Archive for the ‘Concert’ Category

Crosby, Pevar & Raymond: Live in Philly, 6/26/98

Posted: May 19, 2020 in 1990s, 1998, Concert, David Crosby, Lucinda Williams, The Old Grey Cat
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Here’s a flashback to some 22 years ago this summer, when my original Old Grey Cat website was running hot: a review of David Crosby’s band CPR at the Theater of Living Arts in Philadelphia.

The “tough, rough couple of weeks” I mention at the start was that the company I worked for, TVSM, was being purchased by the top TV listings magazine in the land, TV GUIDE. That meant the magazines I wrote for, The Cable Guide, See and Total TV, were likely to be axed and everyone would be laid off. And, sadly, most folks were let go – something that pains me, still. But as the fates would have it, by the time the dust settled (the following November), I signed on with TV GUIDE and joined their “pop and politics” team.

Anyway, one thing that I failed to mention in the Lucinda portion of the piece is that she arrived late to the show; while flying into Philly from parts unknown, her plane was detoured to New York because of thunderstorms. She was forced to take a train from the Big Apple to the City of Brotherly Love and then a taxi from 30th Street Station to the venue. As a result, opening act Jim Lauderdale, who was also part of her touring band, went on later and played longer than usual. She still rocked the house when she reached the stage, however. (I named her performance my Concert of the Year for 1998; CPR’s set was third.) 

Also, the quote from David Crosby hints at this: The TLA was a sea of empty chairs for the CPR gig; at most, and I’m likely being generous, 25 fans were there. The main reason, I think, wasn’t a dearth of interest in Crosby, but that all of the venue’s advertising billed the band simply as “CPR.” No one knew that the C stood for Crosby!

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It’s been a tough, rough couple of weeks for the Old Grey Cat, punctuated by a few moments of feverish glory.

Lucinda Williams in Philly 6/26 was one such moment. Backed by a crack band, she played just about every song from her brand-spanking new album, Car Wheels on a Gravel Road (it’s great; buy it), as well as classics from her past. She hit the stage a little past 10 p.m. and played ’til 12:30. No breaks. Backed by a killer band, she played acoustic guitar for the first half, then switched to electric guitar. With Bo Ramsey on electric and slide guitar, Jim Lauderdale (who opened for her, too) on acoustic rhythm and Kenny Vaughn on lead guitar, it was – no joke – a massive, near-overwhelming sound.

Kenny Vaughn and Bo dueled during “Joy,” stretching that song to what must have been 10 minutes. Time stopped there, on the delta of the blues, what with Lucinda’s distinctive vocals wavering from orgasmic moans (“Right in Time”) to out-right bitterness (the aforementioned “Joy”) – and often in the same song.

I mention the above to let folks know: I’m not just into the David Crosby’s music. I step back often and listen to what might best be called “American music.” Not the generic rock ‘n’ roll you hear on the corporate-run stations that plague the nation, but music like Lucinda’s that caresses the soul.

And music like CPR’s.

After a very engaging opening set by Anastasia & John that sent the Cat scurrying to the lobby to purchase their lone CD, David Crosby, Jeff Pevar, James Raymond and company hit the stage. “Thank you for coming,” intoned  David. “Without you we’d be playing to an empty house.”

The magic I talked about in my reviews of their two CDs? It was present from the get-go, with a rendition of “Morrison” that actually improved upon the studio version. Hard to do? Maybe, maybe not. Live music is better, after all. Up next was a delicate, harmony-laden “In My Dreams.” “Three or four voices fading in and out of a radio station …” and guess what? Those “three or four” voices are right there, up on stage. With Pevar and Raymond, one does in fact forget about Crosby’s erstwhile partners Stills, Nash and Young – CPR is that good. A jazzy, uptempo version of the “perverted” “Triad” came next, and while I think I prefer the more genteel take from Four Way Street, I have no complaints about this arrangement.  It was rather exciting to hear Croz recast an old favorite. “Thousand Roads” was another gem recast into a heavier number. To be succinct: It rocked.

Another high point: “Delta.” One of the Old Grey Cat’s favorite Crosby tunes, here it was simply. . . hell, I’ll crib from myself. I’m not proud. In my review of the Neil Young bootleg Blue Notes, I wrote: “You feed off the performer, he feeds off you and…you’re there, wherever there is, not stoned but STONED, and not from drink or drugs but from the music itself.” That about sums up the entire night, but most specifically the performance of “Delta” – and, in this case, it wasn’t just “performer” but performers, as in Crosby, Pevar and Raymond.

Jeff Pevar, aka “The Peev,” is simply phenomenal. His solos during “Delta” brought the audience to its feet. The thing about him, too, is that he’s in sync with the songs. His solos never veer into flash for flash’s sake but, instead, echo and expound the melodies with grace and warmth. Likewise, James Raymond is a true find. Forget the fact that he plays the piano with a precision and passion missing from most folks who tickle the ivories. His contributions to the set, “One for Every Moment” and “Yesterday’s Child,” easily surpass  most of the music passed off as “meaningful” in today’s rock ‘n’ roll climate. Think of him as a mix between Jackson Browne, Bruce Hornsby and … who? I can’t think of who else at the moment, but maybe that’s the point. He’s talented. A real find. David has reason to be proud.

Of course, although CPR is a band, it is David who’s out front. He’s the one who the fans come to see and he’s the one who makes or breaks the show. Have no fear, folks. Aside from the fact that he’s in excellent voice, he’s singing some of the best material of his illustrious career. Check out the driving version of “That House,” which puts into song one of his old nightmares. Or what might be considered that song’s flip side, “At the Edge”:

And it’s life and it’s dying
It’s beginnings and ends
it’s what did you do
with the life they gave you?

It’s a memorable moment in the show, because you know: The song, the sentiments, are from his heart. This music, and the emotions behind it, aren’t fantasies fabricated for radio airplay. It’s the real deal, ego, anger, lust and love rolled into one.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the crowning moment to the show: “Ohio.” Yes, that “Ohio,” by the wayward Y of CSNY. This version was electric – and I don’t just mean “plugged in.” It was hot. “Tin soldiers and Nixon coming/we’re finally on our own/this summer I hear the drumming/four dead in Ohio.” Simple lines about a complex time, when for all intents and purposes American troops were patrolling American college campuses – and for what? To quash kids exercising their freedom of speech?!

We in the audience were singing along, stamping our feet, on our feet and clapping. Don’t – I mean, don’t – miss CPR…or Lucinda, for that matter. Support great music!

set list: Morrison, In my Dreams, Triad, One for Every Moment, That House, Little Blind Fish, Homeward Through the Haze, It’s All Coming Back to Me Now, At the Edge, Delta, Rusty & Blue, Somebody Else’s Town, Thousand Roads, Yvette in English, Ohio, Deja Vu encore: Eight Miles High

Allison Moorer at Cat’s Cradle, 2/22/20

Posted: February 23, 2020 in 2020, 2020s, Allison Moorer, Concert
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Singer-songwriter Allison Moorer wove a spellbinding acoustic set at the Cat’s Cradle in Carrboro, NC, last night, taming a semi-raucous audience primarily there to see her husband, master singer-storyteller Hayes Carll. 

She opened with the ominous “Bad Weather” from her recent Blood album. Stripped to its core, its plaintive power was even more pronounced than on album, with the metaphoric storm clouds gathering inside the ramshackle music hall’s main room, which – in many respects – is little more than Philadelphia’s Boot & Saddle on steroids. (Speaking of steroids, Allison mentioned that both she and Hayes came down with a bad flu while on the recent Cayamo music cruise and, although over it, were both taking some form of steroid to help bolster their throats.)

“The Rock and the Hill” was stunning. Her vocals inhabited the soul, just about, much as they do in this Paste performance:

Two songs from her 1998 debut followed: “Alabama Song” and “A Soft Place to Fall.” While introducing the latter, she recalled that she first played Cat’s Cradle not long after that album’s release, when she opened for Junior Brown. She then made a self-deprecating joke about the trajectory of her career, given that – this night, at any rate – she’s still opening for somebody else. 

“Nightlight,” a song from Blood, followed. During her Fresh Air interview with Terry Gross last fall, she talked of how – at that point in time – she couldn’t get through it without tearing up. It’s a moving number about how her sister comforted her during the frightful nights of their childhoods.

“Thunderstorm/Hurricane” (from her 2015 album Down to Believing) was next. Thematically speaking, though inspired by a different life storm, it’s in sync with the Blood material – the “Bad Weather” materialized, in a sense. “Let it pour over me/Holy water make me clean/Drive and drive and I disappear/Like I was never here/Everything is washed away/A thunderstorm, a hurricane…”

Her set concluded with the soul-salving “Heal.” As I’ve said before, in another era it would have been played on the radio alongside Simon & Garfunkel’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water” and the Beatles’ “Let It Be.” It’s that tremendous a song. While introducing it, Allison talked about how she thought she’d finished writing the Blood album when, a month before the sessions to record it, the song’s title came to her. She called Mary Gauthier and cajoled her into coming over to help write it and, not long thereafter, a classic song was born.  

(Obvious from my use of the Paste footage, my videos didn’t come out all that well. Allison looks like a floating fluorescent light.) 

Later, she joined husband Hayes Carll for three songs, including a very funny “None’ya” in which he “over explained” some of the lyrics. (Hayes, who we’ve seen twice before, was laugh-out-loud funny with his introductions and intra-song monologues; and his songs are flat-out brilliant. Always worth seeing with or without Allison.)

During a meet-and-greet with Hayes prior to the show, she mentioned that she’s halfway through another memoir, this one about raising her son, and that she spends about an hour writing the posts for her blog. (Given that it took me three hours to write this little review, that fact astounds me.)

Two Concerts, One Week: Emmylou Harris and Kelsey Waldon, 11/19

Posted: November 9, 2019 in 2010s, 2019, Concert, Emmylou Harris, Kelsey Waldon
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(Photo by Diane Wilkes)

I witnessed the past, present and future of country music this week – not once, but twice.

Last night, before a sold-out house at Memorial Hall on the UNC campus in Chapel Hill, N.C., Emmylou Harris and band traveled down country music’s historic highways and lesser-known byways, as well as a few roads she paved herself.

The 20-song set surveyed her storied career, in other words, which has often found her giving new life to old classics. Songs by the Louvin Brothers, Les Paul and Mary Ford, Bill Monroe, the Country Gentlemen and Merle Haggard – all of which she’s also recorded – were sprinkled throughout the show, though for me the night’s highlight was her rendition of Billy Joe Shaver’s “Old Five and Dimers Like Me.” She recorded it for her 2008 All I Intended to Be album but, as she explained while introducing it, identifies with the lyrics all the more now that she’s 72. Other highlights included a rockin’ rendition of Neil Young’s “Long May You Run” (which she recorded back in ’82) and the encore, her own “Boulder to Birmingham.”

Two nights earlier, before a sparse crowd at the Local 506 club in Chapel Hill, Kelsey Waldon and her crack band razed the roof with a high-octane sonic concoction that barely left the rest of the building’s structure intact. The performance rocked the soul, in other words. Over the course of an 80-minute set, the Kentucky born-and-bred country singer-songwriter demonstrated that all the good press she’s been getting is well deserved. She’s a force to be reckoned with.

“Kentucky 1988,” from her recent White Noise/White Lines album, was one highlight:

Another: “Lived and Let Go,” which was the second half of a two-song acoustic set.

She also performed a few covers, opening with Bill Monroe’s “Travelin’ Down This Lonesome Road” (which she recorded on her 2016 I’ve Got a Way album) and including a rockin’ rendition of Neil Young’s “Are You Ready for the Country” mid-set. (In the past, as I discovered this morning, she’s also covered Neil’s “Powderfinger” – wish I’d heard that this night. But c’est la vie.) She also placed Bill Withers “Heartbreak Road” as the penultimate song of the night, right before her own “All by Myself.” The combination, and thematic interplay between the two, was perfect.

Back in the ‘70s, Emmy’s oeuvre was essentially a sonic bridge between country music’s past, present and future. It still is. And, in almost every respect, Kelsey’s doing the same. Maybe she’s not re-introducing yesteryear classics to modern listeners at the same rate that Emmy once did, but she’s definitely digging up and sharing the genre’s roots all the same. At its best, after all, country music relates and celebrates the ups and downs, foibles and fables, heartaches and heartbreaks, of common folk. That’s what Kelsey does in her songs. If or when she comes to your town, don’t think twice. Go see her.

Emmylou 11/8/2019: Easy From Now On; One of These Days; Millworker; How High the Moon; Ooh Las Vegas; Red Dirt Girl; Get Up John; Calling My Children Home; Kern River; Making Believe; If I Needed You; Pancho & Lefty; Goin’ Back to Harlan; Old Five and Dimers Like Me; Michelangelo; Tulsa Queen; Wheels; Born to Run; Long May You Run; Boulder to Birmingham

Kelsey 11/6/2019: Travelin’ This Lonesome Road; Kentucky 1988; Havin’ Hard Times; High in Heels; Anyhow; Sunday’s Children; Run Away; White Noise/White Lines; You Can Have It; Are You Ready for the Country; There Must Be Someone; New Song; Lived and Let Go; Black Patch; Dirty Old Town; Very Old Barton; The Heartbreak; Heartbreak Road; All by Myself

Leslie Stevens Live: Salvation in Song (A Review)

Posted: September 28, 2019 in 2010s, 2019, Concert, Leslie Stevens
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I saw the light on Friday night when, a little past 9pm, country singer Leslie Stevens took to the stage at the Cat’s Cradle Back Room. Before a sparse audience, she laid down an hour-long set that swayed from salvation (sans soup and soap) to silliness and back again, earning rapturous applause and, without question, winning over a few converts.

She opened with “Sinner,” the title cut to her recent LP in which she admits, “I’m not the saint you’ve been hoping for/I’m not the blessing at your door.” On album, it’s an atmospheric tour de force that conjures, to my ears, both Emmylou Harris circa Wrecking Ball and Jessie Baylin circa Little Spark. Live, with just her electric guitar and the always great Eric Heywood on steel guitar, it was as sublime. (We last saw Eric in 2017 with Tift Merritt.) “My Tears Are Wasted on You,” a lament that dates to her days with the Badgers (the band, not the squat omnivores), followed. It’s everything a great country song should be, and more.

Tom Petty’s “Southern Accents” was up next – an unlikely pick, perhaps, but most welcome. “12 Feet High,” another Sinner tune, picked up the pace. On the surface, it’s an ode to certain intoxicants, but its sly humor (“Spent all night staring up at shooting stars/Didn’t even notice they were only cars”) sets up something more somber (“Oh, and darling, I’ve been frowning/Oh, and darling, I’ve been drowning/Drowning all of my sorrows/In our lost tomorrows.”) Another of the album’s highlights, “Fallin’,” lost none of its luster. Although I dislike the metaphor, her vocals are indeed like honey – they flow from light to dark, often within the same song, and more often than not set up shop somewhere in the gradients in between.

One of the sillier moments came on the kazoo-accented sing-along of “It’s Okay to Trip,” a song from the Leslie Stevens & the Badgers’ 2010 album, Roomful of Smoke. (And, yes, I said “kazoo.”) She cajoled everyone to sing, and everyone did, “it’s okay to trip, but don’t fall/it’s okay to fall, but don’t hurt yourself/it’s alright to hurt yourself, but don’t hurt nobody else/it’s okay to hurt somebody else/just say you’re sorry…” It was funny and charming – much like Leslie herself.

“Everybody Drinks and Drives in Heaven,” from her 2012 Donkey and the Rose album, was similarly amusing. (She noted before hand that heaven is the only place where that’s permissible because everyone’s already dead.) As someone who, going into the show, was only familiar with Sinner, the non-Sinner songs were a revelation – as was her humor. For example, also from Roomful of Smoke, “Old-Timers” is a deft portrait of love felled by a tree – literally. 

On a serious note, she prefaced “Depression, Descent” with a discussion of suicide, as she explained the song was spurred by a friend who took his life, and noted that it’s okay to not be okay. It’s a powerful, powerful song. And while the quality of my video isn’t the best, it ably captures the emotion of the performance:

The night ended with Leslie’s stirring cover of Buffy St. Marie’s version of Neil Young’s “Helpless.” (She went out of her way to explain it that way.)

In short, she provided salvation through song, allowing us to momentarily escape the madness that is life in the Trump Age. The only downside to the night was the set’s brevity; it would have been nice to hear a few additional Sinner tunes, such as “Storybook,” “Sylvie” and “Teen Bride.” Here’s the non-set setlist, which veered off course somewhere along the way…

Afterwards, we had a chance to briefly meet Leslie, who was as effervescent off-stage as she is on. If you have the opportunity to see her live, do. And if you don’t, check her out on Apple Music, Spotify or YouTube – and then go buy something from her website.

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