A Brooklyn-based sextet will travel outside the city, bringing with it a sound that fits the foothills of Appalachia better than the borough's brownstone houses and apartment buildings.
Yarn will play at 9:30 p.m. tomorrow at Jackie O's Pub and Brewery, 24 W. Union St., to promote its new album, Come On In, which will be released Tuesday.
The band's third album features melancholy lyrics about the struggles of life rather than the peaks, said Blake Christiana, the main songwriter and lead singer.
"It's a lot easier to write when you're a little down than when you're happy because when you're happy, you're gonna be OK, so you don't have a whole lot to say," Christiana said.
The band consists of: Christiana (guitar, vocals); Trevor MacArthur (guitar, vocals); Andrew Hendryx (mandolin, harmonica); Rod Hohl (electric guitar, dobro, vocals); Rick Bugel (bass); and Robert Bonhomme (percussion).
Yarn's Americana-influenced sound is a seeming anomaly as the band is based in Brooklyn - recently known more for its status as a safe-haven for all things indie.
Christiana said that the country scene in New York City is pretty vibrant.
"It's New York. You've got everybody in the world there, so pretty much every scene in New York City is in some way thriving because there are enough people in the town to make it happen. And country is in no way different from that," he said.
Yarn has adopted the city as its own, with a song on the new record titled "New York City Found."
"New York is a struggle," Christiana said. "(Writing music) definitely helps get some (things) off your chest. If you're feeling down and burnt out from the city, it's a way to get away."
It is clear, though, that Christiana's home town, Schenectady, N.Y., has swayed the band's lyrics and music at least as much as the Big Apple. The chorus of Yarn's homage to the city is, "Schenectady / I been waiting for so long for you to comfort me / but this boy has moved on."
"Schenectady's a dark, deep kind of place. ... I had a blast growing up there, but once I got a little bit older, I saw the darker side of the city," Christiana said.
"A lot of hometowns are pretty much the same in that regard where everyone wants out."
