“Notes on Disease,” the first song on the Monarchs’ new EP, Oak, is written with what sounds like the coolest deliberation. The first lyrics come out in a slow drawl, punctuated in almost staccato succession: “Its – been – a – long – time – coming.” And it seems like it takes a relative eternity for that single thought to emerge over the slowly-shifting minor chord progression. But singer-songwriter Celeste Griffin in one sentence establishes a command that will put you on alert with anticipation for her next verbal and musical utterance.

It is partly the haunting vibrato drawl of the voice, the slightly discordant plaintiveness that opens up to show quick flashes of disarming power. It is partly the simple poignancy of the feelings in “It’s Not Me” and “Open It Up,” the urgency belied by the slow and steady rhythms and almost conversational melodies. It is partly the accompanying instrumentation, especially the slow but insistently driving keyboards and wail of the violin.

Monarchs at Cave9. Photo by Stephen Humphreys.

That is what I thought I heard, but to my surprise I learned a lot more when I asked Griffin my perfunctory interview questions about her musical training and previous band and songwriting experience.

It turns out that Griffin, who plays keyboards on most Monarchs songs, took piano lessons in the third grade. She plays guitar on some songs, though she never had a lesson. “Notes” is the first song Griffin ever wrote, when she sat down at the piano at her mother’s house a year ago and started playing around with words and chords.

Preston Lovinggood, lead singer for Wild Sweet Orange, happened to be sitting with her and heard something developing in the random musical musings. Lovinggood urged her to keep going. The result of this first effort is perhaps the best song on Oak, but in the last year Griffin has written a torrent of songs that have already bypassed the output of her first recording with songs like “Move Me.”

The Oak EP evolved from that first session. First she got a drummer, then added a bass. Eventually she collected a strong contingent to back her up, including Van Hollingsworth, currently on tour with Maria Taylor, on guitar.

Oak was made in true garage style, recorded on Taylor Hollingsworth’s four-track tape recorder, with vocal tracks laid down in a shower at the women’s bath-house at Wade Sand & Gravel, drums at the abandoned Birmingham Hotel, keyboards on the piano at Griffin’s mother’s house where she wrote her first song.

“Notes” emerged from a long period of struggle, according to Griffin. The succession of songs that has since flowed from her she considers a gift. Frankly, I cannot believe the poise with which she writes music and lyrics, plays and sings, and puts on a performance, for someone who has never done it before. It’s as if, as the song says, it has always been in her waiting to come out.

My friend Olivia, with that eerie female prescience, commented that Griffin must have been keeping a journal for a long time. And that is exactly what Griffin told me. But her journaling was over-analytical, or “head-heavy.” She says it really helps her work through her feelings to place them to music. It is a process of discovery through expression.

“Putting words to a melody frees me,” Griffin says.

As the Greeks and Gnostics knew, discovery and revelation come from somewhere else, we don’t know where, but these songs have been a long time forming, like wine in oak barrels, reaching a fine point before it is ever released.

But just as no song springs from nowhere, every muse has its influences. Just as I detect notes of black currant in a wine, in Monarchs I can hear strains of Bright Eyes — though with less teenage male neurosis than Conor Oberst. Especially on “Open It Up” the lyrics have the lyrical, Southern-summer-night quality of Michael Stipe’s “Nightswimming.” She’s less nerdy and traumatized than Stipe (and Michael agrees that females are superior beings, anyway), and lacks the sexual confusion, too.

Though Griffin’s songwriting skills must still be fledgling, her angst embodies more mature female emotion. It’s both more decisive and fatalistic than we earnest boys can muster. Another thread I hear in her music is Hope for Agoldensummer. Oh, and then there is Maria Taylor. What you hear in the Monarchs is a strong Athens, Ga., influence — an Alabama-Athens axis already pioneered by Maria and her Azure Ray cohort Orenda Fink, Drive By Truckers and others.

Doubtless Griffin is a strong new songwriting talent. You can hear her confidence in “Here I Go Again.” If she keeps writing and keeps getting stronger she could go again and again and end up who knows where. The only criticism that comes to mind from Oak is the deliberate tone-poem tempo and lyrical drone of every song. Maybe in future efforts she can pump it up with a little more up-tempo Athens influence from The Whigs.

Right now the music is more folksy, but she left no doubt she can belt it out in songs from a recent Cave 9 set that are not on the EP. Because on “Move Me,” when she sang she was ready to be moved, and practically screamed “Go and move me,” as if she had done it a thousand times, she moved me. You should already be waiting for better things from Celeste Griffin and Monarchs. I know I am.

The EP release party for Monarchs’ Oak is scheduled for Wednesday, June 25, at WorkPlay with Duquette Johnston and the Rebel Kings opening. Show time is 8 p.m. and tickets cost $10. For more details, visit www.workplay.com or the Monarchs’ MySpace page:
www. myspace.com/monarchsband

A frequent contributor to Birmingham Weekly, Stephen Humphreys is a copyright and entertainment law attorney in Athens, Ga., who has performed services for acts such as Dangermouse, Gnarls Barkley and R.E.M. Write to stephen@bhamweekly.com