Jack and the Bear

Anybody and everybody, when fervently or even just mildly interested in a band, will fight to investigate what they used to define and create their sound. Bands like Jack and the Bear, the musical act who performed at MUSIC Matters’ Whole Foods Fundraiser this past Tuesday, have a burgeoning fan base across the country. These fans, a group to which I include myself, are attracted by the elusiveness and originality of this band and their chosen list of influences. We want to know, truly, what created and defines the unheard of genre of “theatrical rock?”

“It’s a lot less marketable,” explained the band’s guitarist and writer Brandon Schreiber, “but this was just something we wanted to do. I know every band says that but we didn’t want to blend in with every other band just by calling ourselves a folk band.”

And so in 2013, when the then-folk band of Jack and the Bear started recording with Tom Waits’ former producer at Prairie Sun Studios in Sonoma, California, the band was aided in not necessarily changing their sound, but opening up their embedded talents and strengths to a less traveled road of music: the indefinable, uncategorized kind. Other artists among the band’s listed influences, including Randy Newman, Warren Zevon, or Mr. Tom Waits himself, ventured through their careers in a similar fashion. With mild influences and a few recognizable familiarities to music of their predecessors, these famed musicians sonically struck out on their own to make the music that felt most natural to them. Jack and the Bear has followed suit: while not easily defined, they are easily enjoyed.

Adam Schreiber, the drummer and freelance sound engineer for the band and brother to the band’s guitarist Brandon and horn player Christina Nielsen-Schreiber, quickly interjected an unafraid confession: “Disney stuff, we took a lot of influence from the music of Disney.”

While this description appears surprising at first, the band’s music and Tuesday’s live performance explains this comparison. It’s as if the music of Jack and the Bear is a modern expansion of the formula that has defined the music of Disney for decades: whimsy mixed with more fantastical elements to be mediated by sheer, undeniable musical talent. The band is collection of music minstrels, made up by the Schreiber family music trio, bassist Evan Close and pianist/vocalist Ryan “Reggie” Servis, worthy of this comparison. The horn of Christina Nielsen-Schreiber, the quick drum interjections of Adam Schreiber, and the steady, strengthening bass guitar of Evan Close add a tangible depth—that “music makes you feel something” quality—to the Jack and the Bear’s melting pot music. The vocals of Brandon, the band’s writer and guitarist, in tandem with fellow vocalist and pianist Reggie add meaning and whimsy through their lyrics and instrumentation. Eccentric but filled with meaning, jazzy with sporadic, small folk admissions all strewn together with talent and experience of an well-traveled band, Jack and the Bear need no validation for their Disney influences.

So while they aren’t on the road as they were for most of 2013 and 2014, and when they’re not fostering predictable friendships with brother bands like Dr. Dog and Deer Tick, Jack and the Bear is working on expanding the influence and opportunistic variety of their craft. Recently the band converted an old house in Michigan’s Bolles Harbor into a studio, calling it “Jack and the Bear Studios.”

“We call it ‘Jack and the Bear Studios’ as if it’s our own ‘Walt Disney Studios’ or something. And we put together our own house shows. And we like helping other bands too, mostly because we know how tough it is,” explains Brandon.

The band could easily foster a local collective á la Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros with this newest expansion. Their sound is so infectious and involuntarily pleasing that finding bands interested in creating a similar sound, or even in being associated with a band of this originality, should be fluid.

The hard work that compounds from a national tour and two-time participants in the popular Vermont summer music festival, The Friendly Gathering, have left this originated-in-Michigan band with a nationwide, sporadically strong fan base. So while the University of Michigan campus may be generally less acquainted with this folk gone theatrical rock band that does a fantastic rendition of “Bare Necessities” from Disney’s “The Jungle Book,” it shouldn’t be long before many of us are in the know.

Jack and the Bear will be playing the Blind Pig in downtown Ann Arbor on April 17th, 2015. - 10 After

The Clash used to advertise themselves as the only band that matters. A comment on the limp insipidness of most pop music at the time they were active. They weren't the only band that mattered but not many did in this correspondent's opinion. Things haven't changed much regarding the nonrelevance of popular music but there are bands that matter and I just worked with two of them.

Jack and the Bear, based out of Michigan and currently embarked on an extensive U.S. tour, stopped in at Prairie Sun to record their first album about three weeks ago. They are a family affair. Drummer, Adam Schreiber, and guitarist/vocalist Brandon James are brothers while sister Christina Schreiber plays trumpet and percussion. They travel with manager Jake Nielsen who is engaged to Christina and works for nothing save the greater glory to come. The band is rounded out by Reggie Servis on keyboards/accordian/vocals and Evan Close who holds down the bass. They are young, in their early twenties and idealistic. Not only unjaded by the travails and travesties of the road but actually having fun at it.

I'm interested in band names so asked how they came up with Jack and the Bear. Bear because it's the first initials of the original members - Brandon, Evan, Adam, and Reggie. Christina whose silence in the name and trumpet playing role symbolically represents the spirit that guides them. Jack is the name of manager Jake Nielsen's dog. I didn't ever get it straight how they arrived there but on their Facebook page they say they were: "Named after an inspirational figure in lead singer Brandon James’ life." They also say that they have their own superhero so I wonder if that dog might be the same one from the Sufi joke.

It's the one where a rich lady goes to the big market in Delhi and finds herself at a stall advertising talking animals. She asks the dog, "what time is it?" The dog replies in perfect English, " time for you to buy a new menagerie." She asks a chicken how she's doing and the chicken answers, "eggcellent." She continues asking questions of all the different animals there and gets a wisecrack answer in the King's English each time. So she buys the whole lot and takes them home. An observing bystander approaches the vendor afterwards and asks, "where did you find all those talking animals?" "Well between you and me," the vendor confides, "only one of them can talk. You see, the dog is a ventriloquist."

A talking dog would certainly be an 'inspirational figure' yet the true identity of the dog they call Jack seems shrouded in mystery. But seriously, does it matter?

Their name led me to suggest they read The Bear Comes Home by Rafi Zabor one of the best books on music and expanded consciousness out there. The Bear also conjures the memory of the Grateful Dead sound engineer/alchemist of the same name who once operated a lab across the street from Prairie Sun.

A couple of weeks before their project was to commence I was getting some things out of storage and pulled out a few cds I hadn't heard in awhile. One of them was Bruce Springsteen's We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions, an album I appreciated for its spatial use of room ambience and natural sound along with the great music. I'd lost track of Springsteen's musical arc after the mega popularity of Born in the U.S.A. but reconnected with the The Seeger Sessions, Bruce's rendition of the folk songs Pete Seeger popularized in his day. Featuring classics like Jesse James (the melody that Woody Guthrie appropriated for his Jesus Christ labor organizer song), John Henry, Mary Don't You Weep and Froggie Went A-Courtin'. A great thing about this album is that it has a big, full sound. Standard drums, bass, guitars, and keys are augmented by banjo, accordian, two fiddles, and a horn section. Folk songs that rock out in the inimitable Springsteen style.

The music of Jack and the Bear sounds just as big.


Jack and the Bear at Prairie Sun

Initially both Adam and Christina told me, separately, that The Seeger Sessions was a big influence on their sound. The other inspiration they mentioned was Mule Variations by Tom Waits, an album I have some familiarity with. These references gave me a clear picture for how to record them.

The Bear ( I'm not sure about Jack, I never met him) were so into The Seeger Sessions that they flew out Sam Bardfeld the lead fiddle player in the Sessions band to augment their sound. Jack and the Bear previously had a fiddle player in their band but hadn't found a suitable replacement yet. Everyone they auditioned was told to play like Sam Bardfeld so when it came time to record someone said lets just call Sam. Bardfeld was into it and even wrote some string arrangements for a few of the songs along with playing a straight fiddle on many of the others.

Sam is a real pro. An inveterate New York studio musician, writer and arranger along with being a member of The Jazz Passengers and Springsteen's Sessions band. We have mutual friends in guitarist Mark Ribot and horn player Steven Bernstein. We have also both worked with The Soldier String Quartet.

When Sam came to the studio for the first time he walked up to me and asked if I would take a mic request, "It's probably the one you already chose," he said. I replied yes, definitely, because I feel it's important to make the artist comfortable even if it means using a mic that might not be the best one for my tastes. However, Bardfeld was right, he requested a Neumann U67 which was the mic I'd allotted for the violin. It's one of the only times I've been able to use the 67 on violin. It's a vintage mic, relatively rare in my experience. I noted the coincidence.

The song Jack's Flying Theme (this dog apparently not only talks, it flies) is one with an evocative string arrangement that helps create tension and sets the mood for a song about humanity on the threshold of the next evolutionary step in consciousness, or so I interpret it.

Sam plays a killer solo on The Atrocious Tale. He also contributed some general production advice including suggesting a tremolo guitar part for Back to Despair which worked out well

Some noted musician, I forget who, once opined that every band has a music boffin, one member who is an expert in music theory and arrangement. Paul McCartney was the muisc boffin for The Beatles. Keyboardist Reggie Servis seems to play that role for Jack and the Bear. He also contributes lead vocals and wrote a few of the songs including Eris.

Eris is the Greek Goddess of chaos, strife and discord and serves as the chief deity for the Discordian religion/anti-religion. Wikipedia, the fount of all knowledge has this to say:

The religion has been likened to Zen, based on similarities with absurdist interpretations of the Rinzai school, as well as Taoist philosophy. Discordianism is centered on the idea that both order and disorder are illusions imposed on the universe by the human nervous system, and that neither of these illusions of apparent order and disorder is any more accurate or objectively true than the other.


Discordianism was most prominently brought to the public eye by Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea in their magnum opus The Illuminatus! Trilogy. As such, it's well known to me. Servis hadn't heard of Wilson, Shea or Illuminatus! Another weird coincidence.

Christina Schreiber contributes trumpet parts sometimes reminiscent of the Spanish/Mexican stylings of Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass. Her tone is very bright and clear. Her pitch is dead on.

The rhythm section of Adam Schrieber and Evan Close create a solid foundation for the songs to groove upon. Schrieber also instigated some Tom Waits style found percussion sounds - not that it was ever lost, found percussion means using unusual objects for percussion instruments like banging on walls, sliding screechy doors and scraping on gutted piano harps. Prairie Sun just happens to possess one of the latter courtesy of Mr. Waits. The idea to incorporate that came from studio head honcho Mooka Rennick who took a special interest in the band.

I've not seen Jack and the Bear perform live but can tell from his work in the studio that Lead Vocalist/Guitarist Brandon James makes for a compellingly entertaining frontman oozing charisma and soul. He sings so passionately, putting it all on the line, that you sometimes wonder if he's going to spontaneously combust. For some of the songs he requested a vocal treatment ala Chocolate Jesus (Mule Variations).

I got the sound they were looking for using lots of natural room ambience, analog tape delays and dark EMT plate reverbs. It was helped by the fact that we tracked it to 2" analog tape. At my recommendation, they mastered it with Doug Sax (Tom Waits, The Rolling Stones, The Who, Ray Charles, etc. etc. etc.). Afterwards, Sax wrote me expressing his appreciation for this record.

This band, Jack and the Bear, has a bright future. They are still searching for a name for the album. Perhaps they need to consult with their canine oracle who, I understand, doesn't tour. I'll let you know when it's released.

Another coincidence I'll note came from discussing other contemporary bands. The Bear mentioned admiring the production values of an album called Fate by the popular indy band Dr. Dog. I would imagine Jack would be into them also, same species and all. This release got mixed by an old student of mine, Bill Moriarty. - Oz Fritz