Location: hostel Celica, Metelkova / Ljubljana
Concert date: 19.11.2007
Attendance: 30
Ticket price: 0,00€
Whenever I hear that a musician who puts out albums on Cuneiform is playing somewhere nearby, I’m interested. Label boss Steven Feigenbaum has gathered nothing but excellent bands on what’s by now a cult label, from legends like Soft Machine, Univers Zero and Present to younger acts like Guapo, Nebelnest, Happy Family,… Mister Alec Redfearn belongs to that latter group, and this year he decided to go on a world tour. A young accordionist who’s almost unknown here, he took on a real feat, since a world tour takes a lot of money, and a fairly obscure musician is always short on it.
So it’s no surprise that some pretty interesting and sometimes downright bizarre things happened to Mr. Redfearn on the road – from flooding the bathrooms at a hospitable friend’s house to racking his brain over how to pay for a hotel room after he ran out of cash. Some of his ideas are properly funny, and he described them very vividly on his blog. What’s stranger is that the tour made a stop in Slovenia, and not only at Metelkova, already a cult spot for lesser-known and quality bands, but also in Maribor and Murska Sobota. He later cancelled the Maribor show, though.
Given everything I’d heard and read about him, I was hoping for an interesting evening, if nothing else. I was really curious whether he’d share some of those funny stories with the audience too. But the moment I got to Celica, I was hit with the news that one of the two performers had fallen ill. Since I wanted to hear Alec Redfearn, I wished the illness, a bit gleefully, on the guy he’s touring with. But as usual, gloating comes back to bite you, and this time was no different. Of course the one who got sick was none other than Alec Redfearn. I had no choice but to accept that I wasn’t destined to see him (Murska Sobota is simply too far for me, and who knows if he’d even be healthy by then). I only hoped Micah would play at least something similar to his touring partner’s music. But the announcement alone made it clear that Micah is rooted in folk and country, with a bit of blues too.
From the very first song, the performer showed he’s a pretty typical representative of American country folk, where the key things are nice melodies and colorful lyrics. The lyrics were quite varied: there were plenty of typical country misadventures and bitter heartbreak over a lover who ran off, but also some more metaphorical lyrics in the style of Bob Dylan. Over a good hour and a half of playing (with a break in between), he went through some of his best originals and a few covers, including a piece by Richard Thompson, which clearly showed that Micah has a great command of the guitar. Later he tried his hand at improvising, too, even throwing in a couple of flamenco bits.
His voice stayed very clear all evening, despite a cold. At times he reminded me of Art Garfunkel, or Cat Stevens. He could sing high and low, and at one point he even yodeled, which got a laugh out of part of the crowd. In short, he used plenty of classic country and folk tricks. His contact with the audience was minimal. This is a musician who isn’t interested in entertaining people who are bored. His aim is to please those who came to listen to music. He clearly trusts himself and his abilities. And with good reason. I was genuinely surprised at what a good guitarist this gentleman from America is. On a twelve-string acoustic he played a heap of tricky chord progressions, and he picked the strings like a classical guitarist. True, he didn’t play any typical rock solos, but he didn’t need them to prove his skills. The sound he coaxed out of his instrument occasionally even outgrew its frame, so that now and then the guitar sounded like a banjo.
My enjoyment of the last couple of songs was somewhat spoiled by some annoying guy who apparently figured the crowd would absolutely love it if he accompanied the guitarist by drumming his finger on a beer mug. At a loud gig you wouldn’t even hear that, but in the quiet, intimate atmosphere of Celica it got distracting pretty quickly. Oh well, that’s not even so important. What matters is that Micah played solidly and well. Sometimes he drifted a bit too far into improvisations that went nowhere, but other times the improvisations were seriously good. With his melancholic melodies he knew how to put a spell on the audience (he spellbound me so well that I almost fell asleep), but he could also play livelier songs.
Micah made it clear that if people want to hear quality folk music, they don’t need to go to a concert by Bob Dylan or Joan Baez, who in their old age (Dylan especially) croak like two out-of-tune crows and make fabulous sums of money doing it. Micah played the show for free, and still gave it everything, heart and soul. Folk and country may not really be my thing, but it was more than obvious that they’re Micah’s, and that alone is enough to make an impression on a not-so-devoted listener. A lovely gig for a cold Tuesday night.
text: Rok Podgrajšek
photos: Jani Lah
