Acoustic Alliance FemEdition, Sunday, January 23, 2011 at The Brick by Brick
Listen Local San Diego sponsors free music shows around town every week at venues like Winston's in Ocean Beach, The Stage Bar & Grill and House of Blues downtown. If you are singer/songwriter living in San Diego, it's likely you’ve played at least one Listen Local show and perhaps scored a spot at the coveted "Acoustic Alliance" showcase - an event that takes place every three months or so. Hosted by Cathryn Beeks, the "Acoustic Alliance" is an early Sunday evening show at Brick By Brick and typically features twelve singer/songwriters showcasing their best songs "in the round." Each artist selected for the show has the opportunity to play three songs in an environment geared towards people who simply enjoy good music. When the Listen Local announcement went out about this special Acoustic Alliance "FemEdition" show I’m sure many of us were blown away by the guest list. There is no doubt that Cathryn books the best talent in town and there was no way I was missing this show so I immediately marked my calendars and enthusiastically emailed all my friends imploring them to come along.
This particular Sunday was the perfect San Diego day. Beach, sun, workout and Live Music – doesn’t get any better than that! My friend B picked me up and we made it just in time to catch the last half of the warm up band. This wasn’t your typical opener, playing on the back stage was San Diego's new Supergroup, The Groove Kitties. Check out this lineup: Garrison Bailey (drums), Nancy Bee (guitar), Cathryn Beeks-Edwards (guitar), Marcia Claire (bass) and Becky Fleming (sax). All multi-instrumentalists this new cool band took turns on vocals rocking original tunes and fun covers setting the mood for a great evening. All too soon, it was time to start the main show. (Note to self: find out where the Groove Kitties are playing next.)
Brick by Brick has changed over the years and thanks to soundman extraordinaire Jon Edwards, this venue rocks now. Cathryn sets a nice vibe for the evening with reserved seating up front, soft lighting and candlelit tables. She also strongly encourages the crowd to pay attention and take conversations to the back of the room. As an audience member, I so appreciate that respect as nothing annoys me more than chatty Cathy’s trying to talk over the performers.
The format for the Acoustic Alliance is divided up in three sets featuring four performers each who alternate playing songs. First up tonight we had Katie and Ashley Reynolds of Katie Leigh and the Infantry, Stella Donna, Thea Tochihara and Michele Shipp.
Sisters Katie and Ashley Reynolds hale from Oklahoma where they grew up in a musical family and eventually brought their brand of country/folk/americana music to San Diego. Opening with "Broken Glass" the audience is treated to those beautifully matched harmonies that can only come from sharing DNA. Katie and Ashley have a great rapport with each other and humor that puts the crowd at ease and makes you smile. For the second round, they dug into their country roots and pulled out, "Moving On" and ended the third round with one of my favorite songs of the night, "Drunk in Georgia.” Stella Donna played in the second slot and is the only performer of the first four that I had seen before. You gotta admire an artist who takes her stage name from her guitar. Stella launched her set with a blues number called "Time" about "feeling old at 19," she is 22 now. She played "Simple Things" for her mom who was in the audience and introduced her last song as the first one she learned to play "as a brooding teenager" - a great version of PJ Harvey's "Rid of Me." Nice choice.
The next artist, Thea Tochihara, confessed to being new to music and started off with "Paper Things" followed by the looking-for-love, bluesy, "Pull You In." Drafting the Reynolds sisters to help out with, "Empty Bottles" Thea remarked about all the people yapping in the back who were instantly drowned out as soon as the three started singing. Beautiful. Rounding out the first set of four was, Michele Shipp, who playfully compared music in-the-round to speed dating. All three songs were from her new CD, Beyond These Walls. She played the upbeat “Shakin’ the Shaman” as well as the title track, yet it was the sexy, soulful “Revealed” that really stood out. All four acts offered a nice collection of songs and I plan to look up their websites and hopefully try to catch them at another show soon.
During the intermission, we hustled to the back stage to catch a short intermission set by the "house" band. On tonight's bill was the fabulous duo of Lindsay White and Veronica May - also known as the Lovebirds - who took turns singing and playing guitar and other various instruments. They sounded great and even played a song of Cathryn’s.
As we prepped for set two of the evening our hostess Cathryn reminded everyone to keep it down or she would have to shush us. No one wanted to be called out so we gladly obliged. The reserved seating quickly filled up and introductions commenced. Set two was ready to go with Lisa Sanders and Karen Hayes, Astra Kelly, Marie Haddad and Tori Roze.
Lisa Sanders played the inaugural Acoustic Alliance show in 2004 and just two night ago, opened up for Bonnie Raitt at Pala Casino. Taking the stage with "Brown Sugah" Karen Hayes they started things off with a song called "Coffee Shop" reminding the audience how lucky we are to have such immense talent in our city. To showcase their beautiful voices, Lisa and Karen took a request for "Butterflies" and saved the best for last delivering a perfect version of “Angels." What an incredible way to start off the set! It was fun to see Astra Kelly perform again too and she treated us to some new songs, "Fire Of Ages" and "Like Never Before." With her voice sounding stronger than ever, Astra left us with an optimistic rocker, "Alright," from her last EP Battling The Sun. Before passing the torch to Cathryn, Astra was the long time host of the Homegrown Music Hour radio show on KPRI and has been a long-time champion in promoting local music.
Accompanying herself on Korg, Marie Haddad played "Beautiful Road" to start off her three-song selection. Marie is an accomplished pianist and showed off some of her chops with "Boxing" followed by the gorgeous "Wishing Well" a song I was really taken with. The last performer in this set was Tori Roze who fronts a 6-piece group called The Hot Mess. I've seen this band play in many different configurations but tonight it was just Tori and her mom, flutist Lee “Mama Roze” Clark. This ended up being one of the most diverse three songs of the night starting with the rockin' tune "Secret" which sounded really good stripped down. Grabbing the guitar, Tori played a pre-Hot Mess song that I’ve never heard before with Lee’s flute accompaniment adding some late-60s flavor. In December Tori and her band released their debut CD, From The Hip, and although she calls herself a true "soul singer" she can deliver torch like nobody's business and did just that ending the set with her ballad "I Try" bringing everyone up to their feet.
Intermission time and The Lovebirds are back getting the crowd geared up for the last set of the evening. I really need to go see these two play again sometime soon. Tonight San Diego was gifted with a special appearance by The Troubadours of Devine Bliss who timed their pass through town just perfectly. It has been said that the Troubadours, Aim Me and Renee, met Cathryn Beeks many moons ago somewhere in the Midwest and inspired her to chase her musical dreams. Who knows, if not for that chance meeting would Cathryn Beeks have ever made her way to San Diego? What would the music scene be like around here without our beloved Cathryn? Where would we have been on this amazing Sunday evening? At home watching a re-run of Desperate Housewives? Thankfully not! Set three kicked off with the aforementioned Troubadours of Devine Bliss followed by Barbara Nesbitt, Jenn Grinels and Steph Johnson.
Guitarist Aim Me Smiley and accordion player Renee Ananda are truly Troubadours of Devine Bliss. The Kentucky duo are currently touring the west coast with their long-time fiddle player, Steph Dlugon, spreading the love through the sweetness of song. They opened set three with an unbelievable cover of Maria McKee’s “Life Is Sweet” yet it was the amazingly beautiful "Awaken Us To Love" that just slayed me. That was the first song I looked up online after the show and I highly recommend everyone do so. Of course they had to perform “I Walk By Your Side” which they introduced as the song Jon and Cathryn walked down the aisle to. What a great wedding song. Having fun with the setup, Barbara Nesbitt followed and prefaced her next song as a “story about when that all turns to s***!" bringing the best laughter of the night. She quickly exclaimed her love for Jonny and Cathryn and then dedicated the heart-breaking, "Give In" to her dear friend, Marcia Claire. All kidding aside, it was so great to see Barbara again. She moved to Austin last year and was back in town promoting her new CD, The Bees. Barbara did sing the title track and later stunned the crowd with her last tune, "Like A Girl Should." I could really sense not only the camaraderie in the room but the true respect and friendship between the artists.
Jenn Grinels was the third performer for set three and she commanded attention opening with the fast-paced, Ani DiFranco inspired "No Better.” Jenn was hilarious introducing her second number. She was asked to write a song for a friend's wedding and was just not feeling like a love song until she realized if she didn’t write one she would have to buy them a gift. She came up with "Right From The Start" and Steph Dlugon lended her fiddle to the cause. I had forgotten how funny Jenn is onstage but not how wonderful her voice is as she ended her set with a fantastic version of Aretha Franklin’s "I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Love You).” Steph Johnson made an interesting choice opening with "Twisted," a campy song that Joni Mitchell made famous. Steph seemed right at home in this environment, complimenting the other artists and telling stories – she seemed to really revel in the moment. Playing her beautiful red Gibson, Steph showed off her trademark jazz/funk chops with "Thank You" from her award-winning album, Mysterious Feminine engaging the "room full of singers" to join in during the chorus. They really did sound good – this was not a bunch of drunken amateurs who thought they could carry a tune. In closing out the show, Steph kicked the hootenanny up a notch and lead a funky singalong to "We Are Family” along with the customary encore. It was the perfect ending to a “blissful” night. As the crowd milled around, chatting with the artists the Tori Rog Band played a short set on the back stage to wind things down.
The talent gathered in this club on this night is infinitely better than anything you’ll see on some television talent show (you know what i'm talking about). The best way to keep opportunities open for people who love a good song and performance is to just go out to local shows, buy a CD for yourself and maybe some friends. The gift of music is always appropriate! Independent artists need our support and it’s always great to discover new music to fall in love with. Sometimes you have to seek it out. I am going to look up every performer that played this gig, get on their mailing list and try to get out more often and support live shows.
The Acoustic Alliance showcases have been running since 2004. The first FemEdition was a huge hit and a Big Thank You goes out to Cathryn, Jon, all the musicians and everyone who helped make this happen. I hope Listen Local does this once a year. Visit the http://listenlocalsd.com website, join the mailing list and Cathryn will send you a schedule each week of bands you should go see.
by LL (harley) Richards
