Somehow and somewhere between two major cities, four musicians have managed to assemble themselves into an outfit that could live in either place (or not), independent (or not) and representative (or not) of each. They might even be named after a long-gone but trailblazing magazine that, for a brief moment in time, united people across one of history’s greatest divides.
Or not. It’s hard to tell with Twen. Originating in Boston, now residing in Nashville, this band enacts jangle and acid pop dramas inside a psych-garage space. In a way minimalist, or rather, economical in sound, Twen is airy and ethereal but also rocks out and drives it to you. Or not. There is such a delicious duality to everything that one can’t help but to close one’s eyes and just let the soundscapes grow.
Propelled by a golden-voiced singer and guitarist, Jane Fitzsimmons, Twen is rounded out by Ian Jones on guitar, Cory Best on drums and Jim Connolly on bass. Instant darlings of the Nashville indie scene, Twen share their name with a Cold War-era West German monthly that also circulated beyond the Berlin Wall. Their calling card is a 2016 live EP recorded at Boston’s Track Shack on the eve of their first show, and which they credit for their successes since.
If Boston was college, Twen’s “free year” has been the road and the finding of a new home in Nashville. Jones told The Deli magazine that re-constituting there “was serendipitous, but you could also feel the gravity of the thing forming before it actually bore any fruit.”
The next step, a debut full-length, will surely take the diffuse beauty of “Twen (Live)” to another level. But will the band use it to make a play for a more focused and definitive kind of musical energy? God, we hope not; they sound beautiful in the uncertainty of a dream.
In the meantime, there will be a special edition tour split tape with Saint Augustine’s REELS released by Fuzz Baby Records, which should hold fans over until the album’s proper release. Or not.
Twen, with REELS, Fat Sun, AnastasiaMax and Matchstick Johnny, performs January 24 at Voltaire in West Palm Beach. ~Abel Folgar
