The Undertow of Okkervil River

When I first heard of the Austin band Okkervil River, I foolishly assumed that they played bluegrass. Their name conjured up the image of a group of good ol’ boys picking banjos as they floated downstream in inner tubes, surrounded by moccasins and other freshwater creatures. It turned out the band is instead immersed in the nebulous waters of indie rock. As for their name, it’s pulled from the shelves of Russian literature: it’s the title of a story by Tatyana Tolstaya. Not only had I misjudged the book by its cover, it seems that I’m also not very well read.

Will Sheff, on the other hand, appears to be quite well read. The singer of Okkervil River pens lyrics that can only come from the mind of a man who spends considerable time in the company of classic authors and dead poets. Weaving simple verse into complex stories with a bard’s sense of symbolism and imagery, he transforms daily tedium into grand dramas that touch on the universal. The band’s latest effort, The Stage Names, is a glowing example. Although its theme is clichéd—it’s another year-in-the-life-of-a-band story—Sheff and his bandmates have polished the old and made it new again.

The album is lush and dense, both lyrically and musically. Waves of guitars and organs and drums and pianos build and crash with great drama, and at the end of its 42 minutes I feel worn out. Similarly, Sheff’s emotive voice rises and falls from hushed whispers to aching screams. He often sounds like he’s on the verge of tears in that angsty Bright Eyes way. While I don’t doubt Sheff’s sincerity, at times his overwrought delivery can seem a bit over the top. But this is no doubt one of Okkervil’s fans’ favorite traits.

Like Black Sheep Boy, their 2005 album that didn’t sell especially well but received superlative reviews, The Stage Names has been called one of this year’s best by many critics. This month Okkervil is getting more press than ever, and Sheff, talking to me from the road somewhere between Seattle and Salt Lake City—says he feels lucky that the band seems to be breaking through to the next level.

“Not to jinx anything, but it’s our time when people are noticing that we are a band and that we’re out there. We’ve been doing this for nine years, and with each record there’s been a little more recognition. I think it’s a slow-burn kind of thing.”

Although they’re playing a lot of the same venues on this tour, he’s noticing more “hardcore fans” in the crowds. He isn’t exactly seeing them—“I don’t see anything, actually, because I take my glasses off, because it spooks me a little bit to see all those people out there looking at me and thinking things about me, and I don’t know what they’re thinking”—but he hears more people singing along and yelling out more requests.

While most of Sheff’s bandmates reside in Austin, he’s spent most of the past two years in New York when he’s not on the road. He wrote The Stage Names in Brooklyn, so this week’s show is a sort of homecoming. “We worked our way up from a tiny little shitty Village Underground gig that nobody came to, to this Webster Hall show. This feels like a massive turning point, and for me, it’s a really great, very special thing.”

Sept. 28,[ Webster Hall, 125 E. 11th St. (betw. 3rd & 4th Aves.), 212-353-1600;] 7, $20.