clouds, threatening storms, thunder & lightning, heavy rain, all before 6:00pm, i was not optimistic… then, just as i arrived at the harbor lawn and “dawes” was starting their set, a light, drizzling rain was starting to fall, but you could see the clearing skies coming in behind the rain and feel the nice breeze blowing in. optimism returning.
just before 9:00PM, as tift merritt and her band took the stage, looking westward, downstream on the ohio river, the sun decided to make a brief yet beautiful appearance, it’s first of the day, before appearing to settle into the river for the evening. clear skies, nice breeze, beautiful evening, beautiful music about to start.
i have seen tift many times (10 or 12 maybe?) and she just continues to get better and more confident on stage each time, she delivers a high energy set, constantly prowling the stage while rotating between acoustic and electric guitar and keyboard, yet never compromising main gift, her subtle yet powerful vocals. the set highlighted most of the music from tift’s excellent new album, “see you on the moon,” along with several favorites like “stray paper,” “broken,” “good hearted man” and “bramble rose” from earlier releases.
for a big, outdoor show and despite a few ignorant, immature, loud mouth drunks, the strength of the songs, the band and tift’s vocals came through loud and clear.
the band consists of; tift’s husband and tour manager (also her long-time collaborator) and drummer, zeke hutchins; lead guitarist (including pedal steel) eric heywood and jay brown on bass and harmony vocals.
so after a pretty hot, sticky and dreary day, we were rewarded with a great, energetic set of music and a beautiful evening. optimism restored.
thank you wfpk, thank you tift.
more pictures @: http://picasaweb.google.com/bivester
what we need is music 