File Griffin in the same bin as Langhorne and Ferraby. Or if you'd rather go with less odd names, try Conor and Bruce. The Ohio native's "Flying Upside Down" disc unveils a crucial new bard of the American landscape; it's heartfelt folk that melds the political with the very personal.
The most intriguing new talent that you have likely never heard of - words frequently used to describe musical artist, Griffin House. At just 26 years old, his breakout talent reveals a wealth of soulfulness and sincerity well beyond his years. As evidenced on his critically-acclaimed, Nettwerk debut album, Lost & Found, as well as his most recent release, Homecoming, Griffin has taken the lessons he has learned from such industry legends as Woody Guthrie and Bruce Springsteen, and applied them to a collection of music that instantly qualifies him as one of the most intriguing new songwriters to emerge in recent memory.
"Ultimately, these songs are about spirituality and trying to find your place in the world," Griffin House says of Flying Upside Down (Nettwerk, April 29), an album that dramatically marks the 27-year-old Ohioan's coming of age as an artist of formidable skills. "Specifically, it's the continuing story of what's happening in my life, following the realization that the more specific I am about my own life and things that have happened to me, the more people will feel it universally."
The 13-track collection, filled with intensely personal, richly detailed vignettes of the highs and lows of House's existence, showcases a young artist whose openly emotional singing, poetic lyrics and spiraling melodies recall Jackson Browne circa Late for the Sky. Embedded in Flying Upside Down is a song cycle chronicling the arc of a relationship, from the first kiss ("Let Me In") to the emotionally lacerating moment of truth ("Heart of Stone") and its anguished aftermath (the title song). These psychologically penetrating songs are set against a backdrop of the lives of family members ("Better Than Love," "Hangin' On [Tom's Song]") and friends, including some serving in the Middle East ("I Remember [It's Happening Again]"). Completing the tableau is a pair of spiky, head-clearing rockers ("One Thing," "Good for You").
House describes the recording of Flying Upside Down "a dream come true," thanks in large measure to the drop-dead studio band assembled by producer Jeff Trott (Sheryl Crow), including a pair of Hall of Famers in Heartbreakers keyboard player Benmont Tench and guitarist Mike Campbell. A huge Tom Petty fan, House found it immensely gratifying that these great players related so strongly and brought so much to his own music. Also making major contributions were Beck's longtime bass player, Justin Mendal-Johnson, drummer Victor Indrizzo (Macy Gray, Aimee Mann, Daniel Lanois) and violinist Sara Watkins (Nickel Creek).
Last August, on CBS Sunday Morning, critic Bill Flanagan raved about House's first album, Lost and Found, putting the newcomer on his short list of the best emerging songwriters in the U.S., alongside Ray LaMontagne and Joseph Arthur. "I bought [House's] CD [after a show in New York City]," said Flanagan, "and this never happens: I took it home and must have listened to it 20 times that weekend. I was knocked out."
Flanagan further noted that Lost and Found revealed "a young man with a young man's influences," citing Wilco, U2 and Ryan Adams as primary touchstones. House acknowledges the accuracy of this assessment. "I was wearing my influences on my sleeve at 22 or 23," he says. Flying Upside Down, by contrast, is without question the work of a major artist, one whose music resonates with hard-earned insights. While it possesses striking emotional depth and intellectual acuity, the album is also wholly accessible, a hook-laden thing of beauty.
Born and raised in Springfield, Ohio, the athletically gifted House discovered in a high school drama class that he enjoyed being in front of people and making them laugh. He got totally swept up in performing after playing the lead role in a musical; it was the first time he'd ever sung, in public or otherwise. "It was like a 'holy shit!' moment, finding out I could actually do this," he says.
Two years later, House shocked his family by turning down a golf scholarship to Ohio U. "Sports were really a big part of me and how I grew up," he says. "So deciding not to take that scholarship was a turning point for me in choosing a new path for myself, a new life making music." There were some issues to deal with first, however ? he couldn't play the acoustic guitar he'd bought from a friend for $100 at 16, nor had he yet written a song.
"I took a couple of guitar lessons and got so frustrated that one day I kicked the strings off my guitar," he recalls with a laugh. "It sat there for about a year, but I took it to school [at Miami of Ohio] with me and made up my mind I was gonna learn how to play. One night I picked up my guitar and wandered around campus till I could barely keep my eyes open, trying to play this one chord over and over. Finally, around 4 a.m., my hand got used to it and I formed my first G chord."
Not long afterward, he wrote his first song for the high school sweetheart with whom he'd parted ways after graduation. When she came for a visit, House played it for her, and it brought her to tears. "Then I was hooked," he says, "I thought, 'Oh, man, if I can make people cry, I'm gonna keep doing this. I'm gonna make as many people cry as I can!'" After laughing at the memory, he puts the experience in perspective: "What I was drawn to was the power of the song, how it could affect people emotionally."
That epiphany caused the neophyte's creative juices to bubble over, and he got really good really fast. After graduating, he joined some of his buddies who'd moved to Nashville, and started doing solo gigs at the bottoms of bills in local clubs. Within months, he was headlining, surprising himself at his rapid development. "I was working in a gift shop downtown for $6.50 an hour," he remembers, "and four months later I was flying to L.A. and New York for meetings with record labels."
House signed with Nettwerk in 2004 and banged out Lost & Found with his band in five days, before moving from Nashville to Cincinnati. He spent most of the subsequent three years on the road, supporting Ron Sexsmith, Patti Scialfa, Josh Ritter, John Mellencamp and Mat Kearny, while also finding time to record several "direct-to-fan" releases, a pair of EPs (House of David Vols. 1 & 2) and the 2006 digital release Homecoming.
During the same period, he fell in love and got engaged, only to realize at the eleventh hour that he'd made a huge mistake. Inevitably, that wrenching experience led to the writing of several of Flying Upside Down's most gripping songs. They came to life during the two months House spent in Manhattan Beach early in 2007 making the album.
"I was living down the street from Jeff, right on the beach," he recalls. "I'd ride my bike to the studio every morning and go make music. It was awesome ? a good way to spend an Ohio winter."
