A Great BIG review from last night's show in Buffalo !
Great Big Sea rocks with an Irish flair
By Garaud MacTaggart
NEWS CONTRIBUTING REVIEWER
Updated: 08/16/08 7:30 AM
Great Big Sea rocked the Harbor Friday night, generating enough
energy to charge up the vast horde of ready souls in attendance and
make them bounce, dance and take part in group karaoke exercises.
It
was an amazing experience watching so many people pogo-ing en masse,
twirling around in little clusters of humanity and belting out lyrics
like a giant a capella choir on steroids.
The fact that, as
band member Alan Doyle noted, the current Buffalo Rocks the Harbor
concert series — returning after a year’s hiatus — was the start of the
band’s latest tour only made the meshing of musicians and audience that
much more special. It’s as if Western New York was home to the most
rabid Great Big Sea fans outside of its Newfoundland base.
Touring
in support of its latest album, “Fortune’s Favour,” the group whipped
through a set of songs old and new, rewarding longtime fans with some
of their favorite material while introducing tunes that could turn out
to be future classics.
The group entered onto the stage as a
recording of the “Banks of Newfoundland” banged out of the speakers
and, by the second song, had dived headlong into partying mode with a
rollicking song for an Irish wake (“The Night Pat Murphy Died”) that
turned into a ceilidh — or Celtic party — revival. Bob Hallett, the
group’s resident multi-instrumentalist, played his heavily amplified,
two-row accordion with impressive ease, tearing through phrase after
phrase as if they
were hors d’oeuvres at an all-you-can-eat spread.
It
is this blend of lively traditional Irish music with equally
high-powered rock ’n’ roll that makes Great Big Sea such a remarkable
live act. It is really quite impressive how they can go from a
straight-ahead barn-burner such as “When I Am King” to a more historic
rave-up, “A Boat Like Gideon Brown,” or a more modern bit of balladry,
“England,” which captures the pain behind so much traditional material.
Mason Jennings, a Minneapolis-based singer-songwriter, was the
scheduled opening act. Playing guitar in conjunction with a bassist and
drummer, Jennings wove his way through a set of original material
before a surprisingly large coterie of admirers crowded near the front
of the stage.
With a voice that had eerie similarities to Lou
Reed, Jonathan Richman and, at times, Tom Petty, Jennings’ approach to
singing was more about sliding into or onto a note rather than hitting
it square on the head. It was a mannerism that was effective more often
than not and was used to greatest effect in quirky yet catchy tunes
such as “I Love You and Buddha Too,” “Fighter Girl” and “Butterfly.”
Samantha Stollenwerck, who was the opening act for this week’s Thursday at the Square concert, was a surprise opening act.
Concert Review
Great Big Sea
Friday night as part of Buffalo Place Rocks the Harbor at Erie Canal Harbor.
My basement homebrew bar area