Saturday, April 7, 2012

Alison Krauss & Union Station-4/4/12

Savannah, GA is known as the most haunted city in America. If you've ever been to Savannah, then you know it's also one of the most beautiful cities in America. These two characteristics, beautiful and haunting, also seem to sum up Alison Krauss & Union Station's music perfectly. Tonight's show was at the Savannah Civic Center in the heart of the historic district in Savannah.. The show started with the album opener and title track of their latest album, Paper Airplane and was followed by Dust By Children sang by guitarist Dan Tyminski.. After an instrumental piece that showcased the band's chops, the band seamlessly merged an old classic, Daylight, with a new classic, Sinking Stone. Then it was time to lighten the mood a bit with Let Me Touch You For A While, before making us all cry again with the heartbreaking, Ghost In This House. The show continued through these emotional peeks, as Alison and the band seamlessly pulled off a full range of emotions. At one point during the show Alison joked that many people ask "Why are all of your songs so sad.", too which she replies...oh... it's just because we ARE sad people". This couldn't be further from the truth, as the band is all smiles and joking in between songs.The Middle part of the show was time for the rest of the band to shine. First she introduced a song written by guitarist/banjo player Ron Block, there were more songs sang by Dan Tyminski, including the huge hit Man Of Constant Sorrow from the O' Brother Where Art Thou Soundtrack (Tyminski was the voice of George Clooney in the movie). Then the legendary, Jerry Douglas, known as the best dobro player in the world, was left alone on the stage to showcase his skills. Alison wasn't even on the stage for five songs during this part of the show, proving that this band is definitely about much more than her voice. She returned for another tearjerker, Dimming of the Day and the set ended with a rousing rendition of Oh Atlanta. This was definitely the most upbeat part of the night. The band received a standing ovation and took their bows but never left the stage. A single mic was placed in the middle of the stage and Alison stepped up and hushed the crowd with a gorgeous rendition of When You Say Nothing At All. Next She was joined by bassist Barry Bales to sing a snippet of her duo with Brad Paisley, Whiskey Lullaby. The show closed with 3 very touching spiritual numbers, Down To The River To Pray, Your Long Journey and There Is A Reason. If anyone made it through that section without tears i question their humanity. Such a beautiful evening of music, in a beautiful city.

Friday, March 16, 2012

MuteMath-3/11/12

MUTEMATH Brings their Odd Soul to the Orange Peel

On Sunday night we made the short trek to Asheville to see one of our favorite bands. We can always count on MUTEMATH to supply with an evening full of fun. This was our tenth time seeing the band over the last 6 years and just like always, they delivered. In fact they have even surpassed the incredibly high levels of awesomeness that they reached in the past. On this night, as singer Paul Meany informed us early in the show the band was going to play their entire new album Odd Soul, along with a bunch of their back catalog. They came through on their promise as they delivered a 26 song set that clocked in right at two hours. The show began with the band parading through the crowd from the back of the club, each member banging away on a drum or other percussive instrument and surrounded by Christmas lights. As they took the stage, drummer Darren King performed his ritual of duct taping his headphones to his head and the band launched into the title track off Odd Soul. New guitarist Todd Gunnerman starts off the first single from Odd Soul, Blood Pressure. At this point it appeared that they might play the album straight through, then they break out the song that made them famous, Spotlight, from the Armistice album and Twilight soundtrack.They followed this up with more of the new album and then a detour for a couple of songs from the previously mentioned second album, Armistice, including my favorite from that album, Clipping. After this the band ramped up the energy by playing Plan B a song off their first EP Reset. After the new single Cavalries, it was time for bassist Roy Mitchell-Cardenas to show off his skills on the instrumental, Obsolete. Then came a couple more songs from Odd Soul,Walking Paranoia and One More. Then the band slowed it down a little bit with the beautiful Odds from Armistice and In No Time from the new album. From here on out the show was a continuous blur of awesomeness. While earlier in the set some in the crowd seemed to just take in the new songs, by this time everyone started to get more into the show, dancing and jumping around and singing along. They ripped through crowd favorites Noticed and Chaos, Paul gets down in the crowd to sing the most anthemic song from the new album, Equals, as he belts it out confetti erupts all around. Speaking of eruptions that is just what happened when the band broke into their first ever single Control and then came Break The Same, which they cut short and launched into seven minute Odd Soul album closer Qaurantine. Following Qaurantine the band went into their patented percussion jam, where all 4 of the guys bang away on anything and everything around and Darren comes down into the crowd to bang away on a snare drum. For me Darren is always the highlight of MUTEMATH shows, he is a blur of energy and frenetic beats and sometimes I believe smoke can be seen coming off of his drumsticks.Sometime during that jam Paul was down in the crowd again, surfing on an air mattress embedded with led lights. After a short encore the band returns to the stage to play their instrumental masterpiece, Reset, featuring Paul rocking out on a converted Atari instrument, followed by blistering the set closer Typical, where Paul rocks a keytar harder than a keytar has ever been rocked before. After the lights went up at the conclusion of this show, everyone's faces hurt from smiling. We drove home on a cloud of excitement, wishing that we could experience it all over again and I'm sure we soon will.