Max García Conover and The Ghost of Paul Revere
Club Passim 4/5/15
Max García Conover and The Ghost of Paul Revere began their national tour of 55 shows in 45 days on Sunday night at Club Passim. They’re playing again in Boston on Saturday and you should go. (one of the dates with multiple shows: an afternoon show in Boston and a night time slot in New York.) I’ll admit, I’m biased: my family and I moved down here from Maine last summer, and both Max and the Ghosts are well-known in Portland.
Max García Conover has serious chops as a fingerpicking guitarist. He is clean and fast and, with an array of different tunings, creates layered, beautiful songs. He played a mix of new songs and selections from his 2014 release, ellery, the result of a wonderful collaboration with the Boston-based composer and stupidly-talented instrumentalist, Ben Cosgrove.
He started with an instrumental portion of “In City Light” from his first EP (2010) and then moved into “Eddie’s Wine” a brand new song.
“I have used all my goodbyes. / The forest shines at night / with high and hungry sounds. / You don’t have to stay forever, / but don’t go leaving me now,”
he sang. “My day job is playing instrumental music in fancy restaurants,” Max said while tuning. “Well,” he said, “that’s what I did today. And Easter is a day when people eat together…who don’t normally eat together.” The crowd laughed and I heard a woman say, “I like this guy.”
After playing the lovely, lilting instrumental song, “The Pulse Behind Her Knees,” Max came down on the floor to play two songs from ellery: “The Start of Fables” and “Say That You Know Me.” Both songs on the album are upbeat and driving and Max played with that a bit, starting “Fables” with fingerpicking instead of strumming and slowing “Say That You Know Me” down in the middle only to speed it up again.
Returning to the stage, Max introduced “Deer Bones,” a song about a formative experience years ago in his hometown. He was walking his of and came upon a full deer skeleton in the woods.
“Come indoors, come inside / I got hope in this kind of life /
Come indoors, come inside / deer bones below the pines /
So how to love, and how to use our time / And ties that bind.”
The ties that bind–it’s all there in this song, the ties of family, of place, of connection to ourselves and others. Max shared that he and his wife, Sophie Nelson, bought a motorhome last year and set out on a national tour. The motorhome started losing gears out west and finally broke down in New Mexico. “It turned out that everybody but us knew that would happen,” Max said. But he wrote a love song to the motorhome, and to that time on the road, and sang it:
“When we stopped asking everyone’s permission / We found out it wasn’t theirs to give.”
For his last two songs, Max added percussion, playing a suitcase drum. His wonderful song about the trans-Mongolia railroad had everybody leaning in.
“We were well in Russia once / We were getting on a train /
Heading west through the tall pines, hon / We were well and we’ll be well again.”
And then, “As Much a Rising Sun As a Setting One, Part 2” was a furious end to the set – alternating between intricate fingerpicking and driving strumming, with lyrics reminiscent of “Maggie’s Farm.”
The Ghost of Paul Revere took over and their three-part harmonies were immediately transfixing with the opening song “Ghostland.” I had wanted to see them for a while but their shows in Maine were always sold out. People had likened them to Trampled by Turtles, and it’s a fair comparison. Matt Young’s harmonica gives the Ghosts a distinctive, grittier sound than TBT or other roots acts like Spirit Family Reunion and The Lone Bellow.
Griffin Sherry (guitar) sings lead on most of their songs, and the first three (Ghostland, Mountain Song, and San Antone) showed off his ability as a singer to dig deep and belt it out. San Antone started almost ponderously, with Matt on mandolin. Griffin, Max Davis (banjo) and Sean McCarthy (bass) harmonized:
“I lost my heart in the heat of San Antone. / I found my love in the cold of the great white north.
I watched my lover roll me over like a river stone. /
You’ve got pain in your bones you know you’re not alone.”
The song then shifts to a stomping, driving rhythm that had folks at Passim hooked. I found myself thinking that this verse is a good representation of some of the lyric tendencies the band has: it’s catchy, and emphasizes the juxtaposition of seemingly opposite ideas (heat, cold; loss, gain). The long vowels in the lyrics let the harmonies really soar.
I was especially drawn to the song Funeral, written by Max Davis. It’s daaaaark.
“Mercy on the road. / As you swing from the gallows.
Blessed be that this thing that’s been haunting me / Is a love like a long and shiny barrel.”
The tempo of the song shifts two or three times from melancholy to frenzy and back again. Davis’s voice in the lead creates a different, less polished tone, which I liked a lot. Funeral made me think a lot about Dock Boggs, not because it sounds like one of his songs but because you can trace today’s Americana sound back to his morbid country blues pretty quickly. (Griel Marcus wrote an incredible book about The Basement Tapes, which arguably are the foundation for contemporary alt-country and Americana music; Dock Boggs is all over The Basement Tapes.)
After playing Andra, the Ghosts wrapped their set with “After Many Miles,” a song with just vocals, stomping, and clapping. So damn good. Griffin, Sean, and Max each took a turn on lead vocals and it was cool to hear their three very distinct voices separately and then blended together on the chorus.
“Oh, lover I’ll see you there / Waiting in the willows with your auburn hair
Oh, lover, I’ll see you there / After many miles.”
Sean said, “We got one more,” but the crowd murmured in disagreement so they said they’d do one more and then one more after that.
Griffin said, “This song is called This is the End,” and someone in the audience said, “Yes!” It was a fun way to end the set – a great singalong song that Max García Conover joined them on stage to sing.
“This ship is sinking past the whiskey. / Give me my last cigarette.
Tell my mother not to worry / Oh, my friends, this is the end, this is the end, this is the end.”
After big applause from the audience, Max Davis said, “Pretend we just left the stage.” Awesome. “Was that a forced encore?” Sean said. Perfect dry humor that made me feel like I was back in Maine. They ended with a cover of “Baba O’Riley,” which was a lot of so good–great harmonies and an intro on the banjo, instead of Pete Townsend’s hypnotic guitar.
The Ghosts did not disappoint and now I know why their shows sell out every time I’ve tried to see them in Portland. They play with heart and passion, and have also clearly worked incredibly hard to refine their sound together. Go see this tour–you’ll be happy.
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This show review was brought to you by guest writer Ken Templeton. Ken lives near Boston and likes live music.
Ken did such a fantastic job with the Sturgill Simpson show it was an absolutely pleasure to have him back to guest write on the blog. I hope he contributes more in the future as his reviews are incredibly pensive and really great!