Chicago-based songwriter Ezra Furman is certainly an artist who has never been short on acclaim. His first band, Ezra Furman and the Harpoons, garnered attention almost immediately, was picked up by an indie label in 2007 and subsequently went on a national tour while he and his bandmates still attended nearby Tufts University. He’s since gone on to form Ezra Furman and the Boyfriends, who have received similar accolades for just about every piece of music they’ve released. In particular, 2013’s Day of the Dog received critical acclaim overseas. In Europe, rave reviews turned into sold out clubs and appearances at major festivals and as a result the band has spent the majority of their time touring that circuit.

Here in the U.S., the acclaim hasn’t yielded the same kind of tangible success he’s been able to see in Europe. This became evident to me upon learning about Furman almost a year after his most current release, 2015’s Perpetual Motion People, and catching a fiery set with just a handful of other people at a small club in New Hampshire called the Press Room on a Monday night last fall.

Shortly after that night I spotted him on Later with Jools Holland, the historic musical variety television show that showcases legends alongside noteworthy up and coming artists. The appearance on English television was just another testament to the buzz he’s created across the pond. Then Furman caught my attention again when he made news not only for the release of his new socially conscious protest song and video for “Body Was Made,” but for the notable names in his audience at a New York club. What does all this add up to here in the States? After all this acclaim, exposure and support, still not much.

Perhaps Furman’s music doesn’t quite fit in whatever trendy indie category we could describe as happening right now. There’s nothing lo-fi, there aren’t any hazy sun-tinged guitars or DIY aesthetics. There aren’t any drum machine claps, and for the most part there isn’t anything jaded about it–a feeling that could describe almost any piece of indie rock music right now.

Instead his songs are straightforward and rooted in the feel-good era of classic rock n’ roll and all the unabashed musical integrity that playing from that era would require. The classic sound he and his band capture juxtaposes against some very serious and introspective lyrics. Furman, whose struggles with his own identity perhaps mirrors the struggles of a generation of millennials trying to find themselves, has found his way through the music he’s created, both as a vulnerable and gut wrenching songwriter fully expressing all the complexities and layers of the human condition, and as a front man who pours his heart out in every performance he gives, even if it’s only for a handful of people on a Monday night.

With a band that pays homage to a truly full-fledged classic sound that is equal parts Velvet Underground, J. Giels Band, and Violent Femmes, I can’t help but wonder if he just hasn’t found the right audience yet–or maybe the right audience just hasn’t found him.

Before he makes his return to the Boston area with a show this Thursday at Great Scott, I caught up with Furman over the phone while he was on tour in Europe to ask him about all the success he’s had over there, starting his first band in Boston, and growing up with his brother Jonah of recently broken up Allston Pudding favorites, Krill.

Allston Pudding: You keep getting called back overseas. What do you attribute to the success and the experience that you’ve had across the pond?

Ezra Furman: Honestly, I remain a little confused about it. I don’t understand why, at all, I’ve been able to have success overseas more than the U.S. I try to avoid strategy and thinking about why. As an artist you don’t want to crowd out why something would be successful or why it wouldn’t be. It’s just boring for me to think about. But my experience is that somehow we had a hit song in 2009 in Austria, with Ezra Furman and the Harpoons. We formed at Tufts University in Medford and somehow this song “Take off Your Sunglasses” became a hit there in a big way– in Austria, and only in Austria. And it was like, “What the…this is totally amazing.” Then that totally died down, Ezra Furman and the Harpoons broke up, and we made a few more records.

Then suddenly, some years later the United Kingdom got excited about my [new] music. What do these things have in common? I don’t know, I guess they both have national radio. They’re both these little countries that have national radio, so maybe that’s it. I don’t know.

AP: Yeah, you started with Ezra Furman and the Harpoons in Boston. How would you describe your time with that band and being in the music scene in Boston at the time?

EF: It’s funny because I have that kind of experience of being in college in Boston and forming my first band. Then, and I’m sure we might have been mistaken with this, but it felt that there was no real healthy music scene. There was this and that, and bands around, but there weren’t like a bunch of bands out around supporting each other, playing shows with each other, and talking each other up and stuff. We felt like lone wolves, and only knew a couple other bands here and there.

Then I saw a different version of the Boston music scene when my brother Jonah formed a band like three or four years later. All these DIY venues sprung up and there was just this whole scene that was much more robust than at least anything we knew about. It’s cool and I always wondered if he was just a lot better at making friends than I was, but the Boston scene did kind of grow into a little DIY world, then got crippled because of the police action and stuff which is…shitty. I couldn’t believe that.

AP: Yeah with your brother Jonah being in Krill, was it like growing up in a house full of rock n’ roll? 

EF: I was never really in a band until college.

AP: So Tufts was really your first experience playing out with a band?

EF: Oh definitely, I used to play solo at open mics and little shows. But I was like, “I’m a solo performer, and I just want to write songs and I never wanna have a band, it’s stupid to have a band.” I don’t know if it was some kind of purity complex or something, misguided or something like that as a teenager. Then I was hanging with some musician friends at Tufts and they were in bands and they were like, “Come on man, you write the best songs, would you start a band?” Which I’m really grateful they talked me into it. I’m very lucky they were very passionate about it very quickly.

But yeah, I don’t know. Growing up we kind of kept to ourselves, and Jonah and I–and he will definitely agree to this–are very different kinds of musicians. I mean, we’re both guitar players, but I was all about learning songs and lyrics and playing songs for people and learning chords and he was, like, in jazz band. He was listening to interesting experimental things. I was into rock n’ roll and just great classic songwriting and he was into making crazy sounds and playing with tuning and making sounds very unusual. I learned a lot from him to tell you the truth.

AP: So the scene evolving for Krill in Boston was really a different time frame too.

EF: Thats right. He came along a few years later, I had already left (Boston) by the time Krill formed..and I was living in Chicago; that’s where the Harpoons were. I mean, we were on tour for most of those years, between 2008 and 2011. We never really had a city where we connected to a scene really the way Krill did.

AP: There’s the opening line for the Perpetual Motion People track where you say “I’m sick of this record already.” Is this line about the actual record and making that record? Was it a struggle to get it done?

EF: No, honestly the idea was that it was about listening to another album, like when you listen to a band you’ve never heard and you’re like, “This is boring.” It’s about being bored and having that experience. To me, I noticed it’s about how I get bored with everything and that’s one of my worst qualities and when I’m the least healthy.
AP: Was getting Perpetual Motion People done a struggle though? I know after Day of the Dog you said you felt like that was it. At that point did you go into that knowing what you wanted to make?

EF: Well, it’s true that making Day of the Dog was, like, “well, if this one doesn’t work, it’s over.” It was the best I can do. I know this is good and if people don’t like this one, I think I have to quit. Because I know I don’t want to play to twelve people in Boise, Idaho year after year. And then when Day of the Dog came out, there we were playing for twelve people in Boise, Idaho again. It felt like it was over, and I didn’t think I was going to make it. I didn’t think I was ever going to go on tour again. That was after I decided I didn’t want to be a professional musician. I was done. Then just a few weeks after that decision, that big moment for me to decide to give up, that it was like, “Oh you just got 5 stars in the Guardian, you just got booked for this big festival in the UK and they’re playing you all the time on national radio.” 

AP: So a renewed sense of confidence just came out of nowhere?

EF: Yup. Even then I was like, “well that’s funny.” But I still felt like it was over, so I went over to Europe and did this one last tour and decided we should do it because it would be fun and it’ll be the last one ever. But then we go there and we’re like, “Oh we shouldn’t quit now.”

The other thing is that I’m always writing songs. I keep writing songs. We’re, like, “people are finally liking our band now. Let’s make another record for sure, we have tons of songs.” So a song like “Ordinary People” was written before we even decided to make Perpetual Motion People.

AP: Up until that point in your life where you had been completely devoted to music, did you start to debate what else you could possibly do? Did it get to that point there where you had to think about the idea of a life without playing music for a living?

EF: Yeah, I’ve really become an adult as a musician. I’ve been touring and recording for ten years now so it would be weird to stop, but I do think about it. I have lots of other interests and it [music] can feel like it’s taking over too much of my life a little bit. I also just watched Krill disband and watched my brother quit doing music all out, full time, like he was doing, and he’s really happy about it. But I just don’t think I’m done with music. I still have ideas and a craving for songs and records I want to make. So it wasn’t like I had to come up with something, but I just had the opportunity to make another record. I write tons of songs and I feel like I could really make a new record about every six months. I really write a lot and think about possibilities for recordings a lot. It’s my favorite thing, to create the actual songs and recordings and touring behind them. I always have a good time but it’s a lot harder and more repetitive.

AP: You’re getting to see your font size get a little bit bigger on all the summer festivals. I’m sure that means that touring might be getting a bit more comfortable. Is there any one festival you’re particularly excited to play this summer?

EF: I’ve really just been focusing on this tour. There are so many new festivals. Honestly, I have an ethic of total equity for every show. It’s a principle of mine that every show is equally important. You can’t be like, “Oh this is a big one, this is a really important one.” I just don’t like thinking that way even if it’s shows for twelve people. We have to play good for these twelve people here. We have to leave them satisfied.

AP: You recently posted a picture with Chrissy Hynde of The Pretenders. Is there anyone else on a bucket list of people you’d be pumped to meet?

EF: Oh man, it’s all about how you meet them. I don’t really care that much about getting the chance to meet someone at a show of theirs. I probably won’t go talk to them because nothing usually comes of that. But then again if I get to actually have a good conversation with someone who is a musical hero of mine, that’s incredibly cool. Or if I get to work with them in some way or play a show with them or go on tour. I had that with Eddie Argos when we went on tour with Art Brut, which is a band I love. When their first album came out I was still a teenager. But then it’s like several years later and I’m friends with the lead singer. And to appear social with people like that? There’s something definitely thrilling about it.

AP: And I saw you recently did some demoing with Du Blonde, will those recordings ever come to light or was that just for documenting ideas and songwriting?

EF: Well that’s interesting. I don’t know. We did them at her place and she was like, “Oh yeah this is good, I’m going to edit these and something will come of it.” But she’s been working on it… we even did a Bowie cover. It was just for fun because we’ve recently become friends, and I think she’s incredible.  So I have no idea what will become of those but it was mostly just showing each other these songs. I was just really excited about how good her demos are.

Ezra Furman and the Boyfriends are at Great Scott in Allston this Thursday with Sleepy Kitty and Gracie. 18+ $10.00 adv / $12.00 dos