Irony is something The Hold Steady has worn for years — and really, the fact that multi-instrumentalist Franz Nicolay left the band in January seems like a stitch in that overcoat. The designer of such irony is Craig Finn, guitarist and storyteller of the Brooklyn foursome, a group charged on Indie Rock and, especially lately, a touch of Springsteen.
Finn, the sharp tongue, delivers lyrical topics ranging from loose sex and Oxycotin to Chips Ahoy and Cinco De Mayo — all things unstable and chaotic. But he’s a literature nerd, too, citing Yeats and Blake, among other luminaries. “And I met William Butler Yeats/ Sunday night dance party, summer 1988/ At first I thought it might be William Blake,” he remembers in “Chicago Seemed Tired Last Night.”
The Hold Steady play The Southgate House Saturday. Go here to read Rich Shivener’s full Sound Advice.
This article appears in Sep 22-28, 2010.