The Goodish – Music Blog -

Before braving the hipster throngs and 24-hour industry parties of South by Southwest, M. Ward played an intimate show at the Dallas Museum of Art. No badges required.

Ward took the Horchow Auditorium’s empty stage with just his acoustic guitar– he didn’t need much more to impress. After burning through “Duet for Guitars, No. 3,” (on one guitar, mind you) Ward settled into a satisfying list of familiar favorites and Hold Time stand-outs.

“I don’t normally play in museums,” Ward confessed between songs, in one of his few asides to the audience. “But, I guess there’s a first time for everything.”

Songs such as “Never Had Nobody Like You” and “Magic Trick,” whose album versions move with full pop arrangements were stripped bare and slowed– suggesting what these songs might have sounded like when Ward first heard them himself as he was writing them. Ward’s hushed folk songs, such as “I’ll Be Yr Bird” and “Fuel for Fire,” carried in the silent auditorium, with not a clinking beer bottle or cell phone conversation in their way.

Ward kept the show simple– moving between his acoustic guitar and the hulking grand piano that sat in the rear of the stage– but pulled one trick from his bag. On “Oh Lonesome Me,” he used a guitar effects pedal to loop the rhythm chords as he played the sleepy slide lead over the top. The song took on a long interlude when he let the loop play, shot the audience a “Be right back” look, left the stage and returned after a few moments with a drink.

Ward ended his set with “Story of an Artist,” Daniel Johnston’s lament to a life of being misunderstood and unappreciated– an interesting choice for an artist who had just proven himself in front of a room of true believers.

Setlist:
1. Duet for Guitars, No. 3
2. Fuel for Fire
3. Never Had Nobody Like You
4. One Hundred Million Years
5. Oh Lonesome Me
6. I’ll Be Yr Bird
7. Chinese Translation
8. Hold Time
9. Vincent O’Brien
10. Sad, Sad Song

Encore:
11. Magic Trick
12. Poison Cup
13. Here Comes the Sun Again
14. Story of an Artist (Daniel Johnston cover)

Photo courtesy Texwurld.

I really feel strange about coming to love a Bruce Springsteen song through a cover. I feel like I’m somehow betraying the songwriter. But, I didn’t fully appreciate “The River” until I heard Josh Ritter’s bare-bones take on an internet video a couple of years ago. Ritter’s cover is simple and straight forward, but conveys the brutal honesty in Springsteen’s epic song.

Ritter recorded this version for the Hangin’ on E-Street series over at Springsteen’s site. While you’re there, watch the interview with Ritter, and Boss covers by other young devotees like The Gaslight Anthem and The Avett Brothers.

Like Oprah and the Coen Brothers, Lucero’s Ben Nichols is a fan of Cormac McCarthy. The Last Pale Light in the West, his first solo record, is inspired by McCarthy’s 1985 novel Blood Meridian, the tale of murderous gang in the pre-civil war American Southwest. And, Nichols is a good man to tell the tale. His gritty voice and driving acoustic guitar are backed by subdued accordian and shimmering pedal steel that paint a bleak but captivating picture of the books desert setting.

The songs–all but one named for the book’s charachters– touch on lost love and redemption, but center around the gang’s brutal work. The theme of The Last Pale Light in the West is summed up on “The Kid”: “We killed in the desert, we killed in the streets/ We showed what shall and what shall not be/ We stood with pistols, fought back to back/ Now you stood your ground, what ground is that?”

But, it’s a short ablum for such an epic story. At just seven songs (one is an instrumental) the album clocks in at just 27 minutes. Last Pale Light in the West is out now on RCRD LBL.

Ben Nichols – “Toadvine”

Listen to Nichols read an excerpt from Blood Meridian at Daytrotter.

Ben Nichols and Lucero are on tour now.

Bonnie “Prince” Billy will make a fan out of me yet. The upbeat country jam, “I Am Goodbye,” got its claws into me on first listen. The video follows a jovial, heavily-bearded Will Oldham as he bobs through the city singing that undeniable hook. “I Am Goodbye” appears on Bonnie “Prince” Billy’s latest, Beware – out March 17 on Drag City. If the rest of the album is anything like this song, it’ll be a winner.

Goodish favorite Joe Pug has finished recording his debut full-length album, and word on the street is that it will be released in May. For a preview of what’s to come, check out the Billboard Underground interview or Pug’s recent Daytrotter session, which includes three excellent unreleased songs that will be included on the album.

Pug hits the road next month for a quick tour that includes a string of SXSW shows and opening slots for Madeleine Peyroux and The Flatlanders.