Kieran Garvey, the lead singer-songwriter and founder of the five-piece folk band No Sailor, may live in New York City now, but he is more of a nomad than anything, with a musical network that stretches from the South Fork to New York, Philadelphia, and Slovenia.
No Sailor debuted the latest single from its upcoming album “Anchor Broken Free” at the Stephen Talkhouse in Amagansett on Friday.
Mr. Garvey was joined onstage by the local members of the band, Morgan Tracey on electric bass, Ryan Sherman on drums, and Jack Marshall on violin, who is familiar to South Fork vinyl fans from his work at Innersleeve Records in Amagansett. The band also occasionally adds the Portuguese piano player Tiago Rosário from New York City, where there is a different iteration of No Sailor. And the album itself features the original members of the band, Urban Grabensek on piano, Lloyd Betsworth on stand-up bass, and Jelena Zdrale on violin, who came together more than a decade ago in Slovenia, where Mr. Garvey was living at the time teaching English and where he wrote the latest single “Tactless Butcher” and the other songs on the album.
The band began as a trio, with Mr. Garvey, Mr. Betsworth, a fellow expat from England, and Ms. Zdrale. “I was very broke, and I lived in a shanty,” he said, “but it was great. It was the perfect artist life.”
The original recordings that form the basis of the album were made in Slovenia, then reworked in Scotland with a producer known for his collaboration with smaller indie bands like Franz Ferdinand. Mr. Grabensek was flown in to play piano and add texture to the tracks. It was only later, after Mr. Garvey was back
in the United States and visiting Philadelphia, that he found a drummer and added those tracks to the album.
“It’s a little backwards,” Mr. Garvey said. “Usually in music you record drums with the band or record the drums first.” He said that “it became a nightmare in certain ways, like ‘I wish I could add this tomorrow but, no, I need to save money to go back to Scotland.’ ”
The album became a reflection of his own travels, musically and literally.
A music lover from an early age, Mr. Garvey first came to singing through his high school choir in Bucks County, Pa., a nationally-recognized group whose conductor was invited to both the White House and Carnegie Hall. “We’d practice two to three times a week,” Mr. Garvey said. “It was like being on the football team.” He picked up the guitar for a project at the end of his senior year.
He draws influence from new age folk and rock bands like the Lumineers and Kings of Leon, with a little Bob Dylan and Neil Young sprinkled in. No Sailor’s songs can sound like any one of these influences or all of them. It is almost allegorical to the band’s name itself, which he settled on while recording in Scotland.
He presented the producer with a list of around 50 names, and the only one he liked was No Sailor.
What you think of the name “depends on what you think of a sailor,” he said. “Is it something that’s positive, like someone who is well traveled, dressed handsomely, strong and capable and able to navigate the rough seas and his life by way of the stars and his literacy there?”
“The other side,” he said, “is the guy who comes into port, drinks like a sailor, curses like a sailor, is lecherous like a sailor. Whatever you think about a sailor, good connotations or bad, I’m no sailor.”
The name can set people’s expectations in two directions. At times listening to the band’s music can feel that way, too. The tone can shift from song to song.
Sitting outside Hampton Chutney on Newtown Lane, Mr. Garvey spoke over a cardamom coffee about his musical journey. “For me the music is all about authenticity and vulnerability,” he said, “and that’s something for me personally I’ve just been doing forever, being really raw and real with people.”
He first pulled into port here, as it were, more than 20 years ago, visiting an aunt and uncle who lived in East Hampton and finding community skateboarding in the streets.
Around 2015, after spending a bundle recording in Scotland, he was working in restaurants in Philadelphia when he decided to find work in East Hampton instead. After an initial gig at the Blue Parrot, he restaurant-hopped before landing as a private house manager. “I worked for Gwyneth Paltrow at one point,” he said. “It’s where my gray hair started.”
He also hunkered down here during the pandemic. It was a creative drought for Mr. Garvey, but in the years following he describes himself as “renewed.”
“Tactless Butcher” is the fifth single to be released from “Anchor Broken Free” and No Sailor is also filming music videos in Sag Harbor. “The village has got something that is just so unique.” He talked about the iconic Sag Harbor Cinema sign and the Sag Harbor Variety Store. “These things don’t exist in America anymore and that was something that I felt was so kindred with the band,” he said. “Sag Harbor is filled with that old American soul that visually accompanies the genre of music,” Mr. Garvey said, “the whaling village with all this history that people can still see on its surface, and sadly that is something that a lot of America has lost.”
“This has a vibe that is real,” he continued, “and that is what I’m trying to do with my music. I don’t care if it’s raw sometimes or slightly out of tune. If you understand it and you feel it, that’s all I care about.”
As for what’s next, Mr. Garvey is eager for the album’s release so he can start recording some of his more recent songs.
“I’ve written four and half albums worth of new songs,” he said, “They are about being back in New York,” he continues, “and being married and all these new changes in my life.”
More releases, including the full album, will come early in the new year. All of the band’s singles are available on all music platforms including Apple Music and Spotify, and a video can be seen on YouTube.
