Jennifer Markey
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Biography
Jennifer was born in Dayton, Ohio to musical parents. Her father was a flautist with Akron's East High School band, and her mother is a singer and pianist. Jennifer's father enlisted in the Air Force upon graduation from East High and repaired planes. Between the time Jennifer was born and the time she turned ten, the family (which grew in 1975 to include adopted Filipino baby Chris) had lived in Guam, The Philippines, Akron, Ohio, and Elgin, Illinois, among other cities for a total of twenty moves. In 1992, the family settled in Minneapolis and that is where they stayed.
At age 13, Jennifer received a twelve-string guitar, a hand-me-down from a fellow church-goer's attic. Finding all of those strings difficult to deal with for a beginner, she removed half to make a six-sting and proceeded to learn a few chords. This proved difficult; the strings hurt her fingers and the learning process was so slow that she gave it up.
At 16, she thought she'd give it another try, in order to learn the Beatles' catalog well enough to form a band with friends. This proved frustrating as well; the Beatles' songs were chord-laden and not easy to learn. So the guitar went back in its case and rarely came out until 2003.
Married in 2001 and getting increasingly fed up with married life and the daily toils of the preschool classroom, Jennifer was looking for something different and interesting to do; she went to some of the local clubs occasionally and her favorite local band at the time was Ol' Yeller (Rich Mattson, Dale Kallman, Keely Lane). One night in January 2003, after a show at Mayslack's, where the band performed a song by favorite songwriter Mike Nesmith, Jennifer decided, sheepishly, to try and talk to someone from the band. Keely seemed to be the most approachable, and she chatted with him for a moment before leaving for the night. The next day, she found out about a country music jam at the Hexagon Bar in South Minneapolis, where Keely played drums along with Dan Gaarder of local band Trailer Trash. Jennifer thought she might go and sing a song with the band and try that out. She did just that and, consequently, was there at the Hexagon every week for many months.
One week, Jennifer wanted to sing a song with the band that they didn't know. She also never knew what keys her songs were in. Dan caught up with her on a set break and asked if she had a guitar at home. She replied that she did; he asked if she could please try and play it so that she could know what keys her songs were in. She did her homework and continued to work on playing guitar at home.
In May of 2003 (after a bitter separation which would so be a divorce), Jennifer got word of an open mic night at Mayslack's in Northeast Minneapolis on Monday nights. Local musicians would host and they changed over once a month. The month of May was Rich Mattson's to host. Jennifer eagerly attended a few weeks in May and played a few country songs, including "It Wasn't God Who Made Honky-Tonk Angels", for the small audience there. She was playing her twelve-string-turned-six-string. Rich seemed to enjoy the performances, as did Wain McFarlane (of Ipso Facto) the following month, but most of all Sherwin Linton in the month of July.
Jennifer was making new friends at these establishments; she met Richard Gunderson at the Hexagon and he told her about a weekly country jam that he and his friend Clay Williams would be hosting starting in September 2003. She was there most weeks, brushing up on her singing and gaining knowledge of classic country music. She started bringing her guitar and, before she knew it, she was playing and singing with the band on a semi-regular basis. In January, Clay and Richard asked her to join Western Elektrick. She played and sang with them, adding her vocal harmonies and rhythm guitar. This was what you'd call being thrown to the wolves; Jennifer was not confident in her playing, song knowledge or chord structure, but continued to plug away and make progress. Playing for three hours every week, though, made her more and more confident.
Dan Gaarder, with whom Jennifer continued to jam at the Hexagon, approached her about songwriting; Jennifer had written just one song on her own ("Bakersfield"), which was basically a three-chord tribute to Buck Owens, nothing too progressive, but not a bad song. Dan invited her to his South Minneapolis apartment to possibly co-write and see what would happen. Jennifer had a few lyrics written out, but the chord structures just weren't happening. That night, Dan gave her a few ideas, they worked on a couple of songs, and came up with "Bottom Of The Glass," a straight-up country number with a slightly different chord progression that gave the song life. Within the next few weeks, Jennifer was hard at work, suddenly having a door opened to her with Dan's assistance. Over the next months, she wrote "Old Crow," "Say Somethin'," "Knoxville," "My Wedding Day," and "So Tired (Of Foolin' Around With You)."
In April of 2005, Western Elektrick was abruptly relieved of their position as Tuesday night dance band at the Eagles Club. Jennifer and Richard joined with guitarist Bill Kelly and drummer Mike Kirk for a short stint as The Worth-A-Dangs, playing local venues to try and keep together some fo the work that Western Elektrick had been doing, Jennifer and Richard disagreed on some key issues, and by the summer, the band had dispersed.
In the summer of 2006, Jennifer decided that between the covers she was playing and the new songs she had written, she could put a band together and try to get some gigs. Dan Gaarder was in (so exciting!), as was fiddler Kevin Anthony (from Galveston, Texas); Jennifer "borrowed" Kevin's bass player Eric Paulson as well. She nervously presented her new songs to the band. They were on board. Jennifer Markey and her Buckboard Boys played their first show at Lee's Liquor Lounge in December of 2006.
Bands
Western Elektrick
The Dieselfitters
The Worth-A-Dangs
Jennifer Markey and her Buckboard Boys
Jennifer Markey and the Tennessee Snowpants
Yodel-A-Go-Go
The Dimestore Dames
Control Alt Country Delete
Josie Day & The Possums
Discography
We're All Going To Hell! 2010
The Sparta Session 2010
Audio
Reviews
"... this past Saturday night, I ventured into the 331 Club in Minneapolis and encountered Jennifer Markey and her Buckboard Boys, a four-piece roots country band who played original music, covers of Charley Pride and Patsy Cline and an impressive number of countrified covers of the Thompson Twins ("Hold Me Now"), Journey ("Lights") and even Gonzo from The Muppet Movie ("I'm Going to Go Back There Someday"). Lead singer Jennifer Markey's lugubrious voice packs a lot of power and endurance, while the Buckboard Boys enhance her rhythm guitar with plucked-out passing tones, a strong bassline and expressive fiddle fills."
Luke Taylor, gather.com
The best line from “Crazy Heart” comes when a young music journalist asks the hard-luck troubadour where his songs come from. “Life, unfortunately,” answers the dude, and that is the crux of Markey’s 12-song rootsabilly crucible, as suggested by the opening track, “Bottom Of The Glass,” which finds our heroine drinking and waiting on her man. Make no mistake: This is no warbling folk-pop or faux-roots indie rock; it’s classic femme-country rock on the order of Wanda Jackson and Rosie Flores, typified by the protagonist in “Two O’Clock in the Morning” who boasts, “At age 14 you could hardly guess/I had a knife and a pistol underneath my dress.”
Produced and recorded by Eric Koskinen (who knows a little something about barroom bad-assery and classic lived-in country music and who will be uncorking his own record before the year is out), “Hell” is a trip through the same barrooms that Hank and Waylon and Loretta slit their wrists in, but with a decidedly Midwestern twist. “Minneapolis Or You” and “And The Jukebox Played `Sweet Child O’ Mine’” are fun would-be radio hits, but there’s real pathos and yearning in stuff like “Say Somethin’” and “Calico Girl.” It’s all doused with pedal steel guitar, banjo, fiddle, and the expertise of her band, anchored by the warm guitar of Dan Gaarder. All in all, it sounds like a trip to Lee’s or Nye’s coming out of your dashboard; if this is what going to hell feels like, well, everybody grab hands and jump in, because the flames feel fine.
Jim Walsh, Minnpost
Jennifer Markey's sophomore release is a crafty ode to bad decisions. Right away, "Feelin' Single, Seein' Double," showcases the lovable loser Markey likes to portray—a heroine tackling her mistakes and using her brash wit to come away the victor. The tune, set to the honky-tonk beat of the next morning's headache, sees her piecing together last night's hazy adventure. She sings, "When I woke up this morning, might be the sun was high/ then I started walking the long way home just to think of an alibi." "Bartender, Bartender," a tune that could be the theme song for Lee's Liquor Lounge, follows in kind, as does "Love Squared," which may be the best showcase for Markey's humor. The song focuses on her romantic competition, who finds her wrath in the form of a jack knife, a booze-spiked baked potato, and the weapon in this lyric: "I found myself at the hardware store, checking out the hammers/ before I go do something crazy, I guess I should mind my manners."
But The Sparta Session also reveals a side of Markey listeners are less familiar with—honest retrospection in the clear light of day. "(Beggin' You To) Let Me Stay" recalls the apex of a break up with the sad maturity of someone who experienced it firsthand. And the album's closer, "Faith, SD," a stripped-down tune that shows Markey's comfortably-worn alto sounds as good bare as it does with her band's seasoned twang of guitars, speaks of desolation on the road and in her heart, and a feeble, worry-laden journey to where she wants to be. Though it was risky for Markey to momentarily remove her trademark tongue from her cheek, the bet played out well, letting listeners see behind the slapstick.
Erin Roof, City Pages
There are few singer-songwriters quite as blunt and sardonic as Jen Markey. When Ms. Markey played a hootenanny last fall with heavy-hitters Billy Bragg, Tom Morello, and Ike Reilly, she had all the men doubling over in laughter with her sarcastic, local landmark-checking country ballad "Minneapolis or You," showing that she had the chops and the wit to assert herself as one of the boys. Get a load of these lyrics: "I'd rather drink Muddy Waters coffee, than to stick around here with you/Or do it underneath the Cherry Spoon, or hang out at Deja Vu/I used to love you baby, even more than the Como Zoo/But I don't know which I hate more, Minneapolis or you." And on top of her sharp sense of humor, Markey sings with a loud, brash voice that gives her wry lyrics even more bite.
Andrea Swensson, City Pages
