The Garment District's Jennifer Baron on physical media, vintage instruments, new releases

For Jennifer Baron, the multi-instrumentalist behind Pittsburgh band The Garment District, physical media is important.

The thousands of albums — from vinyl (45s, 12-inchers and 78s) and eight tracks to cassettes and CDs — spread throughout her home are proof enough, alongside turntables on two different floors.

“I would say it’s a combination between an open studio/salon/record store/bookstore at times,” Baron said with a laugh. “We definitely actually need a lot more storage for our vinyl.”

And there are some recent additions, as The Garment District released its latest album, “Flowers Telegraphed to All Parts of the World” in September, and contributed to a benefit tape compilation. (The new album can be purchased locally at The Government Center, The Attic, Get Hip, Needle & Bean and Vinyl Remains or online.)

“So Many Things At Once,” which released on April 5, features a remix of “A Street Called Finland,” in collaboration with Pittsburgh-based DJ/musician/producer BusCrates. Besides the physical cassette, which benefits Justice Democrats, it will also be available to purchase on bandcamp, with no plans to release it on streaming services.

Alongside Pittsburgh pop ensemble Chariot Fade, which is releasing a new single, “Make Yours Like Mine,” The Garment District will co-headline a double release show on April 19 at Mr. Smalls Funhouse in Millvale.

They’ll be joined by Jackson Scott and BusCrates, with live projections from MichiTapes.

“We really wanted to make it an event,” Baron said, “an experience just beyond going to see a band.”

Baron, who also plays in the New York-based indie pop band The Ladybug Transistor starting in 1997, released her first music as The Garment District in 2011.

For her latest album, she worked at the home-based studio of her friend, David Klug, in Pittsburgh’s Allentown neighborhood. The close proximity to her home enabled Baron to move at her own pace.

“I could come and go, experiment with things, let things sit, give it time to percolate, go back,” she said. “It really allowed me to challenge myself and stretch in terms of arrangements for The Garment District.”

Baron found inspiration in a variety of places.

“It really starts with the music or the instruments that I’m working with and channeling what the piece of music or the song or the melody have to say and where I feel that needs to go, but I try to let that drive it or dictate it,” she said. “As far as lyrics, there are some with highly personal meanings. There are some that are more expressionistic, and there are some that are inspired by things that I experience.”

As a multi-instrumentalist, Baron is credited with playing organs, synthesizers, electric piano, guitar, bass, melodica, drums and glockenspiel on the new album, released by Happy Happy Birthday To Me Records.

A lot of those instruments — whether it’s a Hammond M3 organ (found at Goodwill for $40) or the Vox Super Continental organ from the 1960s in her basement — have been used throughout Baron’s musical career.

“We have a lot of analog vintage instruments in my house, and it’s not a sense of the preciousness or the collector mentality,” she said. “With vintage instruments, starting with eBay but everything, all the other sites, have just driven up prices to the point where there are these collectibles. But for me it’s about using them and how they service the song or how they help bring the song, the music to life.”

Related

• Real Estate singer Martin Courtney on new album 'Daniel,' recording process, fun gimmicks
• Girlschool's Kim McAuliffe still going strong after 45+ years of rocking
• 2024 Pittsburgh area concert calendar

There’s a synergy evident with those instruments, in comparison to the digital software or iPhones, which she also uses.

“It’s really that these instruments are, and I know it might sound kind of dramatic, but kind of like family members or they’re furniture, they’re part of your household, so I’m very inspired by what sonic quality comes out of them because it’s tactile, it’s physical, it’s like a relationship.”

Connections in the Pittsburgh music community led to borrowed equipment, like vintage synthesizers from Klug’s friend in West Virginia or rare fuzz pedals from The Cynics guitarist Gregg Kostelich. Baron also brought in a variety of musicians, including her cousin Lucy Blehar, who sings lead vocals on the album, for a collective effort.

While her music has been described as “a world of unpredictable sounds, emotional heartfelt reunions and devastating separations” by It’s Psychedelic Baby Magazine and “fun, playful, and it feels vintage but still forward-looking” by The Third Eye blog, Baron prefers for listeners to make their own opinions.

“I like for people to describe the sound. I like for the ideas to come from the listeners because we all bring a lot to music,” she said. “Music can take us to really visceral places. It can take us back in time. It can help us live in the moment. It can help us transcend things, but we bring a lot to it, and I really like for people to develop their own stories or make their own meaning and find their own connections with it.”