- The Weary Boys | Official Site -

Fast and loud can sound better than skill. Punk and the Weary Boys are proof.

Houston Press | Houston, TX
by Rob Patterson - Septmeber 5, 2002 read

Sloppy Joes
For Austin's Weary Boys, energy and
exuberance trump technique

Oops. Somebody forgot to tell the Weary Boys that moving to Austin to play country music was akin to shipping coals to Newcastle. No matter. Despite the fact that Travis County boasts more twang per square foot than almost anywhere else, the Northern California expatriates have quickly risen from playing the streets to playing packed clubs across Texas.

"We just decided one day for the hell of it just to move out to Austin," says fiddler Brian Salvi. "You can't go very far playing music there," he says, referring to the Weary Boys' native Humboldt County. "So we thought about moving to a bigger town, and figured, well, we want to get as far away from our families as possible. So we chose Austin. And it's worked; we haven't seen our families in over a year."

Salvi and Weary Boys singer-guitarists Mario Matteoli and Darren Hoff had played in rock and bluegrass bands back home, but they didn't really get into vintage country until later. "What inspired us to take up instruments and attempt to play country was getting into Hank Williams records and Willie Nelson," explains Salvi, who all but winces when he admits he used to be an Aerosmith fan.

Though the three played together, they weren't a band, per se, until they decided to move away from home and give their music careers a shot. So, as Matteoli tells it, "We drove down to Texas in a Buick."

"Checked into a Ramada," continues Salvi, "looked for jobs and a place to live, and started playing on the street." The spot they settled on was the open-air Renaissance Market on the drag, where leather craftsmen, patchouli peddlers and bead stringers ply their wares across the way from the student center of the University of Texas.

Little did they know that they had landed on a longtime launch pad where acts like Lucinda Williams in the '70s and Poi Dog Pondering in the late '80s began their Austin careers. But dumb luck has been such a consistent fellow traveler with the Weary Boys that the term would make a good album title for them someday.

Despite the outfit's lack of instrumental finesse and polish, they got a good reception. "Even when we started down on the drag, the merchants told us that they'd drive a lot of the other street musicians off because they didn't like them," notes Salvi. Over the next two years, the group rose through the roots and punk music clubs to score a prestigious weekly residency at the Continental Club and a busier slate of roadshows than many Austin acts with far bigger reps.

What's the secret to the Weary Boys' rapid success in a city where you can barely sneeze without spraying on a country band? It could be that the quintet's bluegrassy sound (created with a configuration of electric and acoustic guitars and a rattling snare drum) is riding the wake of the O Brother, Where Art Thou? phenomenon, though Clinch Mountain authenticity isn't exactly their forte. "We just started playing old country songs, trying to rip them off the best we could, and they ended up sounding like we sound," explains Matteoli. "You can't ever really do it like them, especially when you lack the technical skills."

"So you just play faster and louder," says doghouse bassist Darren Sluyter, who Salvi insists be referred to as the band's token Texan because he hails from Harlingen. "We needed a little authenticity," Salvi adds. "Can you put that in the article?"

But just as it did in punk rock, fast and loud can still rule. And like with many budding punk acts, the appeal of the Weary Boys could be attributed to their energy and the sheer joy they seem to get from playing as a band.

They mix familiar old numbers -- like "Worried Man Blues," "Shady Grove" and even Jimmy Reed's "Baby What You Want Me to Do" (which they call "Runnin' Hidin") -- with a handful of original tunes and slightly more obscure covers with the zeal of the newly converted. And with the populist loosey-goosey rawness of their delivery, the Weary Boys give off an "anyone can do it" vibe that also parallels the punk ethos. Call it back-deck music rather than front-porch; it's a style where the boards have gaps between them rather than a tongue-in-groove fit.

The Weary Boys had no idea that in a city with scores of acts under the Americana banner they might face some stiff competition from folks who've been playing and singing roots music longer then the Boys have been buying razors and shaving cream. "We didn't put that much thought into it," Salvi says. "That's been our motto. It's gotten us this far."

So how did they pierce the twangy haze and stand out? "I dunno," ponders Salvi. "We had our own sound. The difference between us and a lot of other country bands is that we're not that good. In a lot of those bands, you take the fiddle player, and the dude shreds shit up. I've only been playing for, like, four years."

But since all of the players are at the same level of inspired newness, it seems to click. "I think the more we learned to play together, the more it worked," Sluyter theorizes. "It's really weird when we play with other people. It's basically a growing experience, but you really have to learn to play the song."

Something's going right for the group. They've managed to get two self-released CDs out in the past year and enjoy an ever-expanding regional circuit, while other acts with discs released by actual labels infrequently venture beyond the Austin city limits. Perhaps persistence is the key to the Weary Boys' success. They tried to record a live album earlier this year at Louisiana's notorious Angola prison (where Leadbelly did time) and saw the plan go down in flames because of a technical snafu. Yet the group will return next month to play the prison rodeo and record again.

When they look at what they've accomplished in two short years in Austin, the Weary Boys almost start sounding like grateful award-winners. Almost. "We feel real fortunate to have the success we've had," Salvi says in all sincerity. Then he adds with a wink, "At least that's what we say."

back to top

Austin Chronicle | Austin, TX
by Jim Caligiari - August 16, 2002

The Weary Boys

photo by Todd V. Wolfson

Anyone who has experienced the Weary Boys live already knows they are a band to be reckoned with. They perform with a wild abandon that is uncommon to any band, much less one that plays country on acoustic instruments.

In fact, the Weary Boys play with a reckless spirit that's the very definition of "alternative country"; one that's part and parcel of the music's past. Their repertoire includes chestnuts from Ralph Stanley, Bill Monroe, and Lefty Frizzell. That said, it's all done with an edge, as if the whole thing were about to collapse if they don't play faster and faster.

Fiddler Brian Salvi and guitarists Darren Hoff and Mario Matteoli relocated to Austin in the fall of 2000 from Humboldt County, in Northern California. The day they arrived, they met bass player Brian Sluyter while playing on the street.

"We wanted to go somewhere where they had a scene that we could work our way up through," explains Salvi. "We didn't know anybody, never been here before. When we first got here, we were living in a Ramada and playing on the street."

Over time, they worked themselves up to a regular Sunday night gig at Ego's, then onto a Tuesday night residency at the Continental Club. They're also settling in to being a touring band, regularly making trips to Louisiana and Mississippi. With the release of their second CD, the not-so Weary Blues, they're almost set to go national. That is, if they can reconcile with their drummer.

"There'll be some small changes," sighs Salvi. "We're a fourpiece for a while -- we'll see what happens."

back to top

The Advocate | Baton Rouge, LA
by John Wirt - July 26, 2002 read

back to top

Austin Chronicle | Austin, TX
by Michael Bertin - March 1, 2002

The Weary Boys

photo by John Anderson

It could be their creed: "We put surprisingly little thought into it." Those are the words of Weary Boys fiddler Brain Salvi, describing the decision of the band's California contingent -- Salvi and guitarists Darren Hoff and Mario Matteoli -- to relocate to Austin from Humboldt. "I didn't even know where Austin was when I got in the car to drive," confesses Hoff.

The same day the trio of foreigners hit town, they met their bass player, Brian Sluyter, while playing on the street. "Then we met our drummer in a bar," Salvi recalls. "He wanted to sit in with us, and we were really anti- 'sitting in.'" Despite that, they agreed, at which point Cade Callahan left, then came back in cowboy boots and a cowboy hat, and set up the snare. "We were like, 'You're in,'" laughs Hoff.

So were born the Weary Boys, five men in black taking Ralph Stanley, Bill Monroe, Lefty Frizell et al., and spewing it back out with the fire and reflexivity of a bunch of punks. A year after their inception, they've become beloved enough for locals to forgive the fact that 60% of them are Californians. Maybe it's attributable to the Zen of caprice or either of its variants -- simply not giving a shit, or finding humor in what could be otherwise humorless situations.

To wit: The band recently played for inmates of Angola State Penitentiary, subject of the Oscar-nominated documentary, The Farm: Angola, USA. They got the gig after a local filmmaker doing a doc about lifers without parole set it up for them. "He saw us play and said, 'You guys belong in prison,'" cracks Salvi.

The Boys were somewhat surprised not only at how well they were received, but also how familiar many of the inmates were with the music. Explains Salvi: "There was this choir, and they were right up front, and half those guys knew every song. I talked to one of them, and he was like, 'I'm just a country boy.'" The fiddle player starts on about the universal message of music before Matteoli clarifies. "A good portion of the audience also got pulled out of the fields for a day, so they were just happy not be picking potatoes."

Funny, true, and even a little touching. And maybe the Weary Boys, like much of their audience, are just country boys at heart, and that self-effacing sense of humor is just masking some genuine sensitivity. That might be true, but then realize that what the band really wanted to talk about was the relatively new phenomenon of "hot chicks" starting to show up at their gigs, and that they got to spend four straight days getting drunk at Mardi Gras. At that point, the words "surprisingly little thought" are just about perfect.

back to top

BMI @ SXSW Write-Up
March 2002

As unconventional as the Weary Boys' sound is, it's not hard to see their appeal. In an era when you can't swing an old Jason & the Scorchers album without hitting a denim-clad, cowboy hat-wearing young rock group cranking out their own variation of punk-infused "alt country," it's still rare to find an act that can convincingly turn out hard-core, traditional country fare with a flair that owes as much to the Stanley Brothers as to the Clash.

A band hip to the difference between "country rock" and country that rocks, not by cranking the amps up to 11 but by simply being true to the music's hard-scrabble, rustic roots. A band so comfortable playing music from a generation two or three generations removed from their own that you can't tell where the traditional covers end and the originals begin.

Packed with a dozen songs bristling with frantic, barn-dance energy and clocking in at just over 30 minutes, The Weary Boys is anything but lethargic. "Wired Boys" would be a more apt name for the collection, though Matteoli's Fender is the only electric instrument in the mix. The energy that courses through the album and the Weary Boys' live performance comes from the genuine rush of playing their music as true to the spirit of the originals as possible, which is no small feat when you're trying to learn from and keep up with albums by lightning-fast pickers like the Stanley Brothers.

Sure, the Weary Boys accelerate Hank Williams' "Ramblin Man" up to runaway train speed, but that's only so its not left in the dust by their loose but faithful cover of the bluegrass staple "Clinch Mountain Backstep."

They know when to slow down, too, as evidenced by Hoff's high, lonesome delivery of Bill Monroe's mournful "Dark as the Night" - the first song the group ever played together, and still one of their best. Other covers include Jimmie Reed's "Runnin Hidin" and a whole mess of traditionals like "Bound to Ride" and "Rock of Ages" that the band picked up off of - where else? - Stanley Brothers albums (though Matteoli confesses he learned "Freight Train Blues" off of Bob Dylan's first album).

The band's originals match the classics not only instrumentally but thematically as well, harkening back to those two benchmarks of the bluegrass/mountain music canon, gospel and murder. "We were going to name our album 'Gospel Songs and Murder Ballads,'" says Matteoli. Maybe next time. For now, The Weary Boys gives them three strong contenders for a future compilation of that name with Matteoli's gospel-themed
"Struggle," Salvi's based-on-a-true-story-with-very-grim-details "Can't Finger Me" and the equally chilling (but damn danceable) set highlight "Lose One More Baby" ("If I lose one more baby / One more baby's gonna wind up cold and blue"). The last of the bunch also contains a colorful geographic reference to the Boys' old California home turf.

In keeping with the purist spirit of the music, the album was recorded live in the studio without a single overdub. "Old school style," Callahan says proudly. "It pretty much sounds just like we sound live," adds Hoff, "except it was recorded six months ago, so we're probably a little tighter now."

Indeed, the best way to experience the Weary Boys is to see them live, lined-up in a row onstage with their bushy beards, black hats and sharply pressed, vintage western wear, looking for all the world like Richard Manuel, Robbie Robertson, Levon Helm and the rest of The Band, circa 1969. And it doesn't matter whether you catch them at a honky tonk joint or punk club, because no matter what the crowd - and these Boys play to all types - rest assured you're getting the real deal: pure, unadulterated and unapologetic "old school" country, played by five disciples devoted to the form's sacred texts but wily enough to make things up along the way as need be.

"We pretty much try to play exactly like they did," Matteoli says of their country and bluegrass heroes, respectfully adding that they're not quite there, yet. "So we do it our own way," adds Hoff with a grin.

"We're not the saviors of country music," says Callahan. "We're just trying to keep this kind of music around and give it an honest college try. And I think that people really appreciate that and go, [nods] 'All right.'"

And what does Ralph Stanley himself think of all this? On a recent trip through the Clinch Mountains, the Boys took a detour to visit the bluegrass legend in his hometown. His advice? Matteoli laughs.

"He said, 'Be careful!'"

back to top

Houston Press | Houston, TX
by John Nova Lomax - January 24, 2002

The Weary Boys

Austin's Weary Boys dress and look like the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band circa 1971 and play their instruments like it's 1947. There's little of the sound of Texas to them; in fact, they sound like much less a Texas country band than a Kentucky hillbilly band that happens to call the Lone Star State home. The quintet features fiddle, stand-up bass, a brushed snare and high lonesome tenors from guitarists Mario Matteoli and Darren Hoff. The core of the band hails from Eureka, California, a small port town on the redwood coast near the Oregon border, where the boys first took the stage in a strip joint when Matteoli was all of 15 years old. Since their recent move to Austin, the band has graduated from busking to clubbing to touring. No wonder these Boys are weary.

back to top