Hi all:
On Wednesday, March 22 Guy Davis played a concert at the Margaret Greenham Theatre in snowy Banff, Alberta, Canada (a ski/resort town about 80 min. drive west of Calgary). The theatre seats about 250 people (it was sold out). The stage is quite large.
First Set
Highway 61 (MF McDowell)
Things About Coming My Way (T Red)
Saturday Blues (I Bracey) 12 string
Second Set
Can?t Be Satisfied (Booker White)
Pay Day (MJ Hurt) Standard G, capo 5
What You Doin? (SJ Estes) Standard D, capo 2
Good Liquor Gonna Carry Me Down (BB Broonzy) Standard G
Backdoor Man (M Waters)
Goin? Down Slow Standard E, capo 3
Encore
Poor Boy, Long Ways From Home Open D (slide)
Dust My Broom (R Johnson) Standard E, capo 2
Driftin? and Driftin? Standard E, capo 1
Sweet Home Chicago (R Johnson) Standard E, capo 1
These are the covers they did. As well they did numerous Guy Davis originals from the Legacy and Skunkmello CD?s, the vast majority blues.
For most of the tunes Guy Davis was joined by three othe musicians, a bass player, electric guitarist and a mando multi-instrumentalist.
The electric player did mostly rhythm stuff, ex. on 4 or 5 tunes where he did screaming (but not too loud) electric blues solos (Slack will like these). He was good.
The solos in the majority of the tunes were taken by the mando player (Buzz will like that). Guy Davis played finger style blues accompaniment-style picking; he didn?t solo even once.
Guy Davis has a good voice with a tendency towards vibrato, which to my taste can be overdone. His original tunes that they performed are firmly in the blues mold, but not ?hard? blues. My personal favorite was ?Chocolate Man? which revisits the MJ Hurt ?Candyman? theme. The verses he sang at the concert are vastly more single entendre than his recording of the tune on his new ?Skunkmello? CD.
The mando player was a stud! Great solos!
The acoustic (mostly) blues combo was very effective and the songs/sound was great. Just enough electric wanking to satisfy the non-acoustic fans (I enjoyed it).
The last three songs of the encore were basically jams, very good feeling between the band members.
All in all a terrific evening of blues. Very well worth the $17 (Canadian) ticket.
The concert lasted 3 hrs and 15 min. with a 15 min. intermission.
The Band:
Guy Davis:
All lead vocals
Mostly played a ?50?s Gibson J-45
Slide on a small bodied Guild 12 string
5-string banjo (frailing style I think)
Mark Murphy
String bass and electric bass
Nerak Roth Patterson
Electric guitar (red Gibson E335)
Ken Wheately(sp?)
Mandolin, tenor 4 string banjo, washboard, tamborine, acoustic guitar
This concert was filmed for an upcoming DVD. The backdrop was spectacular, 12 vintage guitars on stands lined up behind the musicians:
Gibson L-1 archtop
Black ?20?s Gibson Nick Lucas
?60?s Gibson J-45
?50?s Gibson J-45
?50?s Gibson J-50
Banner headstock Gibson LG-2
Gibson LG-2 sized 12 string with tailpiece
Gibson LG-0
Kalamazoo KG-42 (the maple bodied one)
?50?s Harmony Soverign
Gibson L-7 archtop
Another Gibson archtop
Occasionally a musician (Guy or Ken) would get up, grab a guitar from the backdrop and play a tune with it . Very cool!
Alex
