We've seen Phil Lesh a lot, you know. And we'd seen and greatly admired his son, Grahame, for a while. Sometimes show biz offspring can be a little painful, but sometimes they can excel and threaten to eclipse the old man/woman. I can't imagine anyone eclipsing Phil, but Grahame has shown himself to be a true talent on his own, and a dedicated working musician, which counts a lot in my book.
His latest band is Midnight North, with the excellent Elliott Peck joining him on guitar and vocals. Geez, he should stick with Elliott, who's quite a talent. As a young band they don't go on many world tours, but they finally came this way and we were psyched to go see them in Somerville on a Monday night, September 18.
With the demise of Johnny D's, it seems a lot of music clubs have sprung up around Cambridge-Somerville, and Thunder Road is one of the newer ones. We'd been tempted to go there a few times but this was our first. After a quick nap for me and Sarah after work, we met Dave in Davis at Redbones for dinner, and then drove the 1.3 miles down Somerville Ave to the Northern edge of Union Square. Grahame was outside pressing the flesh but we stopped for a toke (totally legal) before we went in, and missed our chance to ask him the tough questions. And when we got inside the place was empty!
Well, not empty-empty (there were bartenders), but at the height of the evening there were maybe a few dozen people there at most, which means we had plenty of room to spread out. There were a couple of Deadicated people there, but mostly it was locals looking for a good rocking Monday show. And I think they got their wish with this band. We grabbed stools right off the dance floor, but we were up and dancing after a few numbers, as was most of the crowd. These guys are good.
Grahame and Elliott were accompanied by keyboardist Alex Jordan, bassist Connor O'Sullivan, and a drummer. Lesh has written some great songs for the band, and Peck has written some even better ones. Jordan is not only a great keyboardist, but is an excellent country-rock backup singer, and they were in the groove all night.
They played a bunch of songs from their new record (Under the Lights), opening with Roamin' and following that up with The Highway Song. Lesh was very good on lead guitar and soon had the sparse (but enthusiastic) crowd whooping and hollering. I think most of the people there were delighted to see such excellent performances on what they thought was a lazy night in a back corner of Somerville. And Peck was supreme, perhaps most impactful when she backed up Lesh with that little bit of twang and lots of feeling that a good country rock song can hold.
Then they said they were going to do a Levon Helm song, and started into the blues beat that I instantly recognized as one of my favorites ever, When I Go Away. Larry Campbell wrote it and Levon recorded it (on a Grammy-winning record), and Midnight North killed it. The vocal arrangements they featured all night were challenging, and pulled off excellently, and they sure had this song down.
They broke into Tennessee Jed after a few originals and that got the crowd dancing faster than a whistle on an evening train. If you watch their videos on YouTube, Midnight North kill a number of CSN songs, and they soon lit into Long Time Gone (David Crosby) like they wrote it. This had some jaws on the floor, it was so good. They mixed in a number of other originals, like Peck's great Greene County. But then they got the crowd back on the floor for good with Viola Lee Blues and later Mr. Charlie, sung by Peck with a great growl.
For a closer they did the whole Suite: Judy Blue Eyes by Steven Stills, perfectly. This was great stuff and though they were sticking pretty closely to the way CSN had done it, jeez, how could you argue with that? They finished the song and then kind of trickled off stage. They left all of us in a pool of sweat on the dance floor and we didn't know whether to shit or wind our watches. But then we realized they were done, and we recovered.
They half-heartedly manned the merch table at the back of the room ... there wasn't really a crowd there to besiege them. But the three of us got our stuff together and then migrated back there and had a nice talk with Elliott and Alex. I told Elliott about just missing Larry and Teresa do When I Go Away with Phil & Friends at the Cap and she was nice enough to sympathize. They were anxious that we'd come back the next time they were in town, and we were anxious that they'd come back to town!
Got out of there and wove through the faster- and faster-changing Kendall Square area over the Longfellow Bridge to drop Dave off at Charles, then got on the road back home. Not in bed too late, though it was well past our normal bedtime for a Monday. But this was really worth it, we saw a great young band in a great new venue without any crowds or hassle, and this was fun all over.
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