Christopher Owens, former leader of the LA based indie band Girls, has become quieter and quieter on stage over the past three years, at T5 last year I don't think he said anything at all, so when he made a statement at the start of the encore of his swift, sleek and very good set at Le Poisson Rouge Wednesday night, it might be worth listening: " We have only performed two shows together, this is nerve wracking and we are still getting used to each other" Owens offered in way of thanks.
The concert went on sale Saturday afternoon and was, from a man who can sell out T5, needless to add an instantaneous sell out. Two gigs on the West Coast, one gig in New York City, then off to Europe, Owens was presented his first solo album Lysandra, with Girls now in the rearview mirror and while I have no idea why he didn't present it as Girls, it sure sounds like Girls, far be it for me to complain when the compact and delightful 35 minute run through suggest these two year old songs soon to be released, are among his best ever.
Gone is the skirt we are so used to seeing Chris in, gone is French kissing his bassist, this night Owens performed a perfect modulation of late 1960s, early 1970s influenced singer-songwriter influenced folk-rock with a backbone of high intensity arrangements. There wasn't a dud in the bunch. There wasn't a headscratcher, these intense and beautiful songs, telling the story of a love gone wrong during Girls first tour, fit like a glove, flowed with a beautiful, rolling beauty. The songs were all clear lines of poetry
With his shoulder length hair and pale beauty, Owens is never a commanding figure, tall and lanky he is ethereal, like he is clinging to life by a thread and a pizza, but the craziness of the first two Girls album has changed into a studious, more careful sound. And I prefer it.
The actual album will be released January 15th, and based upon this outing, it should kill among the constituents. The title track is as sweet as molasses and the instrumental "Rivera Rock" almost a Bossa Nova, but this is not so far from the Girls blueprint. The first two songs, "Here We Go" and maybe the best song of the night "New York City" both take place here. The song suite moves from nyc to San Fran to Europe, Owens tour has moved from San Fran to nyc to Europe, so it as if he is returning to the place where the love affair occurred to transform his life into his art in person.
The band themselves, including two back up singers and flautist Vince Meghrouni.who all but steals the show, are as compact and smart as the songs demand, it is like a strict discipline with only the very end allowed to cut loose a little. Amd the songs, all in the same key, and all long enough to be considered songs but short enough to seem to segue into one long composion, are almost like movements, replete with repeating musical themes. Some of the lyrics are so singalongy they are practically nursery rhymes, the title track is just a gloriously innocent piece of writing.
Owens is one of the more eccentric characters in rock and roll, the son of a "Children Of God" disciple who escaped the cult to find himself a bizarre, eccentric, drug addicted weirdo, writing some of the best songs around. And even so, these songs are pretty amazing, the consistency of the material was very fine and the control of the situation a thing of beauty.
The encore connected Owens right back to the roots of the album. Singer-songwriters nursing a broken heart. Cat Stevens "Wild World" is fine with a beautiful flute adding even more feeling. But the Donovan track "Lalena" was never that good a song and "The Boxer"? Why? There are many better songs on Bridge Over Troubled, and by covering the Everly Brothers "Let It Be Me" Owens proves how aware he is of it (S&G covered the Dona and Phil on their album). The problem with all these songs is not that they're bad songs but that they are overplayed. We've heard that a million times. The last song of the encore was the best song of the encore and of course we've all heard "Don't Think Twice, It's Alright" a billion times as well, but Owens gets deep into the lyric, it seems to sum up everything in a moment.
Done and done in under an hour, but it didn't need any more. It was a lovely, perfects set that needed nothing else. The last time I saw Owens was halfway thru the neverending Girls tour last year, at that cavernous hellhole T5, and I thought he was OK, but distant, maybe arrogant. Indifferent, maybe. But this was a remarkable set for the deeply felt sharing of love and pain, happiness and sorrow at the heart of his concerns.
Grade: A