BAND OF HORSES: ACOUSTIC AT THE RYMAN (2014)
1) Marry Song; 2) Slow Cruel
Hands Of Time; 3) Detlef Schrempf; 4) Everything's Gonna Be Undone; 5) No One's
Gonna Love You; 6) Factory; 7) Older; 8) Wicked Gil; 9) The Funeral; 10)
Neighbor; 11*) Weed Party.
Acoustic? Aren't these guys always acoustic? Oh no, that's right,
they aren't — it's just my memory playing predictable tricks on me, because
that is the way you are going to
remember your bearded guys playing your usual «Americana» stuff. Anyway, this
here is indeed their version of Unplugged,
recorded over two nights in April 2013 at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville and
released as their first and, so far, only official live album.
Band Of Horses are not the best band in the
world, and you are not going to be subjected to any big surprises. The songs,
handpicked in a more or less representative manner off each of the band's four
albums, are stripped down, but not significantly changed otherwise — you get to
hear them in a more «intimate» presentation, with more emphasis on the vocals
and, sometimes, extra piano parts that take the place of orchestral and other
overdubs, but mood-wise, everything stays the same. No reinventions, fresh
interludes, jamming, no in-between-song banter even, which may be a plus in the
context of an actual show, but a minus in the context of a live record.
An even harsher minus is that quite a few of
these songs worked well only because
they were lushly arranged in the first place. Infinite Arms, the band's best album, is only represented by two
songs, and the monumental orchestral grandeur of ʽFactoryʼ, especially its
coda, is hopelessly lost in transition to the live acoustic environment — the
«compensating» piano just does not cut it. It sounds like a pleasant demo
version. If you cut away grandeur without replacing it with some well
thought-out subtlety, what's to like? Bare bones are bare bones, and should be
left for undertakers and grave robbers.
One good thing I am ready to admit here is that
the vocals are beyond reproach: solo parts and harmonies all sound
exceptionally nice, and the material seems very well rehearsed. It is a pleasant
listen all right. But even the song selection is generally questionable (most
likely, they were picking the songs that seemed like the obvious candidates for
transfer to acoustic), so that I could not recommend the album even in the
status of a decent, representative intro to the band's catalog — on the
contrary, only some very serious fans of Ben Bridwell will find sufficient reason
to own it. Not to mention that, if you really want yourself some of that
heart-on-a-sleeve bearded-guy acoustic Americana, there's always The Avett
Bros., and frankly, in this kind of setting I could easily lose track of the
difference between the two. Thumbs down.
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