Down in deep Appalachian country there�s a little bar where, if you like, you can camp out in the back yard. No drinking and driving here. And there�s some hard core drinking going on if that�s your style. The customers are all locals and all regulars. It�s a small little family. If you�re a visitor and you have an instrument on you, or you happen to mention that you play a little bit here and there, you�re going to have to give this family a little love and play �em something.

This is how the Brooklyn roots rock duo, The Shithouse Lilies, first came together. The way Erin Lyons, the band�s singer, tells it, �We were on a road trip to see Appalachian country, looking to save a little money, so we planned our route based on where we camp. Basically I did a Google search on Biker Bars, West Virginia figuring that we�d find camping friendly places nearby. This little bar in Normantown, West Virginia called Talliesduck actually offered camping in the backyard.

�We show up, tell �em we�re from New York City and that we want to camp out in their backyard and they look at us, like, �dumb city kids, there�s no camping here.' But then I told them it was on the internet listing. Well the owner had put it on there as a little local joke but they figured, hell, if we wanted to stay out back, no problem by them.�

Andy Lee, guitarist, jumps in, �Yeah, and then they actually offered to let us stay in the Houseboat out back. There�s no water anywhere nearby. They just got a houseboat up on blocks in the back. And so we stayed there.�

�The state closing time for bars is 2 am,� Erin says, �but Normantown�s a small town. It�s unincorporated, not an official town or anything. They just got 'city' water in the last five years. Before that everyone had to dig their own well for water. So Tallies stays open until the last person leaves and no one was leaving that morning. We got up and played a few covers � �cause we didn�t even have any original stuff at that point. We just did some songs that we both knew. And they loved it. And we loved them. And we just stayed up drinking and laughing with them. Around 5 am, the manger, Rhonda Sue said she better close up shop, so we all just moved to the houseboat together and kept the party going.�

�That was our first gig,� says Andy. �Now we go back there to play for them at least once and often twice a year. We�ve played there at least 15 times by now, probably more.�

Erin adds, �The owner�s since seen us many, many times and the last time we were there, they had even built a stage, so they've become even more music friendly.�

I first caught The Shithouse Lilies late last summer at Banjo Jim�s. Their music has elements of rural blues infused with that old raw country folk sound but shaped by musical influences of a punk and pop-country childhood.

�I grew up in a Country/Western family listening to Reba and Garth and Allen Jackson,� Erin says. �And then I discovered Gillian Welch and everything about her was new. She started her own record label. Everything she�s done has been independent. It was like a new way of listening to that kind of music.�

�Yeah, and I grew up listening to Black Flag,� Andy responds. �My first band was a punk band called the �Oi Scouts�. So today, you might not actually see when we�re sitting there playing, but my performance is more shaped by that experience while the music is influenced by listening to Jimmie Rogers and the Carter Family�back when Country was still just Folk music.�

Erin says, �You take the sheen off of pop-country and it�s still just old fashioned folk music.�

�We listen to a lot of Labor Music. Think of it, I mean, Labor Music was the Punk of it�s day,� says Andy.

Erin adds, �There�s that scene in the documentary, Harlan County USA, where Florence Reece sings, �Which Side Are You On?�. Imagine a 70 year old woman singing a cappella and thinking, �damn, that�s Punk.�

�I�ve listened to a lot of Florence Reece since seeing that and Hazel Dickens too. Both are just pure, absolute Appalachian.�

�When you grow up listening to Punk, it really shapes your worldview.� Andy points out. �And then you hear something like �Folsom Prison Blues� and you realize, �That�s as punk as anything ever written.��

�How about some modern groups,� I ask them. �Anyone current we should know about?�

Erin answers quickly, �I�m big on Rising Appalachia � two women on banjo and beatbox. Elements of rap in their style. And The Wreckers. That�s good stuff too. Hell, I love Chaka Khan. No one is really influenced by just one genre.�

�Steve Earle,� says Andy. �We listen to a lot of Steve Earle. Think of that line in John Walker�s Blues, �[And] I've seen all those kids in the soda pop ads, But none of 'em looked like me.� That speaks to the same disaffection as any punk song.�

�How�d you get into all these Labor songs with that kind of punk upbringing?� I ask Andy.

�I grew up in a union family. My grandfather specifically. For a long time it was a way for any poor young kid to work hard and work his way to the middle class. Now I�m in a Special Ed Teachers Union - it's a branch of the civil servants union, DC 1707. Special Ed - that�s my day job. We went on strike a while ago. And it was important, our demands. They were real. And I told Erin, �This is what I was meant to do.��

�The first song we wrote,� Erin adds, �our first Shithouse Lilies song, was written for Andy�s grandfather. For his eightieth birthday. And we thought it was just a one-off type of thing. But we played for his entire family and when we got done we look up and every female family member is crying. And his grandfather is crying. And we realized that we might just have something special here.

�We collected about one hundred of our favorite songs and we learned them all in order to give us a base of music to pull from. We�ve got this folder, still do, it�s all beat up now, and we can just refer to it if we need an inspiration or to just get us going.�

Andy says, �We do about 90% of our own stuff now for each set, but we�ve got this catalog of 100 covers that we can pull from, so if we do one or two covers per set, we can kind of keep it fresh and different.

�To go back to my point about punk music and where that attitude comes from, you know, I�m thinking about this folder of songs we put together, and there�s of course a lot of Woody Guthrie in there, and you think about him going up against the House Un-American Committee� that�s as punk rock as you can get. Ray Charles singing secular lyrics to church music�man, that�s punk rock. I mean, it�s an attitude. You see teenagers now and punk is just a fashion statement. They don�t get the attitude and the possibilities that all these people and their music represent.� He pauses for a second and reflects on what he�s just said.

�The guitar, it�s just a vehicle to get the songs out. And that�s where Black Flag and the folkies come together.�

You can catch The Shithouse Lilies on their myspace page.

And you can see them live on March 21 at 8 pm at The Yippie Museum and Caf�.