Lisa Marie and Silvertone Steve showed up at the Village Trestle in Goffstown, New Hampshire last night, and the bluesy duo kicked as on many oldies and American roots classic. They are cool, and any blues fan should dig this act.
The pair opened up with the “Driving Song” and it was cool how Silvertone got a good chord thing going on, and with his melody also being bright, clear, and sharp. Lisa Marie, as anyone familiar with her knows, can really belt, even over the round, wide sound of a large acoustic guitar chord progression, and she did plenty of that last night.
The pair would occasionally go into a rendering of “Happy Trails” as The Village Trestle was celebrating the Kentucky Derby by letting its patrons participate in a hobby horse roll the dice competition. Lovely ladies with lovely hats rode their horses hard, all in the name of fun, of course. Lisa Marie later said the Village Trestle is a club that does fun things that no other club offers, and she would be right, or at least find many others who would agree with that statement.
Lisa Marie and Silvertone Steve sang really nice harmony together on The Everly Brothers’ timeless classic “Bye By Love.” And when Lisa Marie let loose her greasy rasp, the tune really picked up the gravitas of the decades it’s been around. That could also be the secret of Lisa Marie’s success: her ability to infuse a song with the oomph it was written to have and to reflect the special meaning the song has accumulated over the decades. It is all in how she finesses the vocal melody, each song getting the treatment it needs to come alive an affect the listener with its unique power.
Silvertone Steve is a good acoustic slide player, and that was something he returned to throughout the evening. The Allman Brothers’ classic “Can’t You See” received the Lisa Marie gutsy vocal treatment, lots of oomph, and that’s important when your guitar accompaniment is putting out a full sound, which was impressive for just one guy with an acoustic.
Lisa Marie’s set lists are usually chockfull of classic stuff that you don’t usually get to hear from other blues outfits. She went into Waylon Jenning’s “Tonight The Bottle Let Me Down” and “Handful Of Gimme” by Fred Neil and each tune was vividly rendered by Lisa Marie’s classy delivery. This blues lady is like an encyclopedia of blues, country, and American roots music and going to her shows is like going to school. There’s got to be at least one person in attendance who is hearing something for the very first time or at least hear for the first time in quite a while.
Later in the set, Lisa Marie belted The Monkee’s late 1960s hit “Steppin’ Stone,” greasing the rails with her sliding rasp here, bringing out the song’s cool backbone while Silvertone Steve’s acoustic got cranking, becoming the locomotive of the song. He also hit the notes and chords just right in Robert Johnson’s pioneering tune “Love In Vain,” making his slide punchy as well as greasy.
Village Trestle owner Steve Pascucci came up to play harmonica for a few tunes, and that added an extra layer of sweet, bluesy melody to the mix. Sweet shuffle became the new order of the evening at that point and “Together We Stand(Divided We Fall) by David Houston was carried off well by the trio. The Bob Dylan classic “Don’t Think Twice It’s All Right” moved along at a jaunty pace with Lisa Marie greasing the wheels with her easy going vocal approach and Silvertone Steve’s empowered acoustic. The pair really knew how to spin Dylan’s twisty rhythms on their axis.
Buddy Holly’s 1950s’s classic “Peggy Sue” found Silvetone Steve nailing the oldies melody while Lisa Marie added a touch of low end in her vocal take. Silvertone Steve strummed the hell out of “Peggy Sue,” filling the room with its familiar chord progression.
Speaking of oldies, the pair also tackled Frankie Ford’s “Sea Cruise,” getting such a rhythm going you might not have missed the saxophone and drumming of the original recording, heard on the American Graffiti soundtrack. Silvertone Steve’s fiery notes showed what a good player can do with an acoustic, making it do what an electric does, making high notes sing. I swear, that guy can make you feel like his guitar is singing to you.
Lisa Marie sang “Everybody Is Talking At Me” by Harry Nilsson from the film “Midnight Cowboy.” Her ability to pull the emotion out of the song intact, Lisa Marie can make you feel what you felt when you first heard this song.
Lisa Marie picked up a funky hand percussion thing that she rubbed the right way, quickly and slowly, to make the rhythm for “Jambalaya,” which made space for Silvertone Steve to play a lively slide guitar melody over it.
If you haven’t seen Lisa Marie with her backing band All Shook Up or in her duo thing with Silvertone Steve, then either you don’t get out much or you don’t follow bluesy roots music. Whichever club you’re in, you’re sure to hear something you like and you’re sure to have fun listening. So, come out and hear her do her thing.