{"id":10153,"date":"2012-04-04T08:12:43","date_gmt":"2012-04-04T16:12:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thelefortreport.com\/blog\/?p=10153"},"modified":"2022-12-07T15:07:30","modified_gmt":"2022-12-07T23:07:30","slug":"kathleen-edwards-at-the-ventura-theater","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thelefortreport.com\/blog\/2012-04\/kathleen-edwards-at-the-ventura-theater\/","title":{"rendered":"Concert Review: Kathleen Edwards at the Ventura Theater"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Canadian singer-songwriter Kathleen Edwards<\/strong> walked onto the Ventura Theater<\/strong> stage last week, sized up the crowd and joked good-naturedly that “there are just as many of you out there as we have up here.”\u00a0 Sadly, this was only a slight exaggeration.\u00a0 We’d waited ten years to see the phenomenal Edwards<\/strong> so we weren’t about to miss it.\u00a0 Edwards<\/strong> has written some of the best alt-country\/indie songs of our time, and she and her talented band (Jim Bryson, Gord Tough, <\/strong>opener Hannah Georgas,\u00a0 John Dinsmore\u00a0<\/strong>and Lyle Molzan<\/strong>) deserved a much larger audience in Ventura.\u00a0 Note to booking agents:\u00a0 unless you rep heavy metal or lame rock-rap bands exclusively, skip the Ventura Theater offramp and motor on to Santa Barbara where there is a burgeoning indie and alt-country music scene supported by a savvy fan-base and several colleges<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

To their credit, Edwards<\/strong> and her virtuosic band nonetheless played this night as if the joint was packed full of VIPs.\u00a0 They played with spirited aplomb throughout, and Edwards’<\/strong> voice and perfect phrasing were impeccable (despite recent vocal problems and steroid prescriptions alluded to by Edwards<\/strong>).\u00a0 In sum, Edwards<\/strong> exceeded our high expectations and was more than worth the ten-year wait.\u00a0 We hope she doesn’t take as long to return to the Central Coast<\/p>\n

As seen above, she opened up the set as we would want:\u00a0 solo and strumming a vintage Gibson (capo-4) and singing her frustration-love song Sure As Shit<\/strong><\/em> (“And I cuss because I mean it; and for that, in my heart, I am hopeful; and these words that I chose, I was so careful.”).\u00a0 Only later would we learn that this was the first time she’s performed this song on this tour.\u00a0\u00a0 And despite the crowd-size and scatological surroundings, we sensed we were in for a special, intimate evening to spite the vacuous venue.<\/p>\n

Edwards<\/strong> then played several gems off of her splendid recent album, Voyageur, <\/strong>before dropping back to a popcorn-infused read of fan-favorite Asking For Flowers<\/strong><\/em>.\u00a0 In between songs, in the house-concert-esque ambiance, she answered audience questions about a guitar (a uniquely-painted, “found” Telecaster–shown below–that she demanded from her ex-husband), and told of a Dorito-loving “mouse” in the dressing room backstage.<\/p>\n

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Following Asking for Flowers<\/em><\/strong> Edwards broke out her violin (we had forgotten she played it so well) and played a sweet lead-in to the bass-buoyed Goodnight, California<\/strong><\/em> (titled appropriately enough, though a tad premature in the proceedings).\u00a0 Gord Tough<\/strong> took over mid-way through the song with his ever-tasteful, but incendiary guitar (at times taking a page or two out of the Neil Young guitar primer).\u00a0 Check out a different-night rendering of the song below the picture.\u00a0 So very good.<\/p>\n

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