A solo four hour drive and an unexpected Champlain Lake ferry suggested by Google Maps, left Gabby Smith of Eskimeaux, giddy at the chance to share a song that she crafted along the way. Although she missed her band, she saw the small alter of Winooski, Vermont’s Methodist Church as this challenge to get more physical with her performance and offer the unlikely material of this freestyle jam. Ending the set with a dynamic, occasionally one-kneed, “ I Admit I’m Scared”, Smith beamed.
Optimism surrounds Smith’s entire being. Her songwriting explores the darkest of places, but we’re always directed to the underlying theme of beauty in detail and the friendship that pulls through. Songs like “Power” off of her latest six-song album, Year Of The Rabbit, feel like more of a compass to easiness than anything. She cites her strongly seeded sources of relief as the inspiration from her friend and occasional bandmate, Greta Kline of Frankie Cosmos and her dear dog , Frankie.
It was only right that Smith directed me to a rainbow during this interview.
Allston Pudding: How did you meet Frankie?
Gabby Smith: I was on the first Eskimeaux tour in 2012 and I was in Athens, Ohio. I played this set and was feeling really chatty that night on stage. I was like, “yeah I went to a pet store today and it was really hard. I think that I’m going to go back tomorrow even though I don’t agree with pet stores. There was this really beautiful dog and we just bonded really hard.” So I was saying all of this stuff and this person came up to me right after our set and was like, “hey, so I have this puppy and I’m moving to L.A., so I’m going to have to give him away. Do you want him?” I was like, “Oh my god, no. That’s amazing and such a bad idea.” She then told me to come over for breakfast and that everyone needs time to play with a puppy and it will be fine. It was totally a trick because she knew that I wouldn’t be able to say no to a homeless puppy. What the hell!
So I went over to her house, she made me chilaquiles, it was amazing, and then I walked out with a dog. He was the size of a tetherball. He was really
By Andrew Piccone
amazing. We took him on the rest of the tour and he was really good. He’s going to be four soon. I assume that he was about two months old when I got him. He is way smaller than I thought. I assumed he would be huge like a boxer, but he just turned out to be not a boxer and definitely not huge.
AP: So he travels well on tour?
GS: He did, but the shows have been really different lately. The way that people interact with us is really different. On the first tours we could just be in the car and hang out with him and have time to take walks with him because it was mostly house shows where we could put him in the car during our set or have him hang out in the house if it was hot.
He does have these hunting, shotgun earmuffs, so that he doesn’t go deaf, but he also refuses to eat. He’s a picky prince. He’s gotten worse with it on tour.
AP: Frankie has been in press photos and he’s on the cover of O.K. with you. How does Frankie influence your lyrics?
GS: Frankie is the center of my domestic relationship. Whenever my partner and I don’t see eye to eye, we have this common dude who we look at and laugh at, and everything is fine. He’s definitely the sense of calm in my life, which is a place where I try to draw emotions from most often.
I talk about him quite a bit, especially in newer songs. In “Drunk”, he’s the source of my anxiety in my dreams. Also “You And Frankie And Me” is about this ball of jokes that you can look at whenever you’re sad and look up from him and see that everything is fine.
AP: You tend to use a lot of metaphors including animals and nature. What do you think is the importance of having a deep relationship with nature?
GS: Oh my god, it’s so important. I grew up in Manhattan and there’s not really any nature. You can go to Central Park, but it’s a little scary sometimes. Now, I know about Prospect Park and it’s really changed my world because it’s so beautiful and huge. Every morning before nine is “off-leash hours” and there’s hundreds of dogs everywhere in the park. It’s so magical. When I discovered that, I realized how important it is to get to know nature. I mean I grew up in a Jewish family and there’s a stereotype that every Jewish family in New York sends their kids off to summer camp to enjoy nature. I totally did that. I was a horse girl.
I feel like it’s just such a special thing.
AP: Did you get to do anything on Year Of The Rabbit that you didn’t get to do on O.K.?
GS: It’s almost live which I definitely did not do on O.K. It was just the complete opposite, where it’s me sitting in my room and adding keyboards to everything. With this we were trying to figure out how we could perform it almost exactly the same live. In some ways it’s better than live because it has Emily [Sprague] and Henry’s [Crawford] amazing guitar stuff that I don’t know how to do. It was really sick. I got all of my friends to do little cameos on it.
AP: You have said that one of the biggest pushes for you to make music was Greta Kline and Frankie Cosmos. What is your favorite Frankie Cosmos song?
GS: There’s this song called “Skinny” on Daddy Cool. It’s so sick. She has a couple of songs that are very nineties in the chord progressions and they’re very muddy. She usually writes with these bright, ringing chords, but these songs are very like “Shing ca dang dang”, very Liz Phair. Oh my god, the song is so angry and so sick!
Also, “cow meeting” is amazing. The first Frankie Cosmos song that I ever really heard was “Havin A House”. I’ve always wanted to cover it, but there’s nowhere for it to go. It’s perfect.
Catch Eskimeaux at the Allston Pudding Presents show on Thursday, May 12th with Free Cake For Every Creature, Claire Cottril, and Lady Pills at Once Ballroom. Tickets are $12.00 in advance and $15.00 at the door.