Langhorne Slim, Ferraby Lionheart, The Smart Brothers @ Casbah, 5.13.08

I haven't been shy in declaring my fondness of Langhorne Slim & The War Eagles. I love the self-titled album, and the EP from before that, and I really love the band's energy and charisma onstage that guarantees a great performance every time. But there's something more, and I suspect there's something to be said for "discovering" a band organically and for yourself. It's one thing if someone tells you about a band or you read about them somewhere, but if you just happen upon them, or they're opening for someone else on a tour, other than the implicit endorsement by the headliner, it's a feeling of connectedness to a band as they come up. I'm that way with Rocky Votolato (with whom they toured) and I'm sure there are a couple others, but off hand, I can't think of anyone else. With that, I was stoked they were finally on their own headlining tour and were coming back to San Diego.

I can't seem to find time to do everything I want to do, so I debated skipping the openers and getting to the Casbah late, but I seem to keep missing the Smart Brothers so I decided to take my laptop with me; if I was bored, I could just fire it up and get some writing done in the Atari Lounge.

Let's just say I'm glad I left it in the car. The Smart Brothers sing old-timey music with multi-instrumentation and three part harmonies. They're a throwback for sure, and in between songs, it is evident that they're hams and live for playing to a crowd.







I was afraid, after having seeing Ferraby Lionheart before, that his being sandwiched between The Smart Brothers and Slim that the show might lose some momentum, but he had a full backing band and he has a beautiful voice- whether rocking out with the band or playing a quiet song on the piano- that held my attention. Unfortunately, the best songs for me were the quiet ones but he had to fight the rowdy bar at the crowd. I would've liked to tell the few at the bar to stfu, but he tolerated and just played on, rising above the noise.





Langhorne Slim closed out the night, and living up to all expectations, killed it. They played some of my favorites, some all out rockers, and some with just Slim and his guitar, and it was nice to hear them close with "Diamonds and Gold".







After the show I didn't intend to hang around, but Paul, the bassist and I played a couple games of pool and caught up. He "found out" I'm a blogger, though I've told him that everytime I've talked to him, and I think it freaked him out a bit, but I don't know what he was worried about because his band always kicks ass. I was really, really glad to not have had plans on Wednesday night, because not only did I need a break, but honestly, few bands could've followed up the excitement that lingered after having seen Langhorne Slim once again.