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Gillian Welch: "Revelator"
Wow, what a show. I saw Gillian Welch play with David Rawlings at the Moore Theater in Seattle last night, and it was fantastic. Just the two of them and their guitars (and a banjo) — no amps, just mics, since they play their guitars without any effects added. You just don’t see a concert stage with so little equipment set up on it very often, but that’s all they needed to make it a night of great playing and singing. Their voices blend perfectly, and David Rawlings’ guitar playing is incredible — he had just one guitar: a 1935 Epiphone Olympic archtop (okay, so I didn’t really identify it at the time; I had to look it up when I got home). But he got some incredible sounds out of that guitar, with beautifully intense solos on a number of songs.
As a result of such excellence, this is my first post on the blog to feature a previously featured artist. My general intent is to cover a wide variety of bands/artists, but of course at some point it becomes inevitable that I’m going to want to feature another song by a given artist. So, might as well break the ice and start now, when I have a good excuse.
The song that really brought the house down last night was “Revelator” (from Welch’s 2001 album, Time (The Revelator)). As quiet a song as it is, it wouldn’t seem at first like a candidate to bring down a house, such as it were. But its beautiful melody and dark sparseness, reminiscent of some of Neil Young’s best early songs, combined with a stunning solo by David Rawlings, made it a show-stopper, getting a standing ovation from the crowd. (Thankfully, the show stoppage was temporary...there was more.) Honestly, it was one of the most moving performances I’ve ever seen.
Original post date: July 14, 2011