Noe Venable isn't really a jazz singer. She is definitely a jazzbo. She doesn't know what to call her music, exactly. ``Depends on my mood, and the weather,'' she says. ``If I'm carrying an electric guitar, I say klezmer. If I'm carrying an accordion, I say country.'' She's essentially a singer-songwriter, performing original material. But there's a jazzy element to all her music -- in the careful arrangements, in her trilling, half-spoken vocals.
The 23-year-old native of the Castro district spins yarns like Rickie Lee Jones' pint-size godchild, even in casual conversation. She says she woke up in her parents' house late one night to the glare of blue neon and the sound of Nat King Cole's version of ``When I Fall in Love,'' wafting from a parked car. ``It was the most beautiful sound,'' she says, ``like the voice of angels.''
Venable, a guitarist and songwriter for just four years, is one of the Bay Area's raw talents: She says she already has enough material for two more albums. ``I feel like I've got to keep up with the songs,'' she says. ``No Curses Here,'' Venable's second CD, was produced by Lee Townsend, who has worked on records for Bill Frisell, John Scofield and Charlie Hunter. Contributing players include drummer Scott Amendola, violinist Alan Lin and multi-instrumentalist Rob Burger. Townsend, she says, has become one of her best friends. ``He introduced me to Robert Johnson, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Peter Gabriel's Real World releases. He has a very natural sense about music. Tribal art, too. He has an appreciation for what's ancient.'' She's attracted to the same thing. ``I feel like the best music comes out of a deep, rumbly place in the earth.''
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