As The Felice Brothers geared up for their own performance, the capacity crowd shuffled and half-stepped around the small venue for a better view of the main attraction. One of the most remarkable things about this cockamamie quintet is their ability to control the tempo of the show, harmonizing on slow soulful ballads like Oxycontin, then shifting gears and turning the room into a full-on hootenanny as on Frankie’s Gun. Similarly, lyrical content boasts diversity and depth, hearkening upon gothic American folk figures as on Ruby Mae or churning on about the timeless relationship between hard drink and heartbreak on Whiskey in my Whiskey.
On an eerie rendition of Helen Fry, the unflinching Christmas* set the mood with a brooding, hypnotic bass loop as guitarist Ian Felice, writhed and twisted along an ambling blues scale. It’s on songs like this where the organ work of James Felice (accordion/keys) really comes alive, transforming the venue into a sort of cathedral, or a better yet, a “Midnight Church” as one of the brothers would coin it during the show-stealing double encore.
Drummer Simone Felice doubled as lead singer throughout the greater part of the show, providing the band with a powerful foundation from front to back. Dropping his drum sticks during the encore and taking center stage on The Devil is Real he truly showed his front-man affinities, his hands trembling as he bellowed out the lyrics with conviction.
One of the highlights of the night, Glory Glory is a traditional gospel number repurposed for a blasphemously secular scene. No doubt, these boys play the ‘devil’s music’, but the band has an inspirational presence, and the song stirred even the most reckless outlaws and wretched sinners in the audience as the evening drew near to a close.
* – Christmas, the bassist, like fiddle/washboard specialist “Farley”, is not an actual sibling of the Felices, though he does have the unique honor of being adopted into the family as an official “blood-brother”, in the Huck Finn/Tom Sawyer sense of the phrase.
5 Responses
Terrific review of a terrific show. The Brothers owned the room that night. I could hardly move but it was worth it.
It was a fantastic night of music. It was my 4th time seeing The Felice Brothers this year and they’ve gotten better every time. Loved some of the new material too.
Can’t wait to see them again in about a month at the Speigel Tent.
Nice work Dan!
Great review, saw them at the Church in Phila last week and had a blast.