The story of Low Cut Connie's birth is nearly as improbable as the Indie Rock band's subsequent success. American piano pounder Adam Weiner, influenced by Jerry Lee Lewis and Iggy Pop, was doing solo gigs under the name Ladyfingers, while British drummer/guitarist Dan Finnemore exhibited his Punk roots in an equally solo fashion as Swampmeat. The pair were booked at a warehouse gig in England and found themselves stranded together on a stalled freight elevator for four hours, where they got drunk and talked about their various musical predilections, eventually vowing to work together in some future capacity.
Against all odds, Weiner and Finnemore combined their estimable talents for 2010's Get Out the Lotion, an album's worth of their individual songs that the duo cranked out in a studio over a single fevered weekend. They didn't even have a name for the band when they did the sessions; Weiner ultimately named their collaboration after a provocatively bloused waitress from his childhood.
Finnemore relocated to the States and Low Cut Connie became a full-fledged sensation with the release of its sophomore album, 2012's Call Me Sylvia, which made a number of critics' best-of-the-year lists and got a further endorsement from President Barack Obama when he announced that Low Cut Connie's "Boozophilia" was on his Spotify summer playlist.
After the release of Call Me Sylvia, original member Neil Duncan left the band and was replaced by James Everhart and Will Donnelly, who joined in time for some typically relentless touring and a few recording projects, including a cover of Harry Nilsson's "Jump Into the Fire" for This is the Town, a tribute to the late singer/songwriter, as well as a third album, 2015's Hi Honey. The album included contributions from early fan Merrill Garbus (tUnEyArDs), Dean Ween, members of Sharon Jones' Dap-Kings and The Sopranos' Vincent Pastore (aka Big Pussy) and received similar acclaim and inspired ecstatic reviews. It also marked the last album with founding member Finnemore, who returned to England after five years in America.
With the addition of Larry Scotton and Lucas Rinz, Low Cut Connie has become a formidable quintet, but the band still centers around Weiner's mutant mad-Punk blend of Jerry Lee Lewis, Screamin' Jay Hawkins and Ben Folds, sounding like Boogie Woogie Glam Rock being pumped out in a chicken-wire dive bar.
The band's latest, Dirty Pictures (Part 1), is an expansion and celebration of everything that Low Cut Connie has done, is doing and still wants to do. Who else could open a heartfelt piano ballad with the line "All my friends got herpes in Montreal”? Nobody but Low Cut Connie, buddy.
