A Shirt on Sunday: Howe Gelb – 07/03/2014 – Islington Assembly Hall

March 2014 was a busy month for concerts. Fourteen acts over eleven nights and only the one t-shirt.

Howe Gelb hails from Tuscon Arizona and is better known as the nucleus of Giant Sand aka Giant Giant Sand aka Giant3 Sand depending on how many people are on stage. But that’s another t-shirt.

I’d seen Gelb do a solo show in New York – one man and a guitar and a piano in ‘Joe’s Pub’ – a night club somewhere in the lower grid. That was a weird evening of mumbled piano playing that was enjoyable whilst being incomprehensible.

In 2014 Gelb had a new solo album out – The ‘Coincidentalist’ – that was a rather lovely acoustic album that I played a lot when I got it.

This gig was a trio affair, with the bassist doubling as the support. Never a good look, but I vaguely recall him being okay.

The crowd is small but dedicated. There’s an aura of plaid shirts, corduroy trousers and truckers’ caps, even if that’s not the prevailing fashion on a work night.

Gelb’s concert is another weird mix of tracks from the new album, Giant Sand numbers and other weird stuff. In amongst the weird stuff, the trio rock out more than I expected. It’s not quite rock ’n’ roll, but it’s as close as Gelb ever gets and veers on Neil Young territory without actually crossing state lines.

Gelb mumbles at the piano, talks obliquely to the audience and generally has a typically low-key time of it. I’d use the word gnomic, but he’s taller than that.

I think I enjoyed it, which is my standard reaction to one of his gigs, and the album is definitely one of my favourite bits of his work, and worth checking out.

Photos of the night (not mine)

Videos

Unforgivable

Same tour, different night

At The Paradiso, somewhere in Europe #

Same tour, different night

Triangulate

From the album The Coincidentalist