By: David de Young
“Relax and enjoy the Van cover-bliss of The Belfast Cowboys.” - Jen Paulson
Terry Walsh of the Belfast Cowboys joined by Stook! and Ben Kyle of Romantica - Photo by Alexa Jones
Indeed, it was a lovely pre-holiday, mid-week break. Though the thing about weeknight shows I never seem to learn is: don’t be late. Arriving just before 10:00 to First Avenue, we’d already missed openers Stook! Mr. Stook! himself, I soon learned, had been a bit hoarse due to a cold, his voice possibly irritated further by having performed just the night before at the Nomad as part of Kyle (More Cowbell) Matteson’s 30th birthday party. However, by all reports, he and the band still sounded great.
Shortly after 10:00, Romantica took the stage. This band has continued to fill venues with good times as they’ve become seasoned performers and really come into their own the past few years. They were joined on violin tonight by Jessy Greene, recently returned from “fighting Foo” (she’d been on tour with the Foo Fighters), and the band opened with “Need You Tonight” from their sophomore album America. About two-thirds of tonight’s set came from that 2007 album, and many of the people who seemed to have been hearing those songs for the first time at their CD release party at the Varsity this past summer seemed to have by now learned the words. The songs have settled in nicely with me as well and are pleasantly familiar now. Romantica’s best songs are warm and familiar and envelop you like a favorite sweater. Halfway through the set many in the audience began to dance. They played only nine or ten songs, finishing up with “Oscar Wilde,” the title cut from their debut album It’s Your Weakness That I Want. I always love the way on this song live they do a sonic “dive” during the break using Jessy Greene’s violin and Luke Jacob’s piano to create an effect that is gripping in a different way than the studio effect.
The band of the night, however, were The Belfast Cowboys. For those of you tuning into this review from a Van Morrison Google link, you have not been misled. You are, in fact, in terrific luck: tonight The Belfast Cowboys are on stage to perform Van Morrison’s Moondance in its entirety.
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| Terry Walsh (in red) with the Belfast Cowboys - Photo by Jones |
Performing classic albums in sequence has been quite the fad lately, and it’s usually a fun experience for both bands and fans, the fans getting to hear live performances of songs they may never hear live otherwise, and bands getting to play deep cuts from albums that would otherwise seldom make their set lists. Because of its song-for-song performance, I hope this fad stays limited to albums with no weak tracks. (BTW, this coming weekend, Rude Girl will do the same with The Clash’s London Calling.)
The set list pre-determined with no wiggle room made for few surprises so we could all just sit back and enjoy the music. Terry Walsh doesn’t so much imitate or channel Van Morrison when he sings, but faithfully and respectfully (and with better pipes than he sometimes credits himself) interprets the songs with soul: his own.
At the end of the song, Walsh held up his jumbo bottle of Summit and remarked (as he would again later in the evening) “They’re growin’ ’em bigger now.” This typically Irish sense of humor and good spiritedness wove its way through the evening.
The crowd started dancing during song (uh, track?) two, “Moondance” and seldom stopped for the rest of the evening. Walsh’s brother Jim brought him a shot during the song earning a resounding thank you in the form of the single syllable, “Dude!” The airy and light flute solo by Walsh’s flute player Vic Volare (no, that wasn’t Al Gore with his hair slicked back in a black rope sweater) topped the song off nicely. One thing that was immediately clear was just how polished The Belfast Cowboys are. I heard that in order to perform all of Moondance, the band had only to learn one or two songs outside their regular repertoire, and it showed, though I’d be hard pressed to pick out which song or songs those might be from listening, though “Everyone” is probably a pretty good guess since it’s less familiar than probably all the rest.
Before playing the crowd favorite “Caravan,” Walsh joked that they were going to “change things up a little bit now and play something by Van Morrison.” Before an awesome rendition of “Into the Mystic” looking out over the receptive and clearly appreciative First Avenue audience, Walsh commented “I feel like I’m watching an episode of 'This is Your Life.'”
Song after well-rehearsed song went by and all was well until the inevitable happened. You guessed it. Someone yelled out a request for "Gloria." Ooops. Wrong album (Though it seems like it might want to be on Moondance, “Gloria” was a song Van Morrison penned for his first band Them which later came out in 1974’s It’s Too Late To Stop Now.)
“Glad Tidings” became a bit of a Christmas song. And Walsh introduced any members of the band he had not yet introduced including Joe Loskota on keys, whom he said by default he wins the MMA for best keyboard player since no awards were held this year. (What was up with that, anyway?)
The album done, the band did not leave the stage but went straight into the encore, which was, by the way, way, way longer than the actual set and included lots more Van Morrison, more chances for the bands’ great horn section to showcase their skills. The band was still playing when I left at 1 a.m., but highlights had included “Bright Side of The Road,” eventually “Gloria” featuring Walsh’s nephew Matt Walsh on vocals, a cover of Bruce Springsteen’s version of “Santa Claus is Coming To Town” which drove HowWasTheShow photographer Alexa Jones (an un-abashed Springsteen freak) absolutely mad. The song also featured Stook! on backing vocals and Ben Kyle of Romantica on vocals and jingle bells (a hand-made jingle stick (see my Trailer Trash review) of sorts, that by the end of the set had lost more than a few bells.) Believe it or not, the encore also included a good portion of “Waitress in the Sky,” left over from The Replacements tribute a few weeks prior. And of course, “Brown Eyed Girl,” for which Walsh invited all the brown eyed girls, eventually all the blue eyed girls, and even more eventually any-eyed girls (and boys) to the stage to sing along.
It was yet another great party to warm up the Minnesota winter night. And great fun.
Location Info:
First Avenue
Artist Info: Romantica, Stook, The Belfast Cowboys
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