By Scott Cullen
Concerts at the Crossing presents independent singer and songwriter Jenny Owen Youngs whose music has graced the soundtracks of many popular television programs on Saturday, Sept. 21. The concert takes place at 7:30 p.m. at the Unitarian Universalist Church at Washington Crossing in Titusville, New Jersey. Opening the show is 17-year-old Lily Mae from Solebury, PA, an rising young singer-songwriter whose music has been compared to Joni Mitchell.
Jenny Owen Youngsgrew up in the forests of northern New Jersey and currently lives in Brooklyn, NY. After self-releasing her first album Batten the Hatches in 2005, Jenny went on to release two albums and three EPs through the Canadian indie label Nettwerk Records. Her songs have been heard on the television shows Weeds, Nurse Jackie, Privileged, Life Unexpected, Switched at Birth, and in Victoria’s Secret stores the world over. She has toured extensively through the U.S., UK, and mainland Europe, both as headliner and support to artists such as Regina Spektor, Motion City Soundtrack, Aimee Mann, and Amanda Palmer.
Youngs’ latest album, An Unwavering Band of Light, finds her knee-deep in crunchy rock guitars, whispery string quartets and a mixed bag of percussion. “I wanted to explore new territory, mess around with tones and textures I haven’t really dug into before,” she explains. The new album serves up a mixture of influences from Tom Waits’ classic album, Swordfishtrombones, to the calypso beat of Harry Belafonte. These influences are echoed in the loose, bouncy, electric guitar lines and many layers of wood blocks, oil drums, and varied percussion that can be found on many of the album’s songs.
Youngs has traveled a long musical path since playing the flute in elementary school and the tuba in junior high school. At 14, she learned to play the guitar. She graduated from State University of New York at Purchase with a degree in studio composition. In 2006, a song from Batten the Hatches, "#$%@ Was I", appeared in the second season premiere of Showtime’s Weeds, resulting in the album being re-released on April 10, 2007 with new artwork and an extra track ("Drinking Song") on the Canadian indie label Nettwerk. Her song was also released on Weeds: Music from the Original Series, Vol. 2.
In addition to her solo career, Youngs is in the band The Robot Explosion, a side project with fellow musicians and friends Bess Rogers, Andrew Futral, and Saul Simon-MacWilliams. She also participates in an online Podcast through Myspace with Bess Rogers and Andrew Futral, titled ‘Once More With Feeling’ (named after the musical episode of Buffy The Vampire Slayer).
Opening the show is sixteen-year-old Bucks County based Lily Mae. A contemporary folk singer-songwriter/guitarist, Lily released her debut EP, Early Days, in October of 2012. Since then her music has received international airplay, most notably on folk radio in the UK as well as locally on WXPN where she was WXPN’s Pick of the Day. Despite her young age she’s opened for performers such as Livingston Taylor and James Taylor’s son, Ben, and has seen her work praised by indie artists such as Jenny Owen Youngs and Bess Rogers.
Tickets for Jenny Owen Youngs and Lily Mae are $20 for adults and $5 for ages 14 and under.
The Unitarian Universalist Church at Washington Crossing is located at 268 Washington Crossing-Pennington Road in Titusville, N.J. For tickets and directions, call Concerts at the Crossing at (609) 406-1424 or visit http://concertsatthecrossing.com.
