The Cave Singers

The Cave Singers aren’t as dark and echoey as the name suggests. The folk trio also doesn’t sound like a band spearheaded by the former garage-punk (of the Murder City Devils) and chaotic indie-rocker (Pretty Girls Make Graves) Derek Fudesco. He spent the better part of the late ’90s and early ’00s rocking out but sounds utterly at home in this intimate acoustic outfit. His fingerpicked guitar lines provide an ambling backdrop for singer Pete Quirk’s drawl, which sounds like the throaty rasp of Deer Tick’s John McCauley — a comparison that’s only amplified by his occasional harmonica interjections. It’s this interplay that makes the Cave Singers’ sophomore LP, Welcome Joy, sound like a batch of folk tunes rooted on some breezy back porch or around a summer-evening campfire.