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A country/western three-piece plays Christmas music with a drum machine. It's almost as if someone had planned a show that I wouldn't want to go see. Yet here I am. First of all, Rich Gilbert is one of the three members, and he is a god who walks this earth in human form. Plus, Tanya Donelly is going to be singing on a couple of songs, and I'd pretty much show up to hear her sing the phone book. (She'd do it really well, with loose, creative, wonderful phrasing, and in that rich, beautiful voice.) And I have some chocolate for her.
It starts up pretty scary. It is country/western music, all kinda twangy and campy, and the drum machine is really hard to take. But after a couple of songs, they play a faster one, and Rich takes a guitar solo that reminds me that he is, in fact, a god who walks this earth in human form. Even in a context like this, he just can't not rock. And Slim, the front man, is funny and outrageous. When Tanya joins them, she sounds amazing: rich and brassy, with more than a hint of Ms. Parton about it. (When in Nashville, do as Dollywould.) The first one she sings is something like "To Heck With Ole Santa Claus," and is clever and funny, and then she sticks around for "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree," on which Rich has another smokin' solo. Those two songs were plenty to venture out for. After this she leaves the stage, and we get "Jingle Bell Rock," which I have always loathed in every context, and then a very pious (mock-pious? One can only hope.) one in the "C is for the Christ child..." vein, and I flee.
