Hail to the salon, the coffeehouse gig, the pizza parlor show, the backyard house party.
I was moved to write this – not a review, but a synopsis – regarding last night’s house concert featuring singer/songwriter Mieka Pauley. With live music seeming to take less precedence in everyday people’s lives, how awesome to hear a night of original, incisive music in a backyard setting accompanied by a choir of crickets, locusts, etc.
Jason Arbenz needs no introduction to Cincinnatians (ex-Throneberry and currently Goose); he performed a splendid solo set of songs balancing light and dark, humor and pathos, his gravelly voice and hobo uncle demeanor channeling various Steves (Forbert, Earle, Goodman). Hostess with the mostess Denise Saker joined him on fiddle for “When Will We Be Married?,” a traditional tune made popular by the Waterboys; Jason also covered the Replacements and Dr. Hook & the Medicine Show (bizarre, considering the latter had come up in a conversation hours before).
I must confess an aversion to some of the artists Mieka Pauley gets compared to in the press, largely due to overt agendas that, for me, often overshadow the music itself. Mieka’s only agenda seems to be writing brutally frank and honest songs; that’s a huge difference. Everyone there was astounded by her voice, and yet, I’m not sure everyone there realized how great her voice truly is. She uses it to constantly and consistently throw sucker punches, switching up lines and timbres on a dime; charming and disarming, just like her Brooklyn accent when she’s talking.
Her guitar playing is the perfect foil for her voice: alternately pretty and crude, going from dainty fingerpicking to indie eighth-note chunking to grabbing chords with intentionally dissonant (read: wrong, hear: fabulous) notes in them. All this coming from someone who only recently learned how to properly finger an F chord; chalk it up to brute force and intuition.
Most of us who attended last night have wonderful images we’ll keep in our heads and hearts for some time: the canopy strewn with twinkle lights; hearing strong voices with wise tales against the night sky; Mieka recruiting the next generation of feminists in an extremely subversive sing-along with the O’Donnell girls (I’m kidding! I’m kidding!) It seems a maxim that most magical musical moments happen at small gatherings; hail to the salon, the coffeehouse gig, the pizza parlor show, the backyard house party.
Was a perfect evening. Cannot disagree with a single word, Roger. Am VERY glad you were there
Me, too!