Folk Fatales

The members of Full Frontal Folk are committed to traditional music, in an in-your-face sort of way.

By: Jillian Kalonick

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Full Frontal Folk, (from left), Courtney Malley, Wendy Fuhr, Jen Schenck and Thea Shoulson, will perform at Concerts at the Crossing in Titusville May 31.


   The ladies of Full Frontal Folk don’t pose on the cover of their album Storming the Castle as their name suggests, but they are nude — quite a draw for those who think folkies are about as sexy as those imitators in A Mighty Wind.
   At a recent show at The Point in Bryn Mawr, Pa., the sexy (but dressed) women warmed up the audience with "Fever" and a cover of the Nields’ "Mr. Right Now," along with their signature mix of traditional folk.
   For members Courtney Malley (Delilah), Wendy Fuhr (Fatale), Jen Schenck (Lolita) and Thea Shoulson (Jezebel), the name is more about their steadfast commitment to traditional music, in an in-your-face sort of way. They will play at Concerts at the Crossing in Titusville May 31, along with Da Vinci’s Notebook.
   All members have family roots in folk music — Ms. Malley’s father, Frank Malley, is a traditional Irish singer, and all their fathers are or have been long involved in the Philadelphia Folksong Society.
   "Our dads actually started playing together, it wasn’t even our idea," says Ms. Malley. "A venue (Allens Lane Art Center in Philadelphia) called and asked, ‘Do you think your dads will play?’ and they opened the show."
   The Frontals actually knew each others’ parents before they met and began playing together when they shared a cabin at Philadelphia Folksong Society’s Spring Thing.
   "We started as a joke," says Ms. Malley. "We got together, Wendy, Jen and I, and we were going to do one song (from the O’ Brother, Where Art Thou soundtrack). Thea came by and she dropped a bass line into it. We found out we had to learn a second song, but we weren’t thinking it was going to be a band. No one knew Thea even played, she’d been a closet player until the weekend that we formed, even her parents didn’t know."
   After their performance, "Gene (Gene Shay, Philadelphia Folk Festival founder and host of WXPN’s Folk Show) came by and said, ‘You guys have something, and you should take it seriously.’"
   Since then they have cultivated Full Frontal’s sound, crystalline four-part harmonies and folk takes on songs such as "Seven Bridges Road" and Tom Waits’ "Jockey Full of Bourbon." Ms. Shoulson and Ms. Schenck play guitar and Ms. Fuhr plays fiddle, but their voices are the main draw for bringing out the beauty of old-time folk.
   "We started looking at what we know," Ms. Malley says. "At least two of us each knew trad songs, Thea brought in punk rock, like (Bad Religion’s) ‘Anesthesia.’ I love singer-songwriter country music as well as Irish music. We realized that our strongest instinct in arrangements is in traditional music, that’s where it comes as easily as it possibly could."
   The group is devoted to songs they’ve been singing since they were children, such as "Blood and Gold" and "Wayfaring Stranger." "It’s the kind of music that people who come to see us haven’t had experience with," says Ms. Malley. "They come because of the crazy women playing at the North Star (Bar in Philadelphia). We play these songs and they say, ‘That’s great — did you write that?’"
   The women also play with other groups, Ms. Malley with her bar band Somethingblack, Ms. Schenck with her father, Steven Schonwald, who plays maritime music. Ms. Fuhr, who also is a family physician, plays with the Irish band So’s Your Mom. As Full Frontal Folk they have plans for an all-traditional album, a follow-up to their debut album, Storming the Castle.
   Two of the Frontals are moms — Ms. Malley has a 12-year-old daughter, and Ms. Schenck has two daughters, 7 and 9, all learning to follow in folk traditions.
   "We spend a lot of time together, we’ll be road tripping, and the girls will say, ‘Let’s sing "Katie Cruel," and they’ll sing in harmony and know all the words," Ms. Malley says. "It’s fun to watch it progress to them like it did to us. Growing up with that music we didn’t realize it at the time — it becomes clearer now."
Full Frontal Folk and Da Vinci’s Notebook will perform at Concerts at the Crossing, Unitarian Universalist Church at Washington Crossing, 268 Washington Crossing-Pennington Road, Titusville, May 31, 8 p.m. A new music showcase will precede the concert at 7 p.m. Tickets cost $15, $5 children. For information, call (609) 406-1424. On the Web: www.crossingconcerts.com. Full Frontal Folk on the Web: www.fullfrontalfolk.com