Last weekend our reviewer was there when Mississippi Jake brought his songwriter friends Vanessa Ellsbury, Ben Schrag, Kelli Rae Powell and The Circumference to DG’s Taphouse. Her take: It was a great time for people to enjoy a gluttonous music feast combined with beautiful sounds and magic lyrics.

“I love lyrics, this is their spot to shine,” said Jake Turner, lead singer of Mississippi Jake, also a graduate student majoring in history at Iowa State University.

It’s interesting that audiences never knew what could be the next song to play. Neither did singers. The five singers sat in a semicircle and played music one after another. They listened to music of other artists, interacted with each other, and chose to play their next song inspired by the one played by the previous singer.

“Sweet Tea & Black Coffee”

Starting with the song “Confluence,” Turner showed the audience the scenes of traveling and chasing dreams. Dreams are worth fighting for even if sometimes they are stupid in others’ eyes.

Turner was taken away from his biological family at the age of three and got adopted by the other family. Two years ago, he found his biological family and got reunited with them.

The song “Sweet Tea & Black Coffee” showed his ups and downs of his family experience. It also showed moments of heart break and sometimes that darkness could hang over the dream. “You can go play a show and nobody cares,” Turner said. He thought that although these were sad stories, they made him stronger and made him become a better person.

Family emotions were filled in the song “DFS” too. The song depicted the interaction between Turner and his biological brother and their learning about each other after being apart for a long time. Turner gave this song to his biological brother as a birthday gift. The lyrics “Brother do you find it hard?” and “I’ve been hungry, I pray that you find fees. I’ve been tired, I pray you find peace,” were pretty touching and drew the attention of the entire audience.

Singing from the bottom of the heart

Vanessa Ellsbury, a multi-instrumentalist musician and songwriter, sang songs from the bottom of the heart. “Someone tells me that when you get on stage, part of your ego has to die in order for you to break through to the people in the audience,” she said.

Picking up her first guitar when she was 11 years old, Ellsbury taught herself and immersed herself into music for a long time. But she didn’t start to write until four years ago, when her father got sick. Writing became a way to get the feelings out at that time.

Now that Ellsbury’s father has passed away, she continues writing. “Life is tough but music makes it better. ‘Music makes bad things go away.’ That’s what my father used to say,” Ellsbury said.

“Lay Me Down” is a song Ellsbury wrote for her father in memory of days they encouraged each other.

The song “Sweet Clementine” told another story about Ellsbury, expressing the feelings for her ex-girlfriend. “Hold me closer, sweet clementine. Hold me closer, my only friend. You know I’ll need ya. In the morning, when I start to bend.”

The lyrics showed her need of comfort from her ex-girlfriend, through the struggling with addiction in the morning. “She brought me out of it,” Ellsbury said. Her ex-girlfriend influenced her positively. Ellsbury wrote her personal stories directly and boldly into the lyrics.

“[Ellsbury] has a very soulful sound,” said Allison Klein, one of the audience members.

Pursuing truth through lively music

Whiling listening to the song “Principal Practice” by Ben Schrag, a songwriter, also working in Ames Public Library, people felt a different style and unique focus that belonged to Schrag.

It seems that words in the lyrics “Principal Practice” are grabbed from all over the place, but there is a line. According to Schrag, the line captures the idea that we are trying to move forward in life, to find something truthful, and to make it to the future together. However, the future might be tawdry and tyrannical even though we have high hopes for it. The tension between the unexpected, cruel realities in the future and great prospect is like the tension between the diffusive words and the major line.

Tension and truth are what Schrag pursues. “When you listen to your favorite songs, something truthful, important, impactful is in that when you are the listener. It’s just rewarding when you get to sing something truthful. It’s a special connection between audience and singers,” Schrag said.

An excellent storyteller

“Did you do it on purpose? Or did you do it naturally? Either way baby, you had better not tell me.” There were people singing along with while listening to the song “Selfish as Fire” by Kelli Rae Powell, a songwriter and also a musical therapist at children’s hospital.

According to her music website, Tommy Ramone once called Powell a poet for her consistently literate lyrics.

Powell started to write songs since 2003, which display how she processed difficult times and how she celebrated particular happy times. Powell said inspiration hit her when she was in transitioning.

“Craggy Shuffle” by Powell told a story about a young man with asthma who smokes. She saw a young man who smoked and didn’t care about the health in the reality. Adding the imagined element of asthma made the song more dramatic. “I exaggerated the truth and manipulated the story to make it more theatrical and more interesting,” Powell said.

“I went to high school with Kelli,” Allison Klein said. Klein is a French teacher from Ankeny who came to support Powell. “It’s wonderful to listen to Kelli’s music, she is very talented. She adds a lot of drama to songs so it’s very engaging.”  

Mellow

“I don’t want to talk today. Everybody talked enough today. I don’t want to hear my name, I’ve already heard enough today.” People immediately got the humor of the song “In Bed By 9” and they could’t help laughing for its funny lyrics.

Songwriter Andrew, the lead singer of The Circumference, who preferred to keep his music separate from professional identity so that not showing his full name, is a student of Iowa State University and will enter his fourth year of PhD program in psychology.

According to the songwriter, “In Bed By 9” described mental fatigue after a long day and talked about ways trying to deal with such tiredness.

Such straightforward and vivid lyrics received warm response from the audience.

“What if nothing is permanent, then everything I say you forget,” is from the song “How The World Would Be If I Could Choose How It Should Be” by the songwriter.

This song recognized that we can’t be with everyone forever so that we should try to make our words count and to have a mutual impact with others in a given time. “All the good things can happen if you open yourself up to yourself and to other people,” the songwriter said.