The New York alt-folk punk singer-songwriter artist and cartoonist from the Lower East Side Jeffrey Lewis has been announced for two shows in Ireland/Northern Ireland this May with his band Jeffrey Lewis & The Voltage.
Monday May 1 – Belfast, Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival – Ulster Sports Club
Tuesday May 2 – Dublin @ The Workman’s Club
Jeffrey then goes to the UK the following week for dates as per his schedule including Focus Wales festival.
Jeffrey’s last album proper was 2019’s Bad Wiring.
I saw Jeff play in 2006, and also enjoyed 12 Crass Songs, 12 interpretations of songs by the anarchist punk band Crass he released in 2007.
Jeffrey Lewis bio
Jeffrey Lewis and his various bandmates have perfected a scuzzy, urban style of indie-folk, developing from late-90s New York City bedroom tapes into a mighty 21st Century mash-up of folksy spiel and artsy garage, like Pete Seeger meeting Sonic Youth. A born and raised denizen of the Lower East Side, Lewis’s home recordings were discovered by Rough Trade Records in 2001 (famed label of The Smiths, The Strokes, Belle & Sebastian and more) while Lewis was briefly living in Austin, Texas. Since the 2001 release of his first official album “The Last Time I Did Acid I Went Insane and Other Favorites” on Rough Trade Records, Lewis has toured the world and released numerous acclaimed albums on Rough Trade and other labels. He’s built a worldwide fanbase while regularly changing band names, most recently recording as Jeffrey Lewis & The Voltage for Don Giovanni Records and Moshi Moshi Records.
A list of the Jeffrey Lewis band’s sonic touchstones doesn’t look all that different from a list of the seminal acts Jeffrey has done gigs and tours with, like Daniel Johnston, Roky Erickson, The Fall, Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks, The Vaselines and The Mountain Goats. Rave reviews have come from just about every corner of the music world, including glowing reviews and/or multi-page features, in publications like Rolling Stone, The New York Times, Uncut, Mojo, NME and others, and praise from music stars like Ben Gibbard (Death Cab For Cutie), Will Oldham, Jarvis Cocker (Pulp), Laura Marling, Regina Spektor and the late David Berman (Silver Jews).
Jeffrey is also an illustrator, and has written/drawn 13 issues of a comic book series called Fuff,
On stage, Lewis is backed by collaborators Brent Cole (drums), Mem Pahl (bass) and Mallory Feuer (keys, violin), a lineup currently known as Jeffrey Lewis & The Voltage. The trio’s spectacular newest full-length album Bad Wiring was recorded in Nashville, TN with producer Roger Moutenot (Yo La Tengo, Sleater-Kinney) and released November 1, 2019, on Don Giovanni Records (USA/Australia) and Moshi Moshi Records (UK/Europe/ROW). Jeffrey has also released four albums exclusively on Bandcamp during the pandemic years of 2020-2021-2022, as well as a 2022 collection of previously unstreamable studio outtakes and B-sides (called “Asides and B-Sides”) for streaming only (on Spotify, etc).
Still based on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, the year 2023 sees no signs of creative slowdown for Jeffrey Lewis & The Voltage, with more tour dates being added to the calendar in the USA, UK and Europe and new comic book projects nearing completion. Live gigs continue to incorporate Jeffrey’s narrative folk acoustics and garage indie-pop wig-outs, as well as the occasional inclusion of Jeffrey’s multi-media full-color illustrated/sung histories and fantasies (some of which have been featured on History.com).
