By: Bob Longmore
Maybe I’m a victim of my age, but Sunday shows are hard for me. I always wonder why bands can’t start these shows earlier so us working stiffs can get to bed at a reasonable hour to rest for the start of another week of corporate drudgery.
When the schedule for Sunday night at the Nomad said music at 7:00, I dismissed it instantly. Sure that the bands wouldn’t start before 9:00, I showed up at 8:00 just for insurance and dammit wouldn’t you know… I walked into see the Roe Family Singers packing up their guitars, mandolins and saw. My loss for sure.
I did manage to catch all of High on Stress, though. Playing the kind of bittersweet straight ahead rock that just goes perfect with a Grain Belt Premium, the band started with “Eyeliner Blues” from their album Moonlight Girls. Singer Nick Leet couldn’t contain a sly grin as he sang, “The radio is playing The Ashtray Hearts,” as the boys from The Ashtray Hearts sat at the bar chuckling sheepishly.
Leet joked about the bands forthcoming album, saying it will be released the same day as Chinese Democracy. The anti-Axl band, High on Stress, played a new song called “Table Eight in Queens,” with the line, “Rock and roll can kiss my ass/ It never saved anyone.”
Ending with “No Such Thing as an Easy Break,” Guitarist Ben “Country” Baker’s harmonica lent a Bruce Springsteen vibe to the heartbreaking slice of Americana.
Stuck in between the unassuming, gentle stage personas of High on Stress and The Ashtray Hearts was brash Cory Branan. He lacks the humility of the upper Midwest and instead has the swagger of the South. But he carries that cockiness with charm. He introduced his first song with a salvo to his hometown of Memphis: “This is dedicated to all the people that won’t shut the fuck up!”
Branan sings and plays from the gut, without abandon and with confidence; when the microphone stand fell during his first song, he coolly started singing sans amplification to the quiet crowd. It was amazing to see a guy own a stage like he did.
Wisecracking between songs, Branan had the crowd enraptured. Before the song “Mrs. Ferguson,” he told the story of a review he’d received that compared this song to a Counting Crows song because they both contain “Sha La Las.” This story set off the big guy in the black T-shirt who’d been drinking at the far end of the bar all night. For the rest of the night we were treated to sporadic slurred shouts of “Sha La La.” Branan took it all in with a smile.
“The Prettiest Waitress in Memphis” is a Dylan-Descendents crossbreed of a song. A typical Branan song filled with witty one-liners and heartfelt compassion while telling a story of blue-collar triumph. He sang, “A small pack of singles from a hard double-shift/ will do terrible things to a smile/ ‘Cause the prettiest waitress in Memphis knows/ She’s only that way for awhile.”
Branan was a hard act to follow, but The Ashtray Hearts turned out to be a perfect Sunday night comedown. Their beautiful melodies played in their humble and downcast way engage the audience in a completely different way than Branan, but just as memorable.
How can such a lush and full sounding five-piece band sound so spare? The essence of songs are centered around singer-guitarist Dan Richmond’s easy strumming and aching vocals. When Richmond sang, “We had jobs we could lose/ Money to spend,” on their song “Valentine,” it captured the feeling of love ruling over all else in the world so perfectly. Instances like this were when all five members of the band combined into a single sound, so that you could imagine no other five people on earth creating that moment.
Multi-instrumentalist Aaron Schmidt and Richmond harmonized in perfect unison, slurring their words in the same manner to create a ghostly single voice, filled with longing and pathos. So much so, that when Schmidt played his sad trumpet, I could feel my heart flutter. Richmond brought the whole room back down to earth though with an in between song toast. He raised his glass, gestured to the back of the room, and said, “Sha La La.”
Photos: High on Stress; Cory Branan by Bob Longmore.
Location Info:
Nomad World Pub
Artist Info: Cory Branan, High on Stress, The Ashtray Hearts
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