to release two albums. One full-out with all 20- some-odd members. The second will be all four-track, more intimate portraits of the songs. After that I would really like to work with the band on making live ambient music exciting and engaging again. I've also always wanted to record a klezmer album, as well as a gospel/blues record. French pop, maybe, Persian kraut-rock, perhaps. Whatever happens, it will always involve as many people that I love and cherish as possible. Which is exactly what I'm doing now."
For more information about the Trials and Tribulations, visit myspace.com/theeverydaytrialsandtribulationsofaltar.
