NOISEY 041: JEFF THE BROTHERHOOD

JEFF The Brotherhood is Jake and Jamin Orrall, brothers who have basically kick-started the Nashville basement rock scene and vaulted it towards a national audience. The brothers claim to be psychologically linked, and you can hear it on the records. There’s a definite mind-meld thing going on; the brothers plow through feverish, stripped-down bangers as Jamin’s boxy, closed-hat drumming locks into Jake’s chugging three-string guitar.

Nashville’s been blowing up lately, and the Orrall’s vinyl-centric label Infinity Cat Records is leading the way. The imprint, which the brothers adorably co-manage with their dad, is a snapshot of the D.I.Y. revival popping off in Nashville. The label’s given a home to first-rate garage acts like Pujol and Natural Child, as well as all the JEFF records released so far.

The buzz surrounding the band has been mounting recently, but Jake and Jamin have been playing together since they were kids, releasing the first JEFF album back in 2002. During the mid-aughts they were foundational members of the now-legendary Nashville garage-punk band Be Your Own Pet.

It was following 2009’s Heavy Days long-player that things started to pick up, as high-profile fans like Ted Leo took the brothers on the road. Since then they’ve been averaging well over 200 shows a year, playing any venue that will have them. We flew out to see JEFF at the Bunk Warehouse in Cincinnati, a perfect venue to catch their show. This eclectic industrial space opened its doors in 2009 as a home for the Bunk News collective, a loose collaborative of friends and artists that are building up a new art community in Cincinnati. The Orrall’s thrive on that same sense of boundless opportunity and artistic freedom.