Tim Easton- Paul Burch- Matthew Ryan---- The Grey Eagle, Asheville, NC
I was really excited about this show, particularly with the addition of Paul Burch to the billing. I had seen Tim Easton play before at the Village Tavern in Mt. Pleasant, SC and he was particularly good. Performing solo acoustic, he is an engaging performer and his songs really translate well live.
Unfortunately for me, Tim Easton, who I had thought was the headliner, came on first and only played for about 30 minutes. He was still very engaging and I particularly enjoyed the new songs he played as well as such favorites as "Black Dog", "Poor, Poor LA", and "Dear Old Song and Dance". He even played one song on the piano and frequently accompanied himself on the harmonica. He was using one of Matthew Ryan's acoustic guitars and his equipment troubles may have been part of the reason for the brevity of the set. He is currently working on a new album, which according to his email is going to be headed in a more "rocking" direction. So, stay tuned for more information on that.
Paul Burch was next. I had heard about him multiple times, but never really checked him out before. He was cool, dressed all in denim, he switched back and forth between guitars and sang mostly upbeat 50's style songs. My favorite song may have been the opener "Montreal", but his set was uniformly pretty cool. He may have lacked the stage presence of Easton, but his songs were pleasing enough. He made a reference to Buddy Holly early in the set and that stuck with me throughout, as their styles sounded really similar. He also pseudo-covered a Bob Dylan's "I Want You", he either just stole the chorus for his own song or changed the verses depending on how you want to interpret it, but nonetheless it was pretty cool.
Matthew Ryan was next and carried with him two additional guitarists (one played bass a couple of times). His attempts to carry the spacey atmosphere songs over into a live environment were hit and miss, though I particularly enjoyed a song called "Providence" that had quite a few verses. He played mainly acoustic guitar, while his sidemen played electric, adding the texture to the songs. He had one cool stage moment, where referred to his harmonica holder as "Americana bling", that the rest of the audience either a) didn't get or b) didn't think it was as funny as I did.
The Grey Eagle is a great place to see a show. It's not much to look at from the outside, but inside they have a bar and grille (located at the opposite end of the stage area), as well as a fairly large stage space with chairs and even some couches set up for the audience. The ceiling rafters had Christmas lights hanging above the audience and the house music was pretty cool (Richard Buckner, Iron & Wine, more Richard Buckner, and did I say Richard Buckner?). The only downside was the temperature was a little on the chilly side.
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