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Ancient Harmony
Paleo Sun Cafe | Wilmington, NC | 03.22.02
Now, I will gladly admit that I’m an Ancient Harmony freak! I love their blend of southern rock and psychedelia. Out of Atlanta, Georgia, Ancient Harmony sounds like the good parts of all the great jam bands – the “feel good” of the Grateful Dead, the “head trip” of Pink Floyd, the intense, ever-escalating jams of early Phish, the intertwining guitars and keyboards of the Allman Brothers, the driving rhythm section of Widespread Panic, and the shuffle of Little Feat. What comes out is an upbeat, sing-able melody, followed by jams (typically ten minutes or longer) that soar from idea to idea, without ever losing focus or direction, always gaining in intensity and eventually bringing you back to the original melody.
I have been seeing Ancient Harmony since 2000, and listening to tapes of their shows since 1999. One of my two best friends, Ben, turned me onto the band, but we couldn’t get the “third Amigo”, Jason Usry, to come out to a show. He’s been liking the music more and more, but timing, work, and motivation have all continually gotten in his way. But on March 22, 2002, Usry was finally able to make it to an Ancient Harmony show!! We grabbed a third friend, Joe, in Raleigh and proceeded to head to Wilmington, NC. Combining the music, the crowd, and the general vibe, Usry got a wonderful show out of the boys, and it went something like this…
We got to the bar, Paleo Sun Cafe, early enough to catch soundcheck and grab some dinner with the band and crew. After a bit of digesting, the guys strapped on their instruments and began! “Chameleon” (a funky, instrumental song by Herbie Hancock) was a nice intro, even a little more powerful than usual. “US Blues”, by the Grateful Dead, was another hot, tight, crowd pleasing tune. “Glad to See You” made everyone feel welcome and was its standard, head-shake-inducing self. This trio of tunes was a great warm up. Familiar, funky songs to get the kinks out and cobwebs off!
But “Right Place, Wrong Time” was when I started boogying! By the time guitarist Shell Stamps got settled into the solo, there were our three smiling, familiar faces getting their groove on, right up front, giving as much juice to the band as we could. The result was them taking what was given, and soaring with it!
"Skywater" was next, and what a great tune! Elated, soaring, sweet, classic Harmony! Joe says it was "Really good!" I thought it conveyed the sense of dancing in the summertime rain, laughing and twirling, like when we were kids.
And then “Lay It Down”... It was a powerful version that had just picked you up and grabbed you when the power pooped! That’s right, the guys in the band were playing so hard, that they blew the fuse for the entire building!! That kind of threw the momentum of the tune off a bit, but, being professionals, as well as mind liquifiers, they got the groove and flow back quickly and finished off a solid version. Unfortunately, the power outage caused the band to cut first set short, to find out where the problem was.
I was talking to some random know-it-all dude that was singing along to a bunch of the songs, and didn't realize how much time had passed until everyone came back in from set break... D'oh!!!! As a result, I missed the first two songs. “Waitin’ for the Man” is a tune I really like, so would have liked to see it. A classic blues-rock romp about waiting for a pimp in New York City.
“ScoMule” is a recently added cover song, originally by the band Gov’t Mule. I wish I had seen, because Joe said that Hal had gone off on the keyboards, wailing like a madman! Our friend Joe said that Hal had played the keyboard part better than the new keyboard player for Gov’t Mule, so I would have liked to have seen that!
But what I caught was the meat!!! “Crawfish (Holy Bejeesus!!!) Shuffle”!!! That is the song that opens up the band. Whatever follows the Crawfish will be hot. Not just whatever song, but everything after! I was flinging sweat at the "dressed up to go out" people with my spastic movements (I call it dance). They slammed it home, and I was convinced that the energy of this show was truly from out of nowhere, as Joe so aptly put it. The original crowd wasn't specifically there to see Harmony, but by the time “Crawfish” finished, the whole place was up and dancing. I don't know how many people were there, but the dancing area was full. And random drunk grad students were loving it, so wha-hey!!!
By this time, the place was pretty much full, drinks were being healthily consumed, and the Boys were on Fire.
"Time Will Tell" was great, but I did hear one of the local ladies say that there needed to be some more words in this song and less “just playing their guitars” (sigh). But what it was doing was making very interesting journeys and twists: explorations within a song designed as an open ended jam vehicle.
On the way down to Wilmington, I had commented on not knowing what the deal is with the “Song Remains the Same > In The Flesh > Mating Drive” combination. I like the weaving of cover songs together, but I wasn't real sure about why you'd only play part of the song. I hadn't dismissed the idea, I just haven't seen it in action (NYE doesn't count...). But last night I saw why it's in the repertoire! The folks that haven't known a song for the last 45 minutes, but have been dancing anyway finally have something to cheer about! And you don't play any more of the songs than that, because they don't know any more of the words. They slammed home the power-rock opening of Pink Floyd’s “In The Flesh” and did a funky as hell “Mating Drive.”
I don't want you to think the crowd was a bad one. There were a ton of folks dancing and having a blast who had no clue who they were listening to, but they were really into it. Even going so far as to request a second drum solo!!
"Atlas” was tough as nails! It is a muscular, oomph-filled instrumental. I like "Atlas." Always have, always will. And when the guys are having a hella-show for no good reason other than "why not, we can", you know "Atlas" is gonna have some hair on its… umm… chest.
”Touch of Grey”, another Grateful Dead song, was well received by the crowd and was a nice one, with Shell nailing the solo-intro on the guitar. After “Touch” was when the guy who was nearly as sweaty as me hollered for the drum solo again, but what he got was:
”YOUNGBOY”!!!!!
"Crawfish Shuffle” opens the channels, but “YOUNGBOY” is what happens once the channels are open and flowing!!! Good golly miss molly, this song was HOT!!! It was the unanimous hands down favorite of the night! Damn impressive rock and roll! Ancient Harmonites know what a “Youngboy” can do, but this one featured a section where Hal and Shell were "talking" back and forth, call and response style! And it had a very exploratory solo. Lots of venturing over here and there to see how much more they could get out of it, and they kept finding more and more!! Add to that the fact that, while it built from slow beginnings, the thing freaking raged from beginning to end! It was unreal, fresh and exciting!!!
The encore, “That’s What Love Will Make You Do”, was delivered to a crowd that had diminished a tad, but hooted and hollered non-stop until the boys picked up their instruments again! A killer song, and much appreciated (I'm sure) by the guy who requested it.
Overall, the show was a complete surprise. What had been expected to be a small crowd, and thus little energy for the band to feed off of, turned out to be a goodly sized group, all of whom seemed to be devouring everything Ancient Harmony threw at them! Definitely a great show for Usry’s first! Now, if only somebody had taped it…
Jason King
JamBase | Southeast
Go see live music!
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