and you really can’t describe what you’ve seen for perhaps a week or two. Yeah, that happened to me. Honestly. I just thought I was going to see Billy Bragg. You pretty much know what you’re gonna get at a Billy Bragg concert: good tunes, tunes you’ve heard for years, some new stuff off his latest album, (which I quite like, by the way), some political rants, (which I also quite like, by the way), a lot of warm fuzzies, a roomful of middle aged to aging middle class folks like me. What can I really tell you? Billy Bragg always does it for me.
But, WHAM, right before his set this crazy looking guy waltzes out on stage with giant geek-glasses, goofy wrinkled geek-buttoned down shirt, baggy but not too baggy geek-nondescript pants and shoes, but wearing a red keytar. He whips out a harmonica and starts making these odd hip-hop beat noises with his mouth into the microphone and this middle-aged white woman stifles a laugh, claps her hand over her mouth for the next 40 minutes and is amazed at what comes out of this, er, spectacle on stage.
photo by iwona kellieHere, I give you a taste of C. R. Avery folks. He’s part performance artist, part one-man band, part genius and part slam poet. I think he’s brilliant and he needs you.
Like right now.
Hell Of A Hotel Of Harm mp3 C.R. Avery Magic Hour Sailor Songs
The Ballad of Charlie Parker and Patsy Cline mp3 C.R. Avery Magic Hour Sailor Songs
The Boxer Who Just Returned From London mp3 C.R. Avery Magic Hour Sailor Songs
go to his MySpace site to buy it!
Ah yes, I saw CR Avery open for Billy Bragg here in Vancouver. Most impressive. The setting, a big f-off church, suited him very well. At one point he was accompanied by The Soujourners, three silver-voiced soul men, and the combo was magic.
Wow! I’d have loved to see him with such a chorus, I know their music a bit too, silver-voiced indeedy. I just wasn’t prepared at all for what happened that night, and was so very pleasantly gobsmacked by it all. Glad you agree and nice to see you over here! xoxoxo