On the final leg of his “Living The Dream” tour, Sturgill Simpson and his band graced the stage at Portland, Oregon’s Crystal Ballroom on Saturday, November 14th.
More or less constantly touring since the release of 2014’s Metamodern Sounds In Country Music, Simpson’s fan base has grown exponentially. He was in Portland at about the same time last year, and played a venue that held 300 people. The Crystal Ballroom holds 1500, and tickets sold out within hours of going on sale.
Along with his audience, his touring band has also grown. Building on a solid base that includes Miles Miller (drums), Kevin Black (bass), and Laur Joamets (guitar), the band has added not one, but two keyboardists. The piano and keyboards really added to the depth and fullness of sound, going from honkytonk piano on bluegrass-tinged numbers to ethereal ear candy during songs like “It Ain’t All Roses” or their adventure into Led Zeppelin’s “When The Levee Breaks.”
Sturgill Simpson is an artist who has done things his own way, and rightfully makes no apologies for it. Not big on stage banter, Simpson let the music do the talking, confidently leading the band through two hours worth of original songs and a variety of covers including the Stanley Brothers’ “Medicine Springs,” When In Rome’s “The Promise,” and “You Don’t Miss Your Water” (a William Bell tune from 1961 that Otis Redding made famous).
With his first independent release, High Top Mountain, Simpson said he really just wanted to make an album of songs he’d like to hear, and wasn’t focused on commercial success. But, as it turned out, there were plenty of country music fans that had grown tired of pop party anthems penned by Nashville insiders, and the songs on High Top Mountain were what they had been deprived of.
Less than a year later, Simpson released Metamodern Sounds In Country Music and hasn’t looked back. While Metamodern still has its roots firmly planted in the Outlaw Country sound of the 70s, the themes of the songs reach far beyond country music clichés. Fans still sang along like they’d been hearing these songs since childhood.
The set ended with a hard-driving version of the Osbourne Brothers’ “Listening To The Rain” with “The Motivator” by T-Rex contained within. Simpson used the ample room he was provided onstage to dance around and get things really charged up before bringing the show to a close.
In Sturgill Simpson, fans of authentic, heartfelt country music have a reluctant hero who answers to his muse rather than the Nashville hit machine. And when he comes around again, wherever he plays is sure to be packed with people singing along and keeping the dream alive.
Check out a full gallery of photos from the event below, courtesy of Greg Homolka:
