It's Called Innovation

My friend Xanthe is at the root of this, really. If it weren't for her, I wouldn't have gone to the Ark's Folk Festival and seen The Paper Raincoat the first time. If I hadn't seen them at the Folk Fest, I wouldn't have ended up sitting at one of the Ark's front-row-and-to-the-side tables while Xanthe tells us that, according to facebook, Vienna Teng might be making an appearance.

Vienna Teng, if you're unfamiliar, is a musician currently residing in Ann Arbor. Alex Wong, the male half of The Paper Raincoat equation, refers to her as, “our famous friend, Vienna Teng.” But that's later. We're still waiting for the stage to light up and The Paper Raincoat to come out. There's a keyboard and a drumset, a guitar and several microphones set up, along with several other instruments.

And then here they are: Alex Wong and Amber Rubarth. The Paper Raincoat, joined by drummer Kevin Rice. On this stage, we are intimately familiar with them, although to see us, they have to ask for the house lights to come up—a bad idea if you're going to get nervous, but Alex and Amber handle this polite Ann Arbor audience with aplomb.

In their tunes, The Paper Raincoat often repeat instrumental lines as a first layer. I'm watching Alex Wong doing this with a set of bells balanced on arm, hitting the same notes again and again, but the exchange between a mix of instruments and the two vocal lines, aided by excellent and conscious drumming on the part of Kevin Rice, keeps us from yawning. There are the changes in sound, when one hand reaches out from guitar or piano or bells and adds something new. There’s the overtones of their voices, the striated complexity of Amber's voice against Alex's stable simplicity. We are listening because we want to know—what next? It’s the same set of voices and instruments, but we want to know how the sounds can be taken apart and put together again.

For the last tune, they leave any external instruments behind. All three stand together at the front of the stage and turn their bodies into music, with a cappella vocals and the percussion of their hands. It’s a novelty tune, capturing the wide-eyed darlingness of the group in one go. We clap when they’re done, drawing Alex and Amber back to the stage, and we clap more when Vienna Teng is invited to join them for the encore, a sweet and communicative tune from before they were The Paper Raincoat. From my perspective, the show begins and ends with their famous friend. Although she brings deeper virtuosity with her piano skills, The Paper Raincoat gives us a complete experience on their own.