Mountain Sprout and Big Idea to play tonight

It should come as no surprise the festival Mountain Sprout, along with Cape Girardeau favorites The Big Idea, are playing this weekend is called No Trad November: A Barely Bluegrass Bash.

Mountain Sprout are headlining, and with The Big Idea make up half of the lineup, but before they head to Columbia, Missouri, they're playing together in Cape Girardeau for a night of loud and dirty "barely bluegrass."

With names such as "Turkey Buzzard," "Town Drunk" and "Screw the Gov't," their songs are raw, often witty and always infused with a rowdy-South sensibility that's pleased crowds all over the country -- far beyond the borders of their Eureka Springs, Arkansas, hometown.

Lead banjo-picker -- and dirty-song-writer -- Grayson Klauber said while the band has endured its fair share of lineup changes over the years, it recently has returned to nearly its original lineup, having recently regained original fiddler Blayne Thiebaud.

"Blayne's been gone for two years. Mike Schembre's been with us, but just about two weeks ago, Blayne Thiebaud's back in Mountain Sprout -- it's the original lineup once again," he said. "That's the big news, I'd say."

Mountain Sprout started around 2004 when Thiebaud and guitarist Adam Wagner met and later started playing with Klauber, who up to that point had been one of New Orleans' many street musicians. Hurricane Katrina uprooted the fledgling band soon thereafter, and they built a name for themselves in Eureka Springs before making a half-dozen albums and embarking on nationwide tours. Their next album -- a ribald live recording -- is due out before Christmas.

The band also features Carbondale, Illinois, native Nathan McReynolds on stand-up bass.

Klauber said it's hard to categorize the band's music.

Well, it's hard to categorize it without a bit of a wink and a nod.

"For people who haven't seen us before, oh man. Don't say anything like hard-drivin' or non-traditional Americana or anything cliche like that," he said. Instead, he prefers to embrace terms such as "trash grass."

He describes the music more as a medley of anti-purist insurgent Americana played on bluegrass instruments.

What he's getting at is the music is bluegrass, but sometimes it's also, in contemporary parlance, not safe for work. But, he explained, that's always been what Mountain Sprout has been good at.

"I would say we've pretty much stayed the same as what we started out as. We might have cleaned it up a bit since then," he said. "But we haven't cleaned it up that much."

The set should go well with The Big Idea's coarse, hillbillyish vibe and opener Not Carl's coarser, even more hillbillyish one.

Those who like songs about drinking and getting rowdy can catch the bands at Pitter's Cafe and Lounge tonight.

Doors open at 7 p.m., the show starts at 8 p.m., and tickets are $8.

tgraef@semissourian.com

(573) 388-3627

Pertinent address:

811 Broadway, Cape Girardeau, Mo.