Somehow Langhorne Slim’s new record came out without me noticing. That seems to happen a lot these days since I let all my music magazine subscriptions expire. I missed his last Madison show in October seeing the Toil in Indianapolis, and I guess it never occurred to me that he might have been supporting a new record. I finally bought Be Set Free a few weeks before the end of the year, had I bought it even a week earlier it would have finished very high on my best of the year list. An undeniable combination of rockers and ballads, all sung with his distinctive, almost whiny, somehow addictive voice, it has yet to leave my CD player for more than a few days.
On stage, he is even more charismatic. With boundless energy and a beguiling smile, he bounced through the set (surprisingly) barely breaking a sweat, looking handsomely hip in his green shirt, striped tie and hat. He was so caught up in the momentum of the show that after breaking a string on the very first song, he didn’t even wait for his strap when the tech handed him another guitar, playing at least three songs without it. On two occasions he dismissed the band and took a seat center stage, strumming a few quieter numbers on his parlor guitar, a contradiction of worn wood and sparkle, thanks to a silver glitter pick guard that adorned the obviously much-loved instrument.
He drew from all three of his releases, featuring much of the new release (in my opinion his best to date). Perhaps my favorite of the new songs is “Cinderella,” where Slim asks “are you my girl?” and the manly voices of his backing band answer “you know I am.” It gets even better when he rhymes “Cinderella” with “handsome fellow.” Even though my sister had only heard the CD once, she instantly recognized many of the songs. At the end of his set she proclaimed he should play in the basement, since “I would love to dance around drunkenly to his music.” Judging by the crowd, which filled in a respectable amount of the cavernous Turner Hall, the days of him playing the basement are long gone, which is too bad for me.
As entertaining as Slim is, a lot of the credit for how terrific the show was goes to his band. Upright bass player Jeff Ratner was as solid as they come. He introduced his terrific drummer Malachai DeLorenzo (who also produced the record) as “Milwaukee’s fourteenth favorite son,” leading me to guess he was the son of Violent Femmes drummer Victor (he is). As great as the rhythm section was, keyboardist/banjo player David Moore stole the show. I’m already a sucker for the banjo and its many moods, but I don’t think I have ever seen one played with such fervor. His hands were a blur as he strummed the instrument, one of which was not shockingly splattered with dried blood.
I was happy that April Smith & the Great Picture Show was just one band, two openers would have been too much on a Tuesday night in Milwaukee. I couldn’t really understand much of what Mays sang, but she had an amazing voice and she could really belt it out. It’s hard to know exactly which picture show her band hailed from, half looked like they came from “Velvet Goldmine” while the rhythm section could have been from “The Sting.” Mays herself had a “Valley Girl” look going on. It was weird to miss a Honky Tonk Tuesday at Mickey’s, but this show was certainly worth it.
April Smith & the Great Picture Show
Langhorne Slim
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