The Pastoral Past: Bowerbirds

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ONE DAY BOWERBIRDS' main songwriter, Phil Moore, realized he knew where his musical future would lie. And that was in the past. The deep past. Like, the past of his mom and pop.

"I grew up on my parents' record collection, like Simon & Garfunkel, Peter Paul & Mary and things like that," the North Carolina native says. "But I was listening to harder music back in college — like Sunny Day Real Estate and Don Caballero. And I had an epiphany that I didn't really like that stuff as much as I thought I did."

So Moore started "re-listening" to old Bob Dylan records and "just kind of got into working out interesting acoustic guitar parts and rediscovering classical guitar and sweet-sounding music again." Moore maintained that non-electric musical outlook when he started Bowerbirds with accordionist and autoharp player Beth Tacular and violinist/percussionist Mark Paulson.

Actually, Moore didn't quite "start" the band. It sort of fell together. What happened was Moore was asked by fellow North Carolinians the Rosebuds to open a gig. He needed to get a CD together for the occasion and brought in Tacular to play and Paulson to produce. Paulson chipped in with some violin parts, and suddenly both a band and EP ("Danger at Sea") were born.

But it was their full-length debut, "Hymns for a Dark Horse," that got them real attention, thanks to its rustic "nu folk" sound and pastoral imagery. Soon they were touring with the Mountain Goats and Bon Iver, and signed to the Dead Oceans label.

"It was completely for my own amusement," Moore explains of the band's inception. "At first, it was gonna be me and my songs, and playing them maybe for my friends in local art galleries. We had no idea that people were actually gonna like it that much."

The band now finds its next album, "Upper Air," eagerly awaited. Fans can catch some of it being previewed on the current tour.

"We'll be playing quite a bit of that music in D.C.," Moore says. "We're really proud of it."

» Rock and Roll Hotel, 1353 H St. NE; with Bell, Birdlips; Sat., Apr. 25; 9:30 p.m., $10; 202-388-7625.

Written by Express contributor Tony Sclafani
Photo courtesy Derek L. Anderson