From Whitney, with love

They're from the Windy City, look like scruffy indie kids, and thought up a persona to present their songs to us: meet the adorable Whitney. "Whether it's a he or a she? That's up to you."

"What would Whitney do?" was the regular refrain when Max Kakacek (24) and Julien Ehrlich (25) started writing songs together. "We had never written as a duo. Creating this sad and lonely persona was a way to lock our brains together," says Ehrlich as he bites into a roll in Les Brasseurs, a cafe just off the place de la Bourse. Outside, people are expressing their grief at the terrorist attacks a few days earlier with a carpet of flowers.

"Whether Whitney is a he or she, that's up to you," Ehrlich adds. He steps up the flirtation with the androgynous a bit with his earring, varnished nails, and young, boyish face. It's hardly a coincidence that "Take on Me" by the Eighties pop icons of a-ha is resounding through the cafe. "After a couple of songs, we dropped that perspective and started writing from our own hearts, but we kept the name," explains Max Kakacek. "But the way we worked is still important now: whenever you're writing, you should remove yourself from it at times."



Like Justin Vernon of Bon Iver, Whitney went off to write songs in a cabin in the countryside in Wisconsin. "But there was nothing romantic about it," Kakacek makes clear. "We were just homeless. My family has a house in a village of 200 people. We took a tape recorder and lived there for a month and a half. It wasn't that remote; we still had jobs in Chicago during the weekends." Like Justin Vernon, Ehrlich has a strikingly high-pitched singing voice, somewhere between Vernon's countertenor, the throat singing of My Morning Jacket's Jim James, and the late Curtis Mayfield.

They themselves point to Bob Dylan. Not the nasal Bobster, but Robert Zimmerman of the warm country crooning on Nashville Skyline. "It's incredible how Dylan completely changed the character of his voice," observes Ehrlich. "Nashville Skyline was the only CD in my car for a while, until I got tired of that 'Nashville Skyline Rag'." [Laughs]

During the recording process, Ehrlich asked the soundman to make his voice sound like a woman. "For a few songs, yeah," he admits with a grin. "I pictured 'Golden Days' being sung by a beautiful woman with an angelic voice, like Loretta Lynn. Or Taylor Swift. It would be a dream come true if she covered that song." We're not that sure that Taylor Swift has an angelic voice. "There's so much processing that it doesn't matter," says Ehrlich with a shrug. "I'd rather hear Miley Cyrus do it," Kakacek chips in. "She did a cover of 'Jolene', and it was very, very good."

Singing drummers are quite rare in pop music. Phil Collins did it, Don Henley too, Karen Carpenter, Dennis Wilson... Ehrlich and Kakacek give me a high five when I bring up the late lamented Levon Helm of The Band. "I've been obsessed with him since high school," says Ehrlich. "During the writing of the Whitney stuff, we started watching The Last Waltz, the film of their farewell concert, once a week in our apartment. Get stoned, freak the fuck out over it. 'The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down' is the best live performance I have ever seen anyone do."

While The Band respectfully explored the American tradition, Whitney leaps around in the Americana landscape like a young foal in a bright green meadow. The seven piece band wraps his playful, melancholy country palette in glowing brass, giving the dark lyrics about heartbreak a jubilant coating. Languid jazz grooves, as in the instrumental "Red Moon", reinforce the illusion of a happy day out beside a sunny lake. "When we are in lyric mode, we're tapping a different part of our emotions," explains Kakacek. "When we're playing music, we are in a happier place. We are all obsessed with makingthings really catchy and melodic."

Kakacek, who plays guitar in Whitney, and the drummer Ehrlich met up in Smith Westerns, an indie band with a fondness for glam and dream-pop that broke up two years ago. Ehrlich had previously drummed on psych-soul ensemble Unknown Mortal Orchestra's first album.



Young indie kids trying their luck with Americana, country soul, and jazz and showing an affinity with forgotten country singers like Jim Ford and Bobby Charles, isn't that kind of unnatural? "It's the music we always wanted to make," says Ehrlich. "With the last Smith Westerns record, there were a lot of conflicting views, artistically, between [the songwriters] Cullen [Omori] and Max." Kakacek nods."I'd listen to these musicians from the Seventies, but there wasn't really a way in Smith Westerns to make that music."

And now both the US and Europe are falling for their laidback country soul. "Without being arrogant, I don't think that people have seen a band play instruments like we do in a while," says Kakacek. "We all grew up being musicians before we started writing songs. So we are very comfortable with our instruments."

So, which kind of audience do they want to play for: indie kids or country freaks? "I'd play anywhere," replies Kakacek with a laugh. "My dream show would be in the Green Mill, the legendary jazz club in Chicago. But that won't ever happen." "We would really love to play the country pop festival Stagecoach," says Ehrlich, all smiles. "It takes place in the same spot as the Coachella festival, but it's a lot less cool. It's all about beer-drinking and truck-driving. [Laughs] Our booking agent said there's no way they would ever book an indie band, so we're making our application via every interview we do. Hear this, Stagecoach: yeehaw, we're ready to saddle up!"

​WHITNEY
17/6, 19.30, Botanique, www.botanique.be