Lucero/The Ready Room

Lucero and Murder by Death

The Ready Room/St. Louis Missouri

Wednesday, July 16, 2014

Murder by Death and Lucero the other night.

They were playing “The Ready Room” which I had not attended a show at prior to this performance.  They have been hosting more and more quality acts lately including my fav’s The Old 97’s.  I had never seen Murder by Death before and they cut right into it with twangy, mounrful Flannery O’Connor soundtrack music about alcoholism, death and of course murder.They are not Chatty Cathies but their lead singer, keyboardist, and guitarist Adam Turla told the crowd.”

According to “Andreina Byrne and KC’s “The Pitch”, “Murder By Death has been riding the wave of dark western for years. Their sound is a haunting one - moreChildren of the Corn than back-porch Americana, but still graceful and wistful at the same time. Cellist Sarah Balliet’s orchestral elements brought some sentimentality to songs that might otherwise drop heavily as morbid tunes. Keyboardist Scott Brackett would often switch things up for a mandolin or trumpet riff, driving tracks “The Curse of Elkhart” to thrilling - and slightly creepy - heights. Turla’s voice was so eerie and enchanting, you either fell in love with him or avoided his eyes for fear of him casting a curse.”  

I quote her because i thought she was brilliant, right on and said it better than I could.  This is a band worth seeing.  They will make a living but never kill it but music is better for bands like this making great music because… it is all they can do.  Their show in St. Louis was just too loud.  The mournful jello was not mournful and the volume was deafening.  The room was packed and the cinder blocks and warehouse roof made me have to move around to find a place with listenable sound.  It was a good opener and the crowd clearly loved them but this is a band I would recommend listening to their music at home rather then take the time and cash to go to their show.

I have seen Memphis-based Lucero at least 7 times.  The first was in the long gone and not much lamented “Fred’s Music Lounge” that was on Chippewa across from Paul's bait and Tackle.  In between I have seen them at the pageant, the Duck Room, Lou Fest and Austin City Limits.  Lead singer and guitarist Ben Nichols drinks too much and he seems to do it...every night.  That boy is placing quite a bit of his pain in the bottle but what does not go there moves with his pen and his guitar to bleed out everywhere for the rest of us and it is…. beautiful and sad and… beautiful again but…

Nichols is a bad and sad drunk and he often puts on shitty and unprofessional shows and frankly, this was one of them.  The volume was toned down from the opener and I waded up front and I got the great high that I always get when I am five feet from the stage and able to catch all the nuance, or lack of nuance that is exhibited.  I have to admit that I was a little shamed by the audience up front.  Everyone knew all of the words to every song.  It was inspiring and made me remember when I was that kind of crazy fan for every band I went to see.  Humbling (again God… with the humbling.  Really?) Nichols was hung over which he announced upon arrival (which made sense based on the review from the night before in KC) and then proceeded to drink whatever was brought to him.  He was slightly critical of the rumple mint.  Now I do not mean to ne one to criticize because I drink too much but this guy… who I love… put on a really bad show.  He was not always in time and worst of all, he kept forgetting and fucking up the verses of songs.  Last time when I saw him at Lou Fest he claimed the flu, came out and tried to sing and puked… but this was just kind of sad and stupid.  I was still happy to be there.  I still got the high that I get form thrumming live music and beautiful lyrics.  I was

The band consisted of Jim Spake on sax, Rick Steff on keyboard and accordion and Scott Thompson on trumpet.  Being an asshole I do not like their more recent stuff as much.  It is great music and his lyrics resonate but it reminds me of Texas Swing or Delbert Mc Clinton (and I say that with respect not disdain) and I am just more of a fan of gritty, jangly, twangy darkness that Nichols does better than anyone else.  That boy… he has a lot of ink.  Songs like “Sweet Little Thing.” Songs like “Raising Hell” become group sings that feel more like going to a dying but grace filled church more than anything else.  A church with a great deal of booze.  My kind of church, were I asked to build one.

Nichols was engaging and he has clearly been around the block since their brilliant debut back in the early 90s.  There are some bands that it is a pleasure to watch age but, I am not sure off this in regard to Lucero.  Nichols drinks so much on stage it is hard to imagine him still being alive but despite the bad show, I am powerfully pleased that he is.

Soooooo…. it would appear that I have been absent for some period of time.  I have many apologies… travel...work… what not.  They are lame but indeed, that is what we have come to expect from these halting pages.  But I have not been idle.  Half way through, despite all the issues and some mist steps it has been… quite year.  

I have seen a lot of music this year.  Much of it has been at Off Broadway and I am happy to report again, and again that this is becoming a treasured venue in town.  I have lived through the venue being the worst and stupidest of shit holes.  Back in the day… when i was a pup it competed rather unsuccessfully with Mississippi Nights and the old Cicero's.  But these venues eventually went on to not become a Jacques Cousteau museum or to become a lame incarnation of itself up the street from it’s former location.  But Off Broadway ambled on… trudged on...slowly… awkwardly and sometimes horribly.  Great bands but a really stupid room.  You would arrive at the front door and come in behind the stage into a “lobby”.  Then walk around and there was a cool long bar that extended down the side.  A “stage” was there, poorly lit.  The “room” had a beautiful wagon wheel chandelier which didn’t belong.  There was an upstairs which could have been funky but was instead awkward and vision was blocked by the over hang as well as… the chandelier.  Doors were at 8.  Bands started to play at 9 ish and there were often 3 of them.  On a school night you were always out till 1.  Too late for people with jobs and too random an experience for a “grown up”

But a few years ago new owners came on the scene.  Things started to happen.  Good things.  Happy things.  They started to experiment with:

Earlier shows

Afternoon shows

Shows that started on time

Tall boy beers

Professional employees

Redecorating

Losing the iconic chandelier

Peeling years of...shit of the walls

Painting

Shortening the bar

Bringing in seats for old people shows or partial old people shows.  What I am saying is that if you ever have an inclination to see some live music.  Hit their website and go out.  They bring in some of the most talented acts that are both breaking and established and when local bands play there it is because they are awesome.  Their website is:

http://www.offbroadwaystl.com/calendar/

So some of the shows I have seen recently.

Rhett Miller.  Rhett is lead singer and other than one song per album by their bassist sole lyricist for The Old 97s.  Rhett is… well… their is really no one else like Rhett.  I would assume he is about 40 (I am too bored to WIKI him).  He went to Sarah Lawrence (girls school) on a poetry scholarship.  Now remember he is from Texas.  He dropped out and moved back and started a band and they have turned out 8-10 CD’s and he has dated and married super models and he has long hair and my best friend’s wife loves to go to shows just to see him whip his hair.  And he does.  But when he comes to town for a show he normally just shows up with a guitar.  I think he has 5 solo albums out and he writes great songs.  He writes lines like:

“I was going through a hell of a time

When suddenly you showed up

You gave me hope but I lost mine

But hope is not enough

I loved you so hard

It broke my heart

And you weren’t like the rest

Until you left”

Seriously… that is “Dylanesque” which is the nicest thing I can say about a songwriter.

Frankly this show was the most fun.  Buy his newest album and buy the new Old 97’s album as well.  It is not poetry but is an album full of songs about getting drunk on bourbon and having sex.  What could possibly go wrong.

Steve Earle hit the Pageant and reminded us all what a grumpy, great, tuneful, deep, flawed, wonderful nightmare that he is.  He had a pretty set with a tight band featuring the husband and wife team “The Mastersons” who opened up the show with a tight swinging sound.  She has a sweet voice and he has good chops.  Together they ably backed Earle.  Steve Earle has had a checkered personal life but has always been a brilliant artist.  Sidelined by heroin and drugs it appeared he had straightened himself out after several marriages and had settled with the talented Allison Moorer in NYC.  This tour seemed to be about him working through that latest break up.  The bottom line with Steve Earle is that he is likely the most soul filled white man out there.  He bleeds through his songs and is constantly working out his thoughts in his songs whether it is personally or politically and… you should go see him.  The Pageant is not intimate enough for what he was doing on this tour but still… as I said...get off your dead ass and go see a show.

Twang Fest 38 returned this year with it’s normal panoply of touring and local acts.  I was only able to hit two nights of the four nights but each one was filled with great music.  KDHX does such a great job for my kind of tunes and the Fest gets better and more professional each year and the partnership with Off Broadway seems here to stay which… is good.

More  recently I hit Off Broadway to see the late great Robbie Fulks (not yet deceased).  Fulks, from Georgia via 20 years or so in Chicago does not come to town enough.  he was playing an early show opening for Chatham County Line who is the latest “thing” in Americana/Alt Country...whatever you want to call it.  But Fulks… I have seen 4-5 times.  I was able to reminisce with him briefly about his first show in the St. Louis at the old High Point...100 or so years ago.

Fulks has been keeping himself in Chicago at the Old Town Folk School up there and has helped them create a beautiful community that teaches a lot of people and promotes even more.  Fulks is a gem and no one knows about him who does not pay attention to great music.  He has a truly unique voice and I don't mean “unique” like Dylan or Niel Young.  I mean unique like...fucking beautiful.  There is something in the way he resonates that literally can make me tear up and there is both a joy and a mournfulness that he conjures which becomes stunning in a small venue like Off Broadway.

The voice coupled with 30 years of songwriting proved too much for the normal 45 minute opener and he played for over an hour and left everyone wanting for more.

Georgia Hard

She said she was leaving

So I went to follow

Blind love and I-55 got me here

Dirty old salt truck

in the smog before me

And dear old Dixie, back in the rearview mirror

Got a third-story walk-up

With a view of the alley

A mailroom job that isn't all glamour and fun

The woman I came for

Is gone to another

Now my feet are just too planted to run

Chorus:

But there's no Carolina Moon over Chicago

No bluegrass growin' out in my backyard

No fields of sugarcane, no soft Virginia rain

But damn, if this livin' ain't Georgia Hard

Down on Halsted

The women walk by me

Like they can tell

I haven't got a dollar to spare

So it's into a side street

For a beer and a sad song

I guess some things

Are the same most everywhere

So please, Mr. Conwell

Could you except the charges?

When I told you "A cold day in Maacon", I lied

And if your pecan trees still need a-shakin'

I'll be back a-beggin' fast as the grey dog flies”

Chatham County seemed like they were going to be awesome after some awful sound problems.  They do 4 musicians, no drummer, and one microphone.  It is almost too cute but these guys are clearly killing it and a braver man would have stayed for more but… I am old.

Robbie Fulks/Chatham County Line

Most recently I went to Off Broadway to see the Felice Brothers.  The Felice Brothers became like gods to me with the release of their eponymous CD from 2008.  Songs like “Whiskey In My Whiskey”, “Scarecrow” and more made a CD that was so solid song to song, so lyrical and so filled with sad energy that it was far and away my best CD released that year.  But so what?  They came to town to the Firebird once since then and I missed them (out of town) which was clearly my bad but mistakes get made.  But I did not miss them this time and they were everything I had hoped and more.  They were brilliant.  Sad.  Emotional.  Funny.  Talented and… shit… they were beautiful.   Ian and James Felice even without their brother Simone play the kind of music that can only be played from playing together for life and loving and hating each other as only brothers can do.  The concert ambled, rambled, soared and swooped.  It was meticulous and it was a train wreck and it was everything rock and roll is supposed to be.  It is clearly for me the best show of 2014!                    

Songs of addiction and madness that when you read the lyrics they just make you ache… and cringe.

Scarecrow

Would you love me

If I told you I was born upstream

If I told you I come from money

White money

Would you love me

Would you love me

Well, I was born down

By a bad little river in a poor town

Where an indian-giver put a board out

It said "Boarding House"

Call him Scarecrow

He kept whores around

And I'd go there

I'd wait my turn on the broke stairs

And get me the girl with the gold hair

Aw yeah, leave your clothes there

On the folding chair

In that cold room

Your breath would twist just like ghosts do

You said, "Call me Dorothy in red shoes"

And the bed moved

The bed moved

The bed moved

Tracy, don't you wake that scarecrow tonight

Well, the man would come in

It's hard living right giving head when

The sad days of winter have set in

And the medicine for an addict is heroin

I'd find you there in the bath

We'd cook up your shit in a tin can

And you started calling me Tin Man

And we started making plans to begin again

Begin again

You saved a C note

Told me you felt like a seagull

Told me to meet at the depot

With the needle, then maybe we'd go

To Reno

Where you'd be my desert dove

And we'd find a way to make better love

Said, "Baby, that's how the West was won"

And the blood-red sun

Yeah, the blood-red sun

And the blood-red sun

Tracy, don't you wake that scarecrow tonight

Well, the man cries,

"Who gives a damn when a tramp dies?"

But I loved you there in the lamp light

With your bare thighs

And the halo of your hair alive

And all my lifelong

I'll never shake off your siren song

And all of your talk about dying young

With an iron lung and that crazy way

Would you love me

If I told you I was born upstream

If I told you I come from money

White money

Would you love me

Would you love me

And all my lifelong

I'll never shake off your siren song

And all of your talk about dying young

With an iron lung and that crazy way

You said, "Simon,

I think I might stay here with Scarecrow tonight

Simon, I think I'm gonna stay here with Scarecrow tonight."

                                  s

“I put some whiskey into my whiskey

I put some heartbreak into my heart

I put my boots on that ole dance floor

I put three rounds Lord, in my 44”

The Felice Brothers.

Quite a year indeed.

Go see some music.

Save your soul.

Edward Sharp And The Magnetic Zeros at The Olympia

Soooo… when traveling, as a music head, I always like to look and see who is playing wherever I am traveling too.  Unless you're going to NYC, L.A., Austin, Nashville, Chicago, Minneapolis or Athens GA you are setting yourself up for a variety of disappointments.  You will never find local bands unless you have a local source and even then it is hit or miss and national acts do not tour on your travel schedule but over the years I have been able to see some fabulous shows.

When I scheduled my Irish boondoggle with daughter I went online and after thrashing around found Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros were playing at the Olympia Theater in Dublin and after a little more thrashing around I found out that it was a very cool, historical venue.  We have some great places to see shows in St. Louis.  The Fox is of course in a class by itself but it is too big.  This place had the same setup but it was intimate, more like The Blue Note in Columbia but without the cigarette burns on everything, the holes in the drywall, the lack of lighting, the building code violations and the smell of urine… everywhere.

http://www.olympia.ie/venue-info/about-the-theatre/

I epically failed to get tickets because ticketmaster said the show was sold out.  It was saddening and comforting at the same time to see that even our Irish brothers are beholden to the Ticket Monster Franchise.  I was able to remember and become infuriated all over again about how long the process takes, how I can never read their code which allows them to allegedly stop the robo dialing scalpers (that is a lie) only to find they are “SOLD OUT”.  I considered stubhub, but was scrambling at work to get out of town so… I guess what I am saying is that I got lazy and got cheap.

I arrived at the Dublin Airport at 9:00 Friday morning having slept about three hours on the plane.  My daughter had a full day planned and we hit a lot of sites in downtown Dublin including Jamieson and a museum and we got me a gluten free lunch at The Millstone and then we were walking along and saw the Olympia.  So I walked into venue and asked and the nice old Irish lady said “we just had a cancellation!  So we bought and the tickets cost less than i would have paid online.

My daughter who was trying to take care of me helped track down a gluten free pizza place and painstakingly got directions.  Our iPhones do not work apart from a WiFi so  she got directions and took a screenshot and we headed to town in the rent a car.  We did not count on dark and rain and my general stupidity and abject fear driving on the wrong side of the road.  We never found the restaurant and ended up back by the theater where we got a burger and some wings and then knowing doors were at 7:30 with the opener at 8, we headed down casually around 8.  The street was weirdly dark.  Laura wanted a chocolate milk or something to take the burn out of her mouth from the wings but the grocery was dark as well.  They were lined up 40 deep outside the theater.  We were instructed to go down a side alley if we had balcony seats so we went down a dark alley using the phones as light.  It all felt sketchy but by the side door we were told, “Power outage.  At Least ½ hour.”

So we went and had a cocktail at “The Czech Inn and then the lights were still off so we got another cocktail at some place where we were speculating on the average patron’s drug life.  As we walked around the corner, the lights popped on in the street and we knew all would be well.

As we got in the opener was conducting a sing along because they still had not completed sound check.  It was charming I guess but the crowd was having none of it singing along to U-2 and getting to sing a particularly painful version of Wonderwall.  Still, it was suitable to have another drink to and prepare for the main course.

After a brief break he comes out… with is band… and they keep coming out… and keep coming out.  9 players (2 drummers, keyboard, organ,  multi instrument, guitar player, bass player, random percussionist, and another guitar player and a female backup.  An 11 piece band?  Really.  When I was listening to him on Spotify I did not really get it.  I get it now.  Edward Sharpe is an:

1 Entertainer

2. Songwriter

3. Misanthrope

4. Band Leader

A band leader!  A bandleader singer!  Like Ricky Ricardo! But cooler, and not dead.

He kicked it off raucously with a song called “In The Summer” and for several songs just did whatever the audience shouted out and it was a lot of fun.  There is a joy to a loose set list and there is a joy to a band that is comfortable enough in their gig and good enough to roll with it.  It is not that easy a thing to find, especially with 11 people playing together.  And Sharp is an entertainer.  He patters with the crown, he shuffles around and does odd things with his hands...he whistles… and he sings.

He then lit into “I Don’t Want To Pray” which is at best an...irreligious (is that a word?) song.  But it is a good song with a nice hook.  He sang a few verses and then had band members and audience members make up verses and… it was fun.  As the show went on his patter wandered more and more but was always entertaining and  then he jumped off the stage and waded into the crowd and started singing down there with them.  He was given a gift of Skittles which he shared.  he explained to people that Dublin was the New orleans of Ireland.  He told a long story about drawing a picture of sitting bull as a child and how it morphed instantaneously into a song… and he spoke of the beauty of melody.

Finally, he gave everyone his hit du jut “Home” and though, after the raucous evening he was a little out of voice and whistle it was a celebration.  

Live at Bonaroo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qa10--IPdI

He was forced to wrap up quickly because of the late start due to the power outage and announced to everyone’s dismay that there would be no encore.  But daddy was ready to go home and I had the joy of seeing a guy who is absolutely at the top of his game.  I got to see him with my daughter.  I got to see him at a cool theater in a foreign country.  Life is indeed. good

Joe Pug @ The Firebird

Sooooo......I haSoooo. I had never been to TheFirebird. But this last Saturday night they had one of my favorites Joe Pug into town.  I have seen him at least 5 times and despite his patently commercial name the guy writes fabulous, meaningful folk/rock.  I have been loving this guy seems I heard the song “Hymn 101”:

“And I've come to roam the forest past the village

With a dozen lazy horses in my cart

I've come here to get high,

To do more than just get by.

I've come to test the timber of my heart

Oh, I've come to test the timber of my heart

And I've come to be untroubled in my seeking

And I've come to see that nothing is for naught

I've come to reach out blind

to reach forward and behind

For the more I seek the more I'm sought

Yea, the more I seek the more I'm sought.”

NPR did a little piece just on this song:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=95798312

This was my first trip to The Firebird.  Not for lack of trying.  They have brought a lot of good acts there over the years but I just… never made it.  It is right off of Olive kind of behind the old A.G. Edwards (whatever that is now) and though it fronts on Olive, parking is behind it and you really don’t notice it unless you pay attention (never a strogng suit).  It has been a long time since I really felt like I was “in a good room”.  The much lamented Mississippi Nights, despite everyone’s best intentions has never been really replaced.  We had lost Ciceros Basement sometime before that and there just was a void.  Off Broadway sucked and though it has improved there was still no place that was just…. a room.  The Firebird could be anyone’s suburban basement.  Just a big, flat room with a stage and a dance floor.  We were lucky enough to get some deating in one of the half dozen booths off to the side and we… had us a time.

He does a solo act and he also comes out with a band and in any case always puts on a great show.  Chicago is the home base but he tours nationally.  His last albumis from 2012 and is called “The Great Despiser”.  He had two prior EP’s and another LP called “Nations Of Heat”.  A nice bio can be found on his site:

http://www.joepugmusic.com/bio/

Each one of the releases has some brilliant songs on it.  One of the problems on all his albums is they are all of such an even, high quality that they seem kind of interchangable.

The same can be said for his live shows.  He has a very tight little three piece band and they fricking OWN his songs.  His voice in consistent and he has learned a lot in the last 4 years of hard core touring.  He works the crowd and plays a tight set frought with with nuance and meaning.  It is music to pay attention to and the crowd at the Firebird was respectful and quiet, almost eerily so for what was close to a full house by the time he went on.  

Anyway, check out Joe Pug (Pugliese) when you have a chance.  Whether life or on one of his CD’s it is what music is all about.