The Airborne Toxic Event/Alberta Cross/Henry Clay People - Black Cat - March 12 2009

Henry Clay People - This young band hit the stage and earnestly layed out its Americana flavored SoCal rock. Perfectly nice, but not overly compelling. Still, likable people get more of a chance from me and these lads were likable. I will recommend the drop Honkytonk Woman from the set. They played it like the original which I've heard far too many times. Do what Gary Louris did when I saw him. He picked a song by Relatively Clean Rivers where I was probably the only person in the audience with the album and even I didn't remember the song.

Alberta Cross - An anglo-Swedish ensemble from Brooklyn? Not as surprising to me anymore as Brooklyn seems host to the most non-scenic diverse set of bands anywhere. The band started off with some really good Americana music, folky, light rocking, etc. (It kind of went from between Crazy Horse and Vetiver for me) But it really kept building and building into some of the more exciting music I've heard in a while. It's hard to say where they fit into the best bands I've seen, but I thought their set was so well executed in terms of drama and momentum which I normally don't think about a whole lot. This is a band to keep an eye on. Do you hear me SxSW industry types and Bonaroo attendees? Of course not, this is just a Blog, not Billboard or Rolling Stone.

The Airborne Toxic Event - A good crowd had built up by now and the band was pretty well known by most. I thought their good songs stood out and captured my attention. But any others just drifted on by. If the playing is strong enough, that doesn't mar the set, but in this case it did. Still, a good band that did indeed nail some really nice songs. I'll keep both eyes open.

Quote of the Night: Airborne's singer... "Here's one for the Krishna girls" Ok, I eventually figured out it was Christian girls, but hearing things incorrectly is much more fun.