"I think the Midwest is a mystery to some people," says Ha Ha Tonka singer/guitarist Brian Roberts offhandedly during a conversation about why more people don't associate the band's home state of Missouri more closely with the South.
Thus summing up the conundrum perfectly.
Missouri lays claim to Mark Twain, Mississippi riverboat culture, and some of the world's finest barbecue. But it's also, like, up there by Kansas and Iowa and shit. And to some, it doesn't really feel exactly like those states that most often conjure the sense and imagery of the capital-S South.
Ha Ha Tonka is a lot like that, as well.
Named for a state park in the capital-S Southern mountain range known as the Ozarks (and not after a mirthful child's toy truck, as one might be forgiven for assuming), the Springfield-bred quartet has the twang and the effortless lazy flow that belies a powerful collective mind behind the simple façade — still waters running deep and all that, producing an engaging musical kindred-spirit to Faulkner and Flannery O'Connor. And Ha Ha Tonka has the bone-deep lyrical reverence for history and geography that typifies those alt-country and dark-rock artists most devoted to the Southern gothic vibe.
"I would say both [history and geography] play a big role in our music," Roberts says. "We definitely have a lot of references to the Ozarks, and to certain types of people, and old place names and things."
Ha Ha Tonka manages, however, to avoid the pitfalls of bland and long-beaten Southern-music tropes. If there's a murder ballad on the quartet's marvelous second album, Novel Sounds of the Nouveau South, it doesn't jump right out at the listener as such; if there's a tune about drinking, it isn't called "I Miss You, So I Drank A Bunch of Whiskey and Got Into A Fight." The group's Southern charm is more subtle, and couched in various other influences from folk to catchy three-chord rock 'n' roll, making for a unique sound that visits any number of aural regions without losing its sweet native accent.
"I don't think we make a conscious effort to avoid being clichéd," says Roberts. "I don't know, it's tough to say what's cliché … a drinking song could be a great song, but someone might say it's cliché. We're on tour with Murder by Death, who have a lot of songs about bourbon, but they're great storytellers with great songs, so to me, to call them clichéd [just for that] would be a cliché itself."
Putting out a great CD with an undeniably countrified edge and touring with one of indiedom's most beloved electric-folk yarn-spinners is a wonderful way to get noticed. These days, though, it's also the quickest route to becoming lumped in among the darker, more humid territories of that wildly eclectic fringe scene that, for lack of more specific terminology, all seems to still be falling under the term alt-country. But Roberts isn't worried; like all the other noble traditions in which Ha Ha Tonka puts so much stock, he's a believer in the idea that every artistic endeavor stands or falls on its own merits.
"I don't think we worry about it, because it's not really stuff you can control, people that listen to your music will say some very diverse things," he reasons. "We've definitely heard some interesting comparisons, people hear what they want to hear. You just try to make good music."
This article appears in Apr 21-27, 2010.