It's almost inconceivable that something like Philadelphia's Marah could exist and grow in our current musical climate, soulless and vapid as it often is. In stark contrast to the fleeting, shrink-wrapped, mousse monkeys currently spinning on your local alternative radio station, here's a quintet of organically grown, skilled, tight players with a deep foundation in history, devotion to tradition and unrestrained zeal for the splendor and salvation of ramshackle rock. Fronted by the brothers Bielanko -- Dave (twenty-six), and Serge (twenty-eight) -- Marah (Old Testament speak for "bitter") have crafted a remarkable sophomore effort in Kids in Philly.

With a young Springsteen's gift for stream-of-thought urban poetry, the Replacements ' indomitable spirit of drink-up and conquer, Booker T's bottomless soul and the Band's firm grasp on staying loose, the guys have drawn some hefty helpers to their corner. Hard-core troubadour Steve Earle signed them onto his E-Squared label and asked him to open his recent U.S. stint, a slot they similarly filled on the Black Crowes sweep with Jimmy Page. The man who discovered and later managed the Replacements, Peter Jesperson, is fond of saying they'll "save rock & roll," as is author Stephen King, who, besides turning up in a Marah tee in the New York Times Magazine, was not long ago overheard arguing with High Fidelity author Nick Hornby over who is a bigger fan of the band.

"Once you walk into the door of the music industry, you pretty much go straight to the room you're supposed to be in," says Dave Bielanko, as he takes in a pre-soundcheck smoke at L.A.'s perennially cool Spaceland, a venue they'll pack and rock later that night. His scruffy looks recall Goo Goo Doll Johnny Rzeznik when he was still just some schmo from Buffalo (pre-makeover, that is), and his gruff voice suggests Christian Slater with emphysema. "You find these people almost immediately. All we did was make a record. We never went looking for anything."

Though their 1998 debut, Let's Cut the Crap and Hook Up Later On Tonight, impressed countless folks, including Blue Mountain's Cary Hudson, who picked the album up for his Black Dog Records, and Earle, Marah initially chose to avoid the circus. Holing up in their homemade studio with an unknown producer named Paul Smith, they set about making Philly, a kitchen-sink block party where twangy banjos, clunking pianos and swingin' horns find a home in perfectly painted songs about passing time in Pennsylvania and trying to find an outlet on a dead-end street.

"We did this album without anybody's help, without anybody's money," Dave says proudly. "We literally almost had to tape over our first record to make this one; we couldn't afford more tape. Steve [Earle] did loan us a couple of microphones, but that's about it."

"When we were done," he continues, "it was like, 'OK, of all of these labels, who wants this music the most and whose gonna care for it best?' We met with A&R guys, from major labels, who had never heard of the record Exile on Main Street! We brought it up and they were like, 'What's that?' That's scary and weird, and that's the business. So Steve Earle got the gig."

A sense of history, rock & roll and otherwise, is an essential element of what makes Kids in Philly click. "Christian St." opens with a lightening speed intro from legendary Pennsylvania DJ Hy Litt (longtime Phillies' mic man Harry Kalas guested on Let's Cut the Crap). "Round Eye Blues" translates author Bill Ehrhart's "Vietnam-Perkasie" into a war memoir shuffle so moving you forget these chaps were barely born during that particular conflict. There are references to Jackie Wilson and Otis Redding and Todd Rundgren and Mr. Coffee.

Marah -- the Bielankos, bassist Joe Hooven, drummer Mick Bader and lap steel/utility guy Mike Brenner -- have been on tour since March, hitting every club their schedule's allowed for between stage warmings for Earle and the Crowes/Page thing. Sharing Motel 6 rooms and subsisting more on character than catering, they're a throwback to the days when bands worked not because they necessarily wanted something in return, but because they couldn't imagine what else they'd be doing.

"If we got dropped tomorrow, we would keep doing what we're doing and I think people would keep connecting with us," Dave says. "People will always connect with something they see as sincere. The industry is incidental to the band. Fucking FM radio in the United States is so piss poor today, to fight that battle, you've gotta have a sense of humor and look at that stuff as peripheral. The music that's being churned out is so temporary, no one will care about it in a year. Even Eminem, singing about Britney Spears and Tom Green in a song? It's like Weird Al. People don't realize it now. They think, 'How great, music for the moment!' But listen to that in three years and it will be Weird Al.

"There's something a little more timeless about what we're doing," he continues. "For every record we sell, we're making a fan, possibly a fan for life."

GREG HELLER
(August 30, 2000)