Jayke Orvis and Friends @ Cafe Nine 10/3/2010

Jayke Orvis + Friends are not for the faint of heart. Dark and dangerous, they may not be for purists, with their tattoos and piercings and dreadlocks, but they tore it up.

Rachel Brooke sings City of Shame like a young Loretta Lynn. She's a little woman with a big guitar. Singing murder songs. Her capoed guitar sounds bright and old-timey.

James Hunnicutt opened. He had a bigger guitar sound--his Martin sounded fat and round, to match the sweat-stain where his strumming forearm rested. He mixed up originals and covers, including The Misfits' Halloween and an couple of Hank Williams songs. Gotta know the canon if you are going to plow this field. He did a nice job with Lefty Frizell's Long Black Veil. It's a killer song that works better with Johnny Cash's deeper gravel voice but he made it his own, segueing powerfully into his own composition.

Jayke Orvis promises to be interesting. Nominally bluegrass-sounding on myspace, his band is setting up beat-up doghouse bass [that's Johnny Lawless with his bass in the photo], banjo, and gold-tone Les Paul electric guitar, with Hunnicutt tuning the Les Paul. And a guy in hillbilly dreads. That would be Mr. Orvis.

"OK we're gonna start. Here's a song." Yes it is.

This is rotgut redeye punk bluegrass. They can play as fast as anyone. And they're loud (except that it's the first sound check I've sat through where the musicians kept asking for the monitors to be turned down. Good sign.). Tattoos, piercings, stickers on the mando and the flat-out best version of Shady Grove I've heard, fast dark and deep. As raw and non-traditional as it might be, it's also the most authentic, hitting minor key notes on the mandolin. Orvis's voice is as old as the hills and he shreds his mandolin. It's not pretty but it's real. Two songs later he sang about killing his ex-girlfriend, dragging her out the door and burying her in the backyard. Perfect.

1. Instumental
2. Shady Grove
3. Thunderbolts + Lightning
4. Gone Forever More ("Here's a song about killing you're ex-girlfriend")
5.
6. (This song has a hot-rod lincoln feel to it)
7. Dreadful Sinner ("What does it take to become a righteous man"--sounds ancient)
8. (Switches to acoustic guitar-"now I'm going away"--hunnicutt tasty flatpick lead work)
9. Empty Bottles on a Broken Shelf
10. Feelings Like This ("How do you feel when you're all alone..." Hunnicutt on electric guitar fits right in. "Little plastic baggies all over the floor...")
11. ("Song's about divorce, about the very last night beofre..." Duet w/ Rachel--closes song with pretty unison riffing on mando + acoustic guitar)
12. Hank Williams" Kaw-Liga. Jayke on guitar Rachel + James harmony.
13. Alone with You (Faron Young tune sung by James)
14. ("Oh my time has come I gotta go" -- a capella with handclaps)
15. Yankee Taste [instumental]
16. Raise the Moon (Last song. "Gonna have a party gonna raise the moon, we all know that he's coming soon")

Marianne Dissard's Super sensual jazzy French lounge-pop.

Marianne Dissard sings in French. I didn't understand a word, but she's intense. Jazzy combo backing, Dissard sings full throated, like a deeper, less warbly Edith Piaf. Facial expressions and hand gestures add to the effect. Super sensual French lounge-pop.

I could fall in love.

With a guitar player, drummer on small kit and Christian the bitters-drinking Italian on keyboards [borrowed from Freddy B], she charmed the small but enthusiastic crowd. Her voice was full of longing and yearning.

Her last song before an uncontrived, unplanned encore, was sung Spanish ("since we live in Tuscon there's tons of mariachi"). Still didn't understand the words, but it didn't matter. Everything made perfect sense.

And kudos to Warren for the perfect sound mix, open yet full and not too loud. Although you could hear the rumble of bar talk during some of her songs, any louder would have spoiled the mood.

Never Seen Anything Like That Before

Minnesotan Paul Metzger's free show at Cafe Nine last night was billed as "head banging, toe tapping, heart soaring banjo jams...escalating solo improvisations on modified banjos and guitars creating a unique live experience." When he started, I would have added head-scratching; by the time he ended it was jaw-dropping.

Metzger's instrument is a banjo with a twelve-string guitar head, apparently tuned like a sitar. Five guitar-like strings run down the fretboard with eighteen other strings in various places. Tuning pegs show up around the rim of the body.

The guy jammed. Sometimes in fits and starts, sometimes blazing fast runs, other times drawing a bow across the strings for sonorous melodies. What began as a curiousity quickly transfixed the audience. I moved around, going up close to try to figure out the instrument and moving to the back to enjoy the reverberations [and because the artist likes to play loud!] Words will ultimately fail to describe the sound--try the video link on Metzger's website: http://www.paulmetzger.net/ or his myspace page: http://www.paulmetzger.net/

I liked sound man Warren's comment after the show about his whole-tone playing near the beginning of his set: "It was not at all ambiguous."