Daniel Donato’s Cosmic Country mothership docked at Portland, Oregon’s Wonder Ballroom on Friday, February 7th for just the second date on their extensive 2025 winter tour.
There was a palpable excitement in the air in anticipation of seeing and hearing the young guitar slinger and his able band (Nathan Aronowitz on keyboards, Will McGee on bass, Will Clark on drums), and Donato wasted no time in sating the packed house, coming out at exactly the 8:00 start time and getting down to business with a cover of Bob Dylan’s “Country Pie.”
Over the course of two long sets, Donato and company lived up to the hype and proved why they are a group quickly on the rise. Working their way through a variety of cover songs and original compositions, the band was tight and seemed as excited as the audience to see where their improvisational muse might take them. The jam at the end of “Gotta Get Southbound” was expansive, psychedelic, and could have gone anywhere. The build-up and tension led to a cathartic release of laughter and dancing when the band finally dropped into the Jerry Reid/Deena Kay Rose song “East Bound and Down” of Smokey And The Bandit fame to end the first set.
The second set, which alone clocked in at around 90 minutes, got an extra boost when the band invited Portland’s own hometown saxophone hero Sean McLean (World’s Finest, Sean McLean & The Vibetenders) to sit in for several songs, including a much talked-about “Tangled Up In Blue,” and also the “Workin’ Man Blues” encore. In a show full of highlights, the second set-closing Waymore’s Blues > Mystery Train was another standout.
With their Portland show, Daniel Donato’s Cosmic Country offered up a take-no-prisoners party based on rock-solid musicianship and joyful improvisation.
Daniel Donato’s Cosmic Country, Wonder Ballroom, Portland, Oregon, 2024-2-7
Set I
Country Pie > Boogie Man, Hi-Country, Free Wheelin’, Everybody’s Talkin’ > Weathervane, Gotta Get Southbound, East Bound and Down
Set II
Honky Tonk Night Time Man, Running Gun, Blame The Train, Fox On The Run > Arkansas Traveler, See Through, Tangled Up In Blue, Tell Me I’m A Lover, Lose Your Mind > Waymore’s Blues > Mystery Train
Encore
Workin’ Man Blues
