Bands Seen

  chris whitley

  Toad the Wet Sprocket

Date:

Saturday, March 28, 1992

Venue:

The Sting

Location:

New Britain, Connecticut, United States

Notes:

Setlist
1. Kick The Stones 4:56
2. Living With The Law 4:29
3. Make The Dirt Stick 3:52
4. Poison Girl 4:04
5. Complex Sex Ritual 3:41
6. Long Way Around 5:10
7. Phonecall From Leavenworth 4:58
8. Traveling Riverside Blues (Song For Elaine) 4:34
9. I Forget You Everyday 5:46
10. Big Sky Country 5:10
11. New Machine (fast) 3:20
12. Bordertown 5:05
13. Look What Love Has Done 4:03
14. Dust Radio 4:55
15. Standin’ Round’ Cryin’ (Jimmy Page Blues) 5:21
16. Gasket 3:47
17. Poison Girl 3:42

Band:
Chris Whitley - Guitar, Vocals, Boot Box (Bass)
Billy Ward - Drums
Alan Gaveart - Bass
Louie Lepore - Lead Guitar
March 30, 1992| By ROGER CATLIN; Hartford Courant Rock Critic

Chris Whitley's look is almost as compelling as his sound -- hawklike face, half-obscured by a spill of yard-long hair, sinewy arms from out of a flap of a T-shirt, handling a wide array of National steel guitars -- those shiny, classic instruments of the blues.
Having opened for Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers at the Hartford Civic Center last fall, Whitley and his small band were able Saturday to explore a full set at the Sting nightclub in New Britain in a show opened by Toad the Wet Sprocket and broadcast live locally over WHCN-FM.
Whitley's album, "Living with the Law," owed a lot of its atmospheric buzz to the production by Malcolm Burn, a protege of Daniel Lanois, who discovered Whitley playing the blues in New York.
It's a sound difficult to reproduce live, but Whitley was closer to it Saturday than he was at the Civic Center. Maybe club ambience was all he needed.
On his album, his approach to material and especially his slide guitar technique made people think he was Ry Cooder -- high praise indeed. Folks were also surprised it was him -- and not Cooder -- playing slide guitar on the soundtrack album to "Thelma & Louise."
He does have a nice style, but half the time at the Sting, his leads were dropped out in favor of the more traditional electric riffs of his backing guitarist Louis Lepare.
Some of the time, in those cases, Whitley could fall back onto his eccentric writing style that marks his best songs -- "Kick the Stones," which opened the hourlong set (and also was featured in the aforementioned film), "Living with the Law," which drummer Billy Ward played with brushes, and much later in the set, "Big Sky Country."
In the middle was a kind of a pronounced lull, no matter how many fascinating old guitars Whitley would bring out. Best of all was a couple of solo tunes in the middle of the set and three for the encore that showed how much he could do with a stomp on the stage, the fizz of his slide guitar and the growl of his voice.

Seen By:

Bones76
Lori K
Kevin Boissonnault