Mutts “Separation Anxiety” 2012. Self-released on colored vinyl. We picked up Mutts’ second full-length LP (they have a couple of older EP’s) at one of their performances at Appleton’s Mile of Music Festival this past weekend. MoM is a 4+day fest in my hometown that is one of my highlights of the year: hundreds and hundreds of free concerts scattered throughout downtown bars, parks, parking lots and even alleys. The Mutts show we caught was at one of my favorite venues, the Fox River House, Appleton’s oldest tavern. The shows are held out back under a beautiful old tree – picturesque but also subject to the whims of the weather. Mostly the weather was perfect this year, warm and sunny, but Wisconsin can be volatile and late afternoon on Saturday a torrential downpour and high winds came pretty much out of nowhere right before the Phillip-Michael Scales (who is BB King’s nephew) and Mutts show (Mutts are Scales’ backup band). Undeterred, we sought shelter in a little alcove by the parking lot, umbrella in hand, and waited out the storm.

Sometimes bad weather puts a literal damper on things but in this case, it created a sense of gleeful solidarity among the audience members who stayed for the show once the festival crew swept away the standing water from the stage and removed all of the hastily thrown down tarps. Scales was great, the Mutts guys providing a solid backing for his “dive bar soul.” Then Mutts hit the stage, raucous, energetic, loud and so much fun! They describe their sound as “grounge” which I’m guessing is lounge-grunge mashup and is fairly accurate; as is the quote from their bio that they sound “like Tom Waits fronting a garage band,” mainly due to singer/keyboardist Mike Maimone’s gravelly vocals and vibe.

Rounding out Mutts’ lineup is guitarist/bassist Bob Buckstaff and drummer Ian Tsan. Tsan is a relatively recent addition to the band, on the LP Separation Anxiety drums are played by Chris Pagnani.

Mutts are from Chicago and have been around for almost exactly 10 years, touring relentlessly these past several months for that anniversary. Weirdly this is only the second time I’ve seen them: the first was a year ago in Indianapolis for the inaugural Romanus Records Festival (which we will be heading to again this upcoming weekend and I think Mutts are on the bill) so I can’t really be certain if their sound has shifted or not. But their live show at MoM was a lot more energetic than their 2012 release so I really need to get on checking out their newer recorded material. I do like Separation Anxiety especially the more upbeat tracks like “Half Mile,” the funky “Apathetic Stars,” and the heavy “Tire Swing Blues” – that one really earns the term “grounge.”