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Who is Cranky George?Cranky George’s music is tipped from the bucket that dredges the confluence of the Danube, the Shannon and the Missouri. Cranky George’s canon: a dog-eared log, with woodcuts of ships, fairgrounds, knives, graves, wharves, groves; a blighted hymnal whose lyrics nurse loss and whose melodies cosset hope. The cradle of The Cranky George Trio dates back to 1989, when James Fearnley (accordion-player and founder-member of London/Irish band The Pogues) met, first, Dermot Mulroney (renowned actor, star and co-star of ‘The Family Stone’, ‘The Wedding Date’ and ‘About Schmidt’), and then Dermot’s brother, Kieran (erstwhile actor in ‘From The Earth To The Moon’ and ‘The Spitfire Grill’, now writer and director) on film locations in Colorado and Virginia. It quickly became evident how much a passion for ridiculed instruments and spurned idiom they shared. Through the 1990’s they convened regularly at one another’s homes to play, drink, talk - to distill the mash of their influences, histories and vexations into the liquor of what would ultimately become the music played by The Cranky George Trio. In 1995 Fearnley and the two brothers formed The Low and Sweet Orchestra with Zander Schloss (Circle Jerks, Thelonius Monster, Two Free Stooges) and Mike Martt (Tex and the Horseheads, Thelonius Monster). In 1997 The Low and Sweet Orchestra released the critically acclaimed ‘Goodbye To All That’ (Interscope Records). The cremation in 1999 of The Low and Sweet Orchestra resulted in the fusing of the Mulroneys and Fearnley as a distinct musical entity. In 1999, Fearnley and the brothers Mulroney hied to Dermot’s garage, with singer-songwriter Mark McAdam, to record an as-yet-unreleased EP, entitled ‘Mossback George’ – a collection of catches that reflect their individual songwriting bents: a polka, a ballad, a country song and an air. In 2004, the Mulroneys and Fearnley were invited to play their début engagement, at Molly Malone’s in Los Angeles. Such was the success of their first outing that they enlisted Brad Wood (Illinois-born, Chicago-bred, son of the last of a line of funeral directors and producer of Smashing Pumpkins, Liz Phair, Veruca Salt, Pete Yorn) as bass-player. Since then, The Cranky George Trio has become an increasingly popular, albeit rare, feature of Molly Malone’s schedule. In 2006, Cranky George dropped the definite article and the word ‘trio’ from their name – components of a joke whose humor had expired upon the admission of Wood into the group. The band distributed the elements of a basic drum kit among their feet, becoming – a rarity in contemporary music – a ‘band of one-man-bands’.
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