I heard a great musical act last Tuesday at one of my favorite NYC venues, the Living Room**. That night I discovered singer and songwriter Marc Berger who’s assembled a tight acoustic band to create a roots-rich concept album called “Ride,” which takes its inspiration from the American West. As Berger writes on his website, “Clouds that forever stampede the endless sky, shadows gliding over canyon walls–the West is a vast expanse of magic and mystery. American artists from John Ford to Frederick Remington to A.B. Guthrie have used film, canvas and the printed page to convey the essence of its unique landscape and mythology.” To those associations, I would add the 1962 Kirk Douglas film, “Lonely Are the Brave,” where he plays a latter day cowboy unable to conform to modern society. The movie was based on Brave Cowboy, a novel by legendary iconoclast of the American West, Edward Abbey. Relatedly, Kirk Douglas also played the lead role in the 1952 adaptation of Guthrie’s novel, The Big Sky. Adding to the association with the movies is journalist Glenn Frankel’s new book, The Searchers: The Making of an American Legend, on John Ford’s 1956 film with John Wayne. Now, Berger has written songs and created a sound that reflects the West of yore, and the West of today, exemplified by the lyrics of the title song, “Ride:
Used to be silent/Used to be open/Used to be romance in a life on the plains/Now it’s Exxons and K-Marts/Best Westerns, McDonald’s/And my cattle graze on the big missile range
Ride, ride/Get along little doggies/Ride, ride/So gold in the sun/Yippy-aye boys/Here the dinner bell ringin’/Get along little doggies/For day’s about done
Though I had never heard these songs, I instantly liked them, and the way Berger and his band presented them. The musicians on stage with Berger were his co-creator, Mike Ricciardi (a steady presence on drums, especially with the soft brushes; he also took landscape photos in Momument Valley for the handsome CD package, graphics that are viewable here); Deni Bonet (on violin and accordion, continually interjecting tasty textures); Rich DePaolo (playing lead guitar on a plugged in acoustic, as rich a contributor as any Stratocaster axe-wielder); Rob Meador (on mandolin); and Jeff Eyrich (upright bass). Berger’s deep voice brings an appropriately weathered sound to his songs, sometimes talking the lyrics, other times belting them out, often in the same song. His harmonica and guitar added another layer to the rich mix. They performed with great energy and care for the material. I was really impressed and look forward to hearing these songs many times over the weeks and months to come. Below are pictures I took of their performance and two videos from Berger’s excellent website, which has many resources devoted to the project. Please click here to see all photos.
** The Living Room is unfortunately facing the loss of its longtime comfortable home at 154 Ludlow Street sometime this summer. Its management is in search of a new venue, and conducting a fundraising drive to help finance the move. I urge you to consider supporting them with a contribution at any level. To do so, please visit their website.
If you enjoy acoustic and roots music drenched in the American West you ought to listen to Marc Berger’s recent album “Ride,” most of the songs from which he and his tight band played at the Living Room last night. I had happened on them by accident when they played the same venue in April, missing the start of their set, so this time I went to hear them deliberately.