by Izzy Grinspan
At last night's free M. Ward show in Battery Park, we counted three yarmulkes and two sheitels. Of course, we also saw eighteen different pairs of vintage sunglasses and thirty-seven tattoos, but the point remains: something about Ward's gravelly voice and old-fashioned guitar seems to attract the frumsters. We don't think Ward is Jewish, although one might speculate about his drummer, Rachel Blumberg. It's not just her name that gives her Jewsrock credibility; up until this winter, Blumberg was the drummer in the Decembrists, the band that gave the world its first (and as far as we know, only) pop song about bestselling Jewish author Myla Goldberg. We don't really think that accounts for the show's surprisingly high Orthodox presence, but in any case, we're glad to see people other than the usual hipsters getting their pre-Shabbot rock on.