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aphroditelion · 7 years

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The Upstairs Room - Live Upstairs in Whelan’s, Dublin

Samantha Crain - Friday 7th April 2017

Honey Blood – Saturday 8th April 2017

I spent the last two nights Upstairs in Whelans, the more intimate of the two musical arenas in the Wexford Street venue. The musical fair on offer was quite different: on the Friday night we had Oklahoman singer-songwriter Samantha Crain with her four piece backing band and on Saturday it was Scottish indie-rocking two piece Honeyblood. The shows were quite different apart from the fact they both lapsed in the “Guinness conversation” with the crowd, almost as much of a visiting band cliché as the Irish ancestors chat but hey. I also noticed Whelan’s is now styling itself as “Dublin’s Original Live Music Venue“ which must mean there was no live music in Dublin before 1989. I’ll have to check the historical records.

Anyway back to the shows. I have to say I was a little disappointed when I got the venue on Friday to see seating in front of the stage. This inferred to me there wasn’t going to be much of a crowd. I didn’t count but there can’t have been more than 50 people at the show which must be a bit disheartening for an established touring artist on her 6 album (YouTube even tells me she played the Late Late Show in 2015!). If Samantha was disappointed she never showed it and was charming, witty and fully engaged from off, filling the silences between songs with amusing anecdotes and background info on her songs.

She, and her band (Emma on Clarinet & backing vocals, Mike on Violin, Ben on bass & backing vocals, and Sebastian on drums) played her excellent new album You Had Me At Goodbye in order. This meant the wonderfully poppy Antiseptic Greeting was up first followed by the equally perky Oh Dear Louis, though without its lofi horror movie video. After a slower Don Draperesque Loneliest Handsome Man and anti-love song Wise One she treated us to Red Sky, Blue Mountain, her first in the Choctaw language of some of her Native American ancestors. As well as the unintelligible lyrics the performance was notable for prominence of the excellent clarinet and violin. (Check out Emma Gatrill’s solo work - http://www.emmagatrill.com/)

The stories about Wichita Lineman and Will Rodgers came as thick and fast as songs they were connect to: the fuzzy bass rock of Smile When and Betty;s Eulogy. When the Roses Bloom Again was introduced as the first cover song she has released on an album. Written by Will D. Cobb in the early 20th century, she discovered via the Wilco / Billy Bragg Woodie Guthrie project Mermaid Avenue, which of course was partly recorded in Dublin. After the 10 songs from You Had Me… were done she dipped into her back catalogue for Outside Pal which has great pizzicato and swopping volion, Santa Fe replete with country-styles vocals from bass player Ben and the summery pop of Somewhere All the Time.

For an encore Samantha returned solo with Elk City, which used the same tuning as Richard Thompson’s 1952 Vincent Black Lightning and was plucking great. The band returned to finish the night with For The Miner, her tribute to the late Jason Molina. This lady deserves a bigger audience.

If Friday night was all about the folky indie pop, Saturday night brought the noise. Unfortunately I only caught the end of opening act Dott but they sounded pretty good. As they were clearing off their gear Stina and Cat from Honeyblood started getting theirs ready- there is no backstage or standing on ceremony Upstairs in Whelan’s. Without pausing for breath or saying hello, as soon as they were ready they tore straight into Justine, Misery Queen. As I had chosen to stand right up the front I was nearly deafened by the combined cacophony of Cat’s drums and Stina’s large Fender Bassbreaker Amp. Unfortunately as a result the vocals were kind of lost in the mix, a feature for much of the rest of the night.

While Honeyblood’s self-titled debut album was a decent lofi-ish indie-rock effort, it’s like everything about them was supercharged for the follow-up Babes Never Die: it rocks hard and the melodies are catchier than chlamydia. This can’t all be down to new drummer Cat Myers. A good example of this was second track Ready for the Magic which adds stop start, hand clap percussion and a noisy false ending to the euphoric chorus. Love Is A Disease was almost as engaging but they turned down the afterburners for Choker and the falsetto melody of Sister Wolf was lost in the noise.

For the longest time Stina seemed somewhat disengaged from proceeding leaving all the intersong chatter to Cat, which she managed in spades. It took about 9 or 10 songs for everything to click. A lot of this was down to Cat entreating us all to come closer and dance to blistering stomp of All Dragged Up, which seemed to wake everyone up. Even Stina smiled at the end. Sea Hearts followed. It too has an earworm of a melody sneaking between the riffs. Album title track Babes Never Die add tom-thumping drums to the catchy indie-rock mix with Cat’s backing vocals almost cutting through the noise.

Given the setup Upstairs in Whelan’s they dispensed with all pretense of an encore and instead rant through the hate-fuelled Super Rat and early single Killer Bangs which almost matches the new material in terms of power and melody. I am not sure when my ear-buzzing will subside but at least there are great melodies lodged in their too.

#Music #Live #Review #Dubliln #Whelans #Upstairs #Samantha Crain #Honeyblood #Emma Gatrill #Babes Never Die #you had me at goodbye #Wilco #Billy Bragg #Richard Thompson #dottattoo

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