Daniel, Fred and Julie (Baby Eagle / Jerry Leger)
The Horseshoe Tavern. Thursday, April 15, 2010.
Waiting for things to get started, I stared up at the ceiling and fretted to myself — as I am occasionally wont to do — over the fate of the Bye Bye Birdie mural, which is getting more tattered and dessicated with every year's passing. Isn't there some sort of heritage grant that can be had to preserve this minor piece of our local history?
Anways, I was distracted from my reverie by local singer/songwriter Jerry Leger, the evening's early opener. His set started off in an appealing enough manner — the lyrics mildly Dylanesque, the delivery calling Steve Earle to mind. Accompanied by James Mckie on fiddle and mandolin, the latter especially gave a Train a Comin' sort of feel to some of the tunes. Playing mostly songs from his 2008 You, Me and the Horse, with what seemed like a few newer ones as well thrown into the mix, Leger was an agreeable low-key presence in the fairly quiet room. Employing an earnest delivery, many of the songs were in a storyteller sort of mode, though even if some of his songs were working in a more contemporary singer/songwriter vein, he also showed his facility with a good old-fashioned honky-tonker on "Half Asleep and Drunk".
There were some diminishing returns as he stretched his set out to fifty minutes. I'd think a solid half-hour might have done to win over the early-arriving crowd unfamiliar with his work. As it was, I ultimately found the songs pleasant, but not especially compelling. This'd probably be agreeable stuff for folks looking for quieter sort of rootsy hellraisin'.
Next up was Baby Eagle, the songwriting vehicle for Steven Lambke of The Constantines. By a weird coincidence, this was the second time in a row that I'd been to a Julie Doiron gig that had a member of The Cons opening. Though in this case, the more immediate connection would be through Daniel Romano of the night's headliners, who co-founded the You've Changed record imprint with Lambke, cementing the connection with a split album by Baby Eagle and Attack in Black (Romano's rock band) last year. And more immediately, Romano was here on stage playing guitar with Lambke. The trio, sort of all pushed over to the far left of the stage, was rounded out on drums by Spencer Burton, himself also a guitarist in Attack in Black.
With two albums (and that split release) under his belt, there's clearly more in the pipeline as Lambke was playing pretty much all new material. Clearly Lambke is in a moment of creative ferment, tossing off one new number after another, and even giving some their debuts. "These are all new, but this one's brand new, first time maybe," he said, introducing one. Some, like "Man of My Time" were reasonably catchy stuff.1
Lambke, with trimmed moustache and round wire-rimmed glasses, needed only an apron over a tweed suit to appear the very image of a grocer or apothecary in an old Western town — a look which suited the band's vaguely sepia-glossed sound. Playing in this configuration, the songs had a bit of a John Wesley Harding feel, if that album were recorded after driving all night and drinking sixteen cups of coffee. Lambke's musical approach is clearly to serve his lyrics, and his voice and guitar bring lurches of tension that underpin the songs. The set featured quick songs — ten of 'em in just under a half-hour. Maybe they were so new that the arrangements aren't stretching much beyond just fleshing out the words. Mind you, I don't mind the concision at play here. Enjoyable, and made more interesting by witnessing it live, but like the previous Baby Eagle material I've heard I can't say it made a long-lasting impression on me.
Listen to a track from this set here.
Going in to Daniel, Fred and Julie's set, I was curious to see what exactly they would bring to the table. Having released their self-titled album not long before, there's perhaps not enough there alone to fill out an entire setlist. On the other hand, given the album is largely composed of traditional folk numbers, there's basically a bottomless well that they could draw from in the same vein. Or, and more intriguingly, there's the not-insubstantial songbooks that each of the participants brought to the table.
Originally conceived as a joint informal folk session between Daniel Romano and Fred Squire, the story as it has been told is that Julie Doiron basically just sort of happened by and ended up adding her voice to the album. Whether it happened so accidentally or not, it's mighty fortunate from the perspective of getting people to take notice, Doiron arguably having a larger built-in fanbase than the others. I know that it was her presence that gave me the impetus to grab the album, and from there to head to this show — part of a tour arranged, it would seem, from the positive reaction that the album had garnered.
The set opened (as does the album) with "The Gambler and His Bride"2, which sets the template for the whole project, with its warm harmonies and mournful subject matter. The tale unfolding over eight minutes, this is a brave way to plunge into a show, but the audience was quietly riveted throughout — a good sign. In fact, this would be one of those shows where the audience was largely paying attention and crowd chatter was not an undue distraction.
That one was followed by "Runner", one of the two original Daniel Romano compositions from the album — though in sound and topic, it could pass for the work of that esteemed folk artist Public Domain. When the band followed that with "I Dream of Jeanie", now the third cut from the album played in sequence, I wondered if we were getting a sort of folk version of "Classic Albums live".
That was sidetracked, however, as Squire and Romano departed from the stage. "This is the point of the evening where I have to play three songs," Doiron said to the audience, pausing for a moment to thoughfully correct herself, "I mean, 'get' to." As the requests immediately began from the audience — one guy was shouting for "Blue" within seconds — Doiron nodded in appreciation, but said she'd rather play some new ones. Accompanying herself on guitar (she'd been singing only during the DF&J songs) she led off with the "maybe the gambler" song she'd previously introduced at her January Cobourg show, as well as the one about "reckless drinking and foolishness" with the picking structure like "House of the Rising Sun".
Listen to one of Julie's songs here.
"Sorry to take it down," Julie said after those two introspective songs. "That's okay, we'll just take it back up," Romano responded as he and Squire returned to the stage, the trio launching into the jaunty "No One Knew My Name". And after one more tune, we were treated to Fred Squire's solo turn.
Squire is perhaps the most elusive of these three musicians, preferring, it would seem, to keep a slightly mysterious low profile. Formerly a member of Shotgun & Jaybird, his most well-known works come from the points where his career has intersected with Julie Doiron, including their work together in Calm Down It's Monday as well as a collaborative album together with Mount Eerie. His stage persona matched that somewhat-oblique secretiveness, spending the evening behind a pair of Roy Orbison-styled shades.
Once alone on stage, he looked at the crowd and considered his words for a moment. "Yup," he said, followed by a pause. "Yyyyyuuuuuuuuppppppp." Before breaking from a his stoicism a bit and adding, "these are some newer tunes. They've been getting great reviews. So they're, uh, on a new EP, which I affectionately titled last night The Horseshit EP. And, yeah, see what you think. Whatever."
The first of them (with a refrain of "no matter how high it gets") had a downer vibe to it, and it was followed by one written as an answer song, of sorts, to the night's first tune, with the murdered Albert speaking to Frankie from beyond the grave as she awaits her execution. Intriguing stuff indeed.
Check out a song from Fred here.
That segued directly into Romano's solo spot, which he shared with Misha Bower (well known in these parts as a member of Bruce Peninsula3). They sang the gorgeous "She Was the World to Me"4 as well as what I'm assuming is another "new traditional" that might be called called "Banks of Trillium", ending with a quote from "Farther Along". Very good stuff.
Check out a song from Daniel and Misha here.
From there, we had just one more from the group to go out on, the old Wobbly anthem "Hallelujah, I'm a Bum", before departing to loud applause. The band returned to encore with "Your Love", the other Romano original from the album. Hearing those harmonies pour out from the three vocalists spread across the stage was a nice improvement from the slightly-affected mono of the album, and a gorgeous way to end the evening. The whole thing ran about sixty-five minutes. A very nice show, and a fine chance to see the folky side of these artistes.5
Hear our three heroes' voices combine on a track here.
1 Some of the other new ones included "Thistle in Bloom", "Dog Failure" ("this is not about any specific dog," explained Lambke) and "Fisherman or Fish".
2 A variant of the old folk ballad "Frankie and Johnny"
3 Bower is also going to be seen on stage coming up soon at The Fringe, as an actor (and writer) of Georgia & Leona. Get more information on the production here, where, as a bonus, you can grab an MP3 of Bower and Romano singing Billie Holiday's "Ghost of Yesterday".
4 This song has surfaced on Romano's rather excellent recently-issued solo album Workin' For The Music Man, which I recommend. Romano will be playing a solo show at Parts & Labour on Sunday, July 11, 2010, which'd also be well-worth checking out.
5 And it looks like the DF&J project continues to have legs, with the group opening for Jason Collett at his Mod Club show on Wednesday, July 21. [Update: it appears this show has been cancelled.] There are also rumours of a fall tour.
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