As a general rule, I try my best to be tolerant. I tolerate my great uncle Vincent’s Candy Crush requests on Facebook. I tolerate Christmas music in November. I’ll even tolerate people who insist that the moon landing was real. But I draw the line at elements of hipster culture. Stop putting things in Mason jars and doubling the price. Stop hiding woodland creatures in your facial hair. Stop trying to impress our professor by using the word meta in class discussion and just admit that you skimmed the readings like the rest of us.

So, with these things in mind, I was deeply concerned when I walked into Cleveland’s Beachland Tavern last Thursday night to see Parsonsfield and I saw the mass of old-timey instruments littering the small stage. Two of my friends had raved about the band, and I warily bought a ticket, mostly to further procrastinate on I.S. (please, dear God, do not let my advisor read this). From the door, I could see a steel guitar, an upright bass, an accordion, a pump organ, a vibraphone, a saw and multiple banjos, mandolins and guitars; if Zooey Deschanel owned an antique music shop, I sensed that this is what it would resemble, and I immediately sat myself down at the bar in preparation for a night of folk-fueled hipster nonsense.

With great pleasure, I can now say that I was more than pleasantly surprised. After a lovely performance by openers Laney Jones and the Spirits, the five members of Parsonsfield claimed the stage. Performing largely from their new album Blooming Through the Black — an album recorded in an abandoned axe factory, which is a detail I’ll just let slide — the band’s sound was dynamic, flawlessly ranging from romping folk rock to aching acoustic harmonies. At times, the music filled the small space inside the Tavern, radiating the room with a raucous energy, but later, when all five members stepped off the stage for a few unplugged numbers, the poignant lyrics of the acoustic set created an intimacy that captured the entire bar’s attention.

Previously, I’ve never appreciated the appeal of modern folk artists; that genre has always felt outdated or unoriginal to me, like every kid with a beard is trying to recreate Blood on the Tracks. And maybe I’ve just become more sentimental as I’ve gotten older and become more distant from my own Appalachian roots, but as I stood listening to Parsonsfield, their music felt like a link back to simple joy, to comfort and to home. Part of the beauty of a simple acoustic folk song is that there’s space for us to interject our own nostalgias and reflections, and I don’t think I’d understood that before.

Parsonsfield’s promising performance was energetic, moving and wonderfully original. And while the band is young, the group is teeming with real musical talent and knowledge. The concert was worth procrastinating for, and Parsonsfield is well worth your time, too.

Katie Cameron, an A&E editor for the Voice, can be reached at KCameron17@wooster.edu.