Tag Archives: Gregg Greenwood
Lucinda Williams Displays Talent and the Truth
March 14th, 2011Lucinda Williams – Webster Hall – March 11, 2011
On Friday, at the first of her two sold-out shows at Webster Hall, Lucinda Williams’ performance reinforced some important truths for her fans. The first, and perhaps most important, was that whether dipping into roots-y country and blues (“Get Right with God”), sweetly harmonized country (“Fruits of My Labor”) or Americana-infused roughly hewn rock songs (“Real Live Bleeding Fingers and Broken Guitar Strings”), the prolific singer-songwriter shifts gears effortlessly; and her distinctive, emotional voice rose to the occasion for each song.
In addition to this display of her singular talent, Williams conveyed another equally compelling reminder throughout the show. “This is another song about another beautiful loser,” she remarked, smirking, of “Drunken Angel,” referencing her penchant for eviscerating no-good men in her songs. When introducing “Buttercup,” from her new record, Blessed, she joked, “This is the only bad-boy song on the new album…. I still have a little bit left in my system.” And as she introduced “Jailhouse Tears,” Williams was quick to point out that, yes, it’s about the same guy. In summary: If you do Lucinda Williams wrong, she will not let you off the hook without a song (or a few), as the set list pointed out.
Of course, it would be shortsighted to classify Lucinda Williams’ extensive catalog as full of songs all about heartbreak. One of her many strengths as a songwriter is the way she can infuse even the most downtrodden tale with strength, confidence and power—never bitterness. On Friday night, this unique quality of her music was underscored as the band began the encore with the title track off Blessed, where Williams’ straightforward lyrics provide a sweet reminder of the many things to be thankful for in this often crazy, messed up world. —Alena Kastin
Photo courtesy of Gregg Greenwood | www.gregggreenwood.com
Dr. Dog Delivers
February 21st, 2011Dr. Dog – Terminal 5 – February 18, 2011
Playing before giant stained-glass panels, Dr. Dog put on a wild show on Friday night at Terminal 5, but not before an excellent opening set by the Head and the Heart, making their NYC debut. The new Seattle band has a sweet folk sound, balancing multiple vocals and sparse but effective piano and violin parts. With a sound akin to Margot & the Nuclear So and So’s, the young quintet showed incredible promise, prompting many in the crowd to ask, “The Head and the Who?”
Headliners Dr. Dog put on a nearly flawless 90-minute performance. They began with jam-oriented tracks like “Only Wear Blue” and “The Ark,” a bluesy tune with the same vibe as the Beatles’ “I Want You (She’s So Heavy).” The audience started grooving along during “The Breeze,” and that energy carried the band into “The Old Days,” a double-time jamfest.
Halfway through, the group moved into the more pop-oriented part of the night, which included a haunting version of “Fate.” Dr. Dog never stopped moving even during the slowest songs, constantly reflecting the energy of the crowd. And they returned to an incredible buzz to play a taut encore that ended with “Jackie Wants a Black Eye,” during which they were joined by the Head and the Heart for one more smile-filled jam session. —Sean O’Kane
Photos courtesy of Gregg Greenwood | www.gregggreenwood.com
Friendly Fires – The Bowery Ballroom – February 7, 2011
February 8th, 2011
The Hold Steady – Music Hall of Williamsburg – January 31, 2011
February 1st, 2011
Broken Social Scene Electrifies Terminal 5
January 19th, 2011Broken Social Scene – Terminal 5 – January 18, 2010
Last night, Broken Social Scene, the seasoned Canadian indie-rock collective, broadcast their show from Terminal 5 to an Internet-wide YouTube-viewing audience. On backlit screens around the world, I imagine small but impassioned groups of fans connected to the stream, speakers turned up and eyes fixed on the performance. As digital music forces record companies to amend outdated practices perhaps this is the new fan experience: concerts from the comfort of your own home. Nothing else seems to be sacred, so the live show is the next logical step for digital revamping. But the experience of a concert, the “being there” quality ranging from sound to the energy of the crowd, is irreproducible. Just ask anyone who was at Terminal 5 last night.
Over nearly two-and-a-half hours, Broken Social Scene dug deep into their expansive catalog. While the majority of the set covered the band’s most recent album, Forgiveness Rock Record, “Guilty Cubicles,” “Cause = Time” and “Fire Eye’d Boy,” from their first three albums, respectively, stood alongside newer songs with equal if not greater passion and interest. Even “Canada vs. America,” a rarely played track from EP to Be You and Me, was revived in part due to the rise of the Tea Party, according to frontman Kevin Drew.
Drew, the band’s cofounder along with bassist Brendan Canning, ostensibly stole the show. For “Lover’s Spit,” he solitarily played the introduction on keyboard, and at the close of “Superconnected,” the showstopper dedicated to a friend’s passing, Drew strummed out the song on electric guitar. He even got the big rock and roll moment on “Ungrateful Little Father” when he dove into the crowd. But, ultimately, the night belonged to those onstage and although Drew joked that each of their songs sounds like the end of the show, the band actually closed with a wonderful cover of Smokey Robinson’s “Ooh Baby Baby” (with the opener, Brooklyn’s Here We Go Magic) and a subdued version of “Stars and Sons.” These songs, an encore after the end of the stream, further proved that “being there” is worth the price of admission. —Jared Levy
Photos courtesy of Gregg Greenwood | www.gregggreenwood.com
The Pierces – Mercury Lounge – January 13, 2011
January 14th, 2011
Gogol Bordello – Terminal 5 – January 1, 2011
January 3rd, 2011
The Walkmen – Terminal 5 – December 2, 2010
December 3rd, 2010
Deer Tick – Music Hall of Williamsburg – November 10, 2010
November 11th, 2010
Florence and the Machine – Terminal 5 – November 2, 2010
November 3rd, 2010
Big Band, Big Sound, Big Night
September 20th, 2010Broken Social Scene – SummerStage – September 18, 2010
Labor Day has come and gone, but summer technically lives on. The weather cooperated on Saturday, and an outdoor party in Central Park with Broken Social Scene providing the soundtrack was a brilliant idea. Bathed in red light and wasting no time, the Toronto collective launched into “KC Accidental,” the kind of anthem with which normal rock bands close their big-time NYC gigs. Of course, BSS is no normal rock band, and sometime between the blistering three-guitar start and the pogoing, fist-pumping finish, the number of musicians onstage doubled, with horn players and guitars everywhere you looked.
Later on, after an especially powerful “Cause = Time,” frontman Kevin Drew introduced himself to a horn player he said he’d never met. “This type of thing happens all the time in Broken Social Scene,” he exclaimed, and no doubt it does. The music was a magnet for more music and more musicians to make it. And there were enough on hand for a tour de force middle section of “Art House Director,” “Hotel” and “Romance to the Grave.” The latter was perfectly atmospheric and well served by the Sam Prekop’s vocals. In the opening slot, his band, the Sea and Cake, was a perfect foil. Their sound was slim and clean, a late-summer breeze floating on Prekop’s vocals and Archer Prewitt’s drifting guitar. Their bandmate John McEntire was an honorary BSS member for the night, providing double drumming on highlight after highlight.
The sound was big and when coaxed by the soundman to throw caution to the wind and just pay the fine for excessive volume, Drew and Co. didn’t require any arm-twisting, screaming out “Superconnected” with plenty of Andrew Whiteman guitar solos. Pushing up against curfew, even the encore was larger than life: four songs—each of which would have done the trick on its own—anchored by Whiteman’s beautiful “Looks Just Like the Sun.” Summer may have saved its best for last. —A. Stein
Photos courtesy of Gregg Greenwood | www.gregggreenwood.com
Robyn – Webster Hall – August 4, 2010
August 5th, 2010
Spiritualized – Radio City Music Hall – July 30, 2010
August 2nd, 2010
The Black Keys Sell Out
July 29th, 2010The Black Keys – Terminal 5 – July 28, 2010
Historically any musical innovation has come from a hybridization of styles. In the case of the Black Keys, they’ve taken their love of the bare-bones sound of drums and an electric guitar and traced its origins all the way back to the Delta blues, then combined it with a variety of influences like Link Wray and Wu-Tang among others, eventually collaborating with Mos Def and Q-Tip on the rap-rock album Blakroc. Longtime friends since high school, guitarist Dan Auerbach and drummer Patrick Carney didn’t necessarily set out to pioneer a unique sound. They took elements from the music they grew up with and added tried-and-true classic-rock screaming distortion.
The Black Keys played three sold-out show in two days, and they headlined Terminal 5 last night, having just left Central Park’s SummerStage a few hours before, not that it showed in their performance. The stage show was as stripped down as the duo—although they played their new material as a foursome, adding keys and bass to the mix—no lasers or elaborate lights, just a huge drum kit stage right, a stack of amps behind Auerbach and a huge banner of two black hands clasped together inside a tire, a reference to their recent album, Brothers, and even Auerbach and Carney’s personal connection, at the back of the stage.
The Keys played their Zeppelin-referenced blues with big crunchy distortion guitar that became another voice alongside Auerbach’s eerie Hendrix-like vocals, which are as equally at home delivering hushed falsetto on “The Lengths” as getting the Led out on “10 A.M. Automatic.” Hardly pausing between songs, they seemed to be taking their Ohio Midwestern work ethic to heart onstage, delivering on the promise of two friends getting to do what they sincerely love: Brothers in riff-heavy blues rock. —Jason Dean
Photos courtesy of Gregg Greenwood | www.gregggreenwood.com
