Bands to Care About: Sgt. Dunbar and the Hobo Banned

Hearing about them for the first time, it would not surprise me if Sgt. Dunbar and the Hobo Banned didn’t instantly grab your attention. "A folk band with horns you say? Next!" But trust me when I say that this a band that should be payed attention. While you wouldn’t think so at first, the jazz-style horns truly add to the regular band. Not to mention the band really wears their influences on their sleeve. While this is normally a bad thing, showing the band as no talent and must copy the music they love, Sgt. Dunbar’s influences happen to be the last, great Neutral Milk Hotel and Mircophones. The band manages to sound like them (singing saws and interpersonal lyrics) and original(darker tones and jazzy sound) at the same time. Ok this does sound a little cheesy and I may be sucker for singing saw, but in this acoustic guitar revival (Fleet Foxes I’m looking at you), I don’t understand why the hell these guys haven’t gotten more attention.

Sgt. Dunbar and the Hobo Banned-A March Through Charles Mingus Garbage Pile

Sgt. Dunbar and the Hobo Banned-Move Your Memories, Pt. II

Sgt. Dunbar Myspace

Also the wonderful people of the blog fork/knife posted an interview with the band which can be read here.