Rodney Crowell

April 1, 2017
The Hamilton
Washington, D.C.
USA

Lostbrook 2.0 Volume 198

Source: Church Audio CAFS>SPSB-12>Sony M10(24/48)
Location: 25' from stage, right of center

Transfer: Sony M10>Micro SDHC>PC>Sound Forge 10>WAV 16/44.1>
Trader's Little Helper>FLAC(level 8)

Taper/Transfer: Lostbrook
Covers/Setlist/Review: ethiessen1

Disc 1:

01 Pavane For A Dead Princess (1:34) (Maurice Ravel) (Duet by Eamon & Joe)
02 Glasgow Girl (4:49)
03 Earthbound (5:28)
04 Stuff That Works (5:36) (Rodney Crowell & Guy Clark)
05 Still Learning How To Fly (5:32)
06 Anything But Tame (4:33) (Mary Karr & Rodney Crowell)
07 East Houston Blues (4:06)
08 Reckless (5:13)
09 It Ain't Over Yet (5:37) (For Guy Clark)
10 I Don't Care Anymore (4:29)
11 Nashville 1972 (3:41)
12 Dancin' Circles Round The Sun (Epictetus Speaks) (9:00)

Disc 2:

13 Wandering Boy (7:52)
14 Frankie Please (4:38)
15 Moving Work Of Art (4:41)
16 I Couldn't Leave You If I Tried (3:45)
17 She's Crazy for Leavin' (3:11) (Rodney Crowell & Guy Clark)
18 After All This Time (4:32)
19 Leaving Louisiana In The Broad Daylight (6:26) (Rodney Crowell & Donivan Cowart)
20 Just Pleasing You (5:23) (Mary Karr & Rodney Crowell)
21 Pancho And Lefty (6:30) (Townes Van Zandt)
22 Forty Miles From Nowhere (5:13) (Rodney solo)

Note: Tracks 7-11 from new album "Close Ties"

All songs, unless noted otherwise, by Rodney Crowell

Rodney Crowell: acoustic guitar, vocals
Eamon McLoughlin: fiddle, mandolin, vocals
Joe Robinson: acoustic guitar, vocals
Steuart Smith: electric guitar (trks 13-21)

Lostbrook notes:

My lack of familiarity with Rodney Crowell is more than offset by Eric's depth of knowledge. It's a testament to the excellence of Rodney's songwriting that we were both equally impressed by this superb show.


ethiessen1"s review:

As we age, watching life's good parts go by way too fast, the bad parts seem to last forever and a day, and music becomes an essential part of our coping mechanisms. Sometimes, it reflects what we're feeling and gives us strength, while other times it can bring us joy and a welcome, yet temporary, escape from reality.

Covering both ends of that spectrum is Rodney Crowell.

His songs have been recorded by Keith Urban (Making Memories of Us), Bob Seger (Shame On The Moon), the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band (Long Hard Road), Crystal Gayle (Til I Gain Control Again), The Oak Ridge Boys (Leaving Louisiana In The Broad Daylight), Waylon Jennings (Ain�t Living Long Like This), Emmylou Harris (Even Cowgirls Get the Blues), ex-wife Rosanne Cash (I Don�t Know Why You Don�t Want Me) and his once father-in-law Johnny Cash. He had five consecutive number-one hits from his 1998 album, Diamonds and Dirt. He has an affinity for hiring very talented lead guitar players: Will Kimbrough, Vince Gill, Jedd Hughes, Steuart Smith (of the Eagles) and now Joe Robinson have all shone brightly onstage with him. We were fortunate to hear both Smith and Robinson play on this night, as Steuart lives in the DC area and joined in for the last half of the show.

The Hamilton, a three story restaurant comprised of four dining rooms, a sushi bar, and three upstairs bars with a music area, opened on December 18, 2011. It is located in Hamilton Square, on the northwest corner of 14th and F Streets, 2 blocks from the White House in Washington, DC. A landmark, originally constructed in 1929, it was Garfinckel�s flagship store until 1990; afterwards, the property was redeveloped into a modern office building, while retaining its restored historic facade. It is a breath-takingly beautiful building, with first class fixtures and amenities throughout; although the twin high dollar Dyson hand dryers in the men's bathroom were both broken on this night.

Crowell is currently touring as one third of a trio, sharing the stage with Australian acoustic guitarist Joe Robinson and English violinist/fiddler/mandolinist Eamon McLoughlin. Even his older songs sounded note & letter perfect when played differently than the original versions by this ensemble, with Joe's trademark guitar harmonics often shining like jewels atop the music - his playing on Stuff That Works being a prime example of this. Interestingly, neither musician played on Rodney's newest album, Close Ties, which was released the day of this show - although you'd never know it.

The show began with Joe and Eamon's duet of Ravel's Pavane, an interesting appetizer to the exquisite feast that was to come. Nicely re-arranged versions of Glasgow Girl and Earthbound followed after Rodney came onstage to join them. Crowell's close friendship with the late master songwriter Guy Clark was apparent as the trio almost reverently played Stuff That Works (which he & Clark co-wrote; getting him back on track musically & careerwise following his divorce), and then just as somberly performed Still Learning How To Fly, Rodney's gift to a friend who was dying way too young of cancer (a song he said he couldn't have written if Guy hadn't gotten him to "get his head out of his backside").

Next came the more light-hearted Anything But Tame, a song he wrote with East Texas poet & essayist Mary Karr, writer of prize-winning memoirs such as The Liars Club and Lit, from a story they invented while wondering how their lives would have been together had they met sooner under different circumstances.

And then, really good got even better...

We were treated to a nice sized 5 song "sampling" of Rodney's new album, with one of many highlights being the eerie bowing, swooping and moaning of McLoughlin's fiddle lending poignant aural punctuation to Reckless. Following one of Crowell's last times with Guy Clark, he was moved to write It Ain't Over Yet in tribute to his old friend, and one could feel the emotion in the air as it unfolded, bringing glistening eyes to many of us in the crowd as Rodney sang "You can't take it with you when you go to the grave." The self depreciating I Don't Care Anymore featured a tongue in cheek Rodney wistfully reminiscing about those old days in Music City in stark contrast to the more seriously autobiographical and self critical Nashville 1972, which finished out the batch of new songs. In the latter, he met Willie Nelson one night at a party and: "I was 22 years old, and he musta been pushing 40, There was hippies and reefer and God knows what all, I was drinking pretty hard, I played him this shitty song I wrote, then puked out in the yard."

Up next, Dancin' Circles Round The Sun (Epictetus Speaks) from 2005's The Outsider gave us a very relevant view of today's world, gussied up by Eamon's blazing fiddling and Joe's fiery picking: "Disregard what don't concern you, don't let disappointment turn you, avoid adopting other people's views, know what you can and can't control, don't let envy take a toll, it's nothing more than weather passing through.."

It was already a great evening, with a set of expertly written songs superbly played...and then it got better...

Eagles' guitarist Steuart Smith stepped out onto the stage while Rodney smiled widely and mentioned how Smith's solo on the studio version of his classic song Wandering Boy (about a pair of twins - an AIDS victim and how his brother handles the news) elevated a seriously somber narrative by introducing several counter melodies that could stand as songs on their own. The ensuing live version did that and more as Steuart's smooth style made his playing appear to be almost effortless.

Loosening up the mood, the country rocking Frankie Please followed, as the capacity crowd clapped along. Robinson, McLoughlin & Smith traded solos in addition to Steuart slipping hot Albert Lee like fills in behind the verses. The slightly maudlin ode to a lost lover who was a "Moving Work Of Art" was next; its softly reminiscent mood augmented by Eamon's fiddle with several tastefully concise solos by Smith.

Then things got more than a bit honky tonk - sweet as molasses harmony vocals with a smokin' fiddle sawing away to the music pulsing with a western swing beat... We were treated to a Rodney-Crowell-was-a-damn-fine-hit-making-country-songwriter set of songs, perfectly rendered. I Couldn't Leave You If I Tried, She's Crazy for Leavin', the beautifully sad ballad After All This Time, and Leaving Louisiana In The Broad Daylight reminded us just how good this style of music can be - although the brilliant fills and solos Steuart coaxed out of his Ernie Ball Music Man guitar would make even the sorriest contestant on The Voice sound good.

One night Crowell was writing with Mary Karr and they discussed what kind of song Hank Williams would have written had he gotten sober. They jokingly put some words together and then, as Rodney said: The ghost of Hank Williams entered the room and we got sober, telling us to "shut the fuck up and write a good song." Smith's perfect pedal steel sound-alike solo played on guitar, along with Eamon's weepingly adroit fiddle playing, made Just Pleasing You a fitting closer to this Nashville tinged set.

As wonderful as the night had been, it was time to start wrapping things up. Crowell offered Townes Van Zant's classic Pancho & Lefty as a vehicle for the crowd to sing along with on the choruses, but, it seemed that not everyone present knew the words... and was almost embarrassingly obvious.
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The musicians left the stage, leaving Rodney to play the encore solo with his acoustic guitar. He chose Forty Miles From Nowhere from his new album; a quiet blues like song played in ballad style. The narrator is talking to a lost love, describing the stormy weather, how old friends let him grieve alone "for reasons not unkind," how her little lap dog chased a squirrel and remains there with him, just the two of them, along with that "old brindle cat." "The floorboards creak and faucets leak, but it's the emptiness that sings," he laments, finally closing with "I weep for you, it's what I do, forty miles from nowhere at the bottom of the world." The sadness was palpable, bringing us back to reality as we went out into the night to rejoin the outside world... but for two hours, it had gloriously ceased to exist for those of us inside The Hamilton.

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