The Figs were beamed into present day Louisiana in a horse & buggy time machine, launched from somewhere in the distant past where there’s an abundance of cool old hats. The Figs new CD, What Keeps Me Up at Night, — retro-produced and engineered by the omnipresent, Jay Burton who is quickly becoming the Brian Wilson of Lafayette — is a filled with antique twang, slowly plucked strings, and monosodium harmonies, floating around a picturesque landscape of good & bad men, wary women, guns, love, boats, trains, buses, escape, and a load of other cool old things that populate the record, which functions like a soundtrack to an imaginary film about women at the turn of the last century.
With the six female members of the band — Claire Caffery, Sarah Gray, Caroline Helm, Jillian Johnson, Paige Pemberton and Melissa Stevenson — sharing lead vocal and songwriting duties, the music and songs never gets tedious, continuously luring the listener further into the next procession of tracks like chapters in a hardbound book that you’d rather not end. The CD is fifteen tracks in all. Thirteen originals and two covers, one of which is the classic Jimmie Rodgers tune, "Muleskinner Blues."
The Figs throw their CD Release Party for What Keeps Me Up at Night on Saturday, Aug. 2 at the Blue Moon Saloon with locals, Direwood opening the show.