Here's my review of the middle two nights of St. Louis' alt country and more music festival, June 9-12

Thursday, June 10: Blueberry Hill’s Duck Room, St. Louis, Missouri USA

These United States

I wasn’t able to see the first band, Magnolia Summer, because of some family obligations, but I got to Blueberry Hill’s Duck Room in time for the start of These United States.  This is a band that mostly rocked, but twanged a bit too as one guitarist also played steel guitar on two or three songs.  Beavis or Butt-head might think this band is a “college band.”  They were OK and seemed to be having a lot of fun on stage, but they didn’t really “wow” me. 

One problem was that the lead singer lacked charisma.  He had fun on stage, but he almost always was looking down at the microphone or had his eyes almost closed, so he didn’t connect well with the audience.  When he did supply some banter between songs, he seemed friendly, but as I said, he had a problem connecting with the audience.  His singing voce had qualities to it that, at the breaking point, seemed like a cross between Walter Brennan and Steve Forbert.  One of the guitarists reminded me of my younger brother – tall and skinny…and rockin’.

Blue Rodeo

What a great band if you, like I, enjoy the genre we call Americana music!  And the ironic thing is that the band is from Toronto, Canada.  But they have a quarter century of experience under their collective belt of churning out satisfying tunes of the alt country flavor.  I saw this band on their home turf at the historic Massey Hall in Toronto February 2nd of this year where the place was packed, tickets were not cheap and almost everybody was singing along to every tune except for those from their latest album.  So it was interesting to see the band again, but up close in a very small club.   

If the world were a fairer place, Blue Rodeo would have gotten as popular in the United States as, say, Uncle Tupelo, Son Volt or Dave Alvin.  When I saw Blue Rodeo in Toronto on that large stage, they had room for lot of musicians including a cellist for a few songs.  Thursday night they were only eight (and that included violin) and packed rather tightly onto the stage.  Not only did I enjoy the band but most people in the audience did very much too. 

I was able to get a word with one of the band leaders, Jim Cuddy, after their gig and thanked him for coming to St. Louis.  For a band that’s so big in Canada, but relatively unknown in the US, travelling here to play the seldom gigs is a real treat.  I also asked him about Kathleen Edwards because her website doesn’t say a lot about what she’s up to this year besides just a few gigs listed.  He said that she’s busy working on a record that will be out next spring, he’s going to be playing a show with her (this) week and that he’ll tell her that people in St. Louis are asking about her.  It was at this same venue, Blueberry Hill, two years ago in May that I had the great pleasure of seeing Kathleen live in concert. 

Ray Wylie Hubbard

The guy who wrote “Up Against The Wall Redneck Mother” was the headliner for the night, but in my opinion, he should not have been because Blue Rodeo was so much better.  But that’s OK, because I therefore didn’t have to stay out so late and was able to go home and get my beauty rest. 

Ray Wylie Hubbard is travelling sparsely.  He plays guitar and sings and he just had his teenaged son with him - on guitar - and a drummer.  I know that Gurf Morlix has played with Ray on some occasions in the past few years, but Gurf wasn’t able to come on this trip.  Actually Ray’s kid was OK on guitar.  Ray was somewhat entertaining – he thinks of himself as a modern-day country bard or troubadour and he retains some fans – but, damn, he’s getting ugly!  He needs to have a make-over on the Style Channel or one of those other Screwed-Up People channels.  His hair was all a mess like a wild animal could easily have made a nest in it, and it was wrapped with some sort of wide, stretchy ribbon thing.  Plus, he didn’t look like he’d stepped very close to a razor lately.  But with Ray, the words to the song are the most important thing – not dynamic stage presence or sex appeal.  I left after about 25 minutes of his set….without hearing “Up Against The Wall Redneck Mother.”


Friday, June 11: Blueberry Hill’s Duck Room

JC Brooks & the Uptown Sound

Holy crap, this band is good!  The singer is a young African-American guy who has the soulful vocal sounds and stage moves of a very good James Brown protégé, and the five piece backing unit is white.  There should be a lot more performers on the scene with as much style, talent and downright pizzazz as JC Brooks, dammit!  Based in Chicago, the band travels around a bit, but is not really big yet.  However, in Chicagoland they are now playing venues the size of The Metro and can attract too many people to fit the inside stage at FitzGerald’s of Berwyn, so that’s getting admirably significant.

Imagine the Apollo Theatre in 1962, but almost everybody in the audience is white.  James Brow…er, I mean JC Brooks….is up on stage singing, and swaying and dancing in all sorts of contortions that would limit the supported-voice airflow of most singers.  And then backing him are a guitarist, bassist, drummer, trumpeter and trombonist.  These guys cooked!  Most tunes were medium or up tempo, with just a few slow songs. 

I want to see this band every time they come back to town and I heard that I can at The Gramophone in St. Louis.   Check them out on youtube and from your favorite recorded music vendor, or at a theatre near you!

Those Darlins

Those Darlins are from Murfreesboro, TN and really like to rock - probably more than they like to twang.  They're a young, five-piece band fronted by three women.  Two of those three played both guitar and bass, trading off bass-playin' responsibilities a few times during their set.  The two young men in the band are the drummer and another guitarist.

At first I thought all five band members were dressed in bed sheets cut to fit over their bodies like loose smocks, but then I figured out that those were just very ill-fitting hospital gowns.   That’s cool that they had some unity of stage apparel.

In the musical department, I was early on thinking that maybe the cute lead singer in the middle was trying to put more hick twang into her voice than what would naturally be the case, but after I found out that she's from Tennessee, I decided that it might very well be natural.

Ya, these kids really like to rock, but with a country accent. Musicianship is far from stellar, rather punk-esque - but quite enthusiastic.  After their show, I talked to the young woman who had been stage right and only singing during the show because she had a cast on her arm (she had referred to a broken bone sustained).  I asked her if she plays an instrument when not in a cast, to which she replied said that she plays baritone ukulele, guitar and bass.  So that makes a third member of the band who takes turns playing bass.  As I was talking to her, I couldn’t help noticing her pungent body odor and unshaven armpits.  I guess that qualifies her for hillbilly, or German. 

Detroit Cobras

The Detroit Cobras is unabashedly a cover band.  But you won’t hear them play such overused and abused tunes as Sweet Home Alabama, Cocaine, Brown-Eyed Girl or Mustang Sally.

Nope, these people mine the classic rock, soul and old-school R&B gems from greats like Irma Thomas, Dan Penn/Spooner Oldham and Little Willie John.  And they can make the songs their own, so to speak.  So they have immense legitimacy in doing it.  I saw one description of their music listed as “garage soul” and thought that sounded very appropriate.

Their record label, Bloodshot, says, “Blurring the lines between R&B and R&R and soul, the Cobras are THE go-to party band for those in the know. Singer Rachel Nagy and guitarist Mary Ramirez are the bad girls by the exit doors at the school dance, all leather and heels, sneaking smokes and passing the flask. They have no time for dewy-eyed love songs or girl group decorum; they’ll take care of business themselves with a bat of the eye or an elbow to the kidney.”  Yes, I’ll drink to that!

Twangfest gigs this year were officially no-smoking, so that was good, but at the start of the Detroit Cobras’ set, there was a flurry of activity up near the stage as some people were firing up the greenery. 

There are three men in this group too - on lead guitar, bass and drums.  It’s a group that plays together tightly and if anybody falls out of order, Rachel whips them back into shape.  About halfway through their gig, a woman from the audience who thought she was doing the band a favor brought them three shots of some kind of hard liquor – maybe Jagermeister or something equally as rude.  Rachel took them from the woman, said, “Thank you for the Scooby snacks that are treats for everyone - for when everyone’s done with work” and promptly set them down at the back of the stage.  I thought this was great band management.  Although some of the band members were sipping beers, for somebody in the audience to assume they’re doing the band a favor by getting them more intoxicated is foolish and the band leader was wise to take control of the situation.

The only thing I would fault this band on is that for a band this professional, the songs weren’t coming out quickly one after another.  The pauses between songs seemed a bit longer than they should have been.  The band actually did have to take a five-minute break after about 40 or 45 minutes “to have a cigarette” and then came back to play another 15 or 20 minutes.  By the end of the night, Rachel seemed rather tired, but it was after midnight, so even a musician has a right to be tired after midnight sometimes. 

This is definitely a band I’ll want to experience in person again.

Thanks to KDHX Radio for putting together another great Twangfest this year!