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What do you get when you put Jim Ward, Chad Price, Frank Turner, Jon Snodgrass, Audra Mae, Chuck Ragan, Jon Gaunt, and Digger Barnes all on the same stage?  The answer is the line up for 2009’s Revival Tour.  Chuck Ragan (pictured), of Hot Water Music, founded the tour two years ago to rousing success.  The tour headline on their website proudly states it is “an acoustic collaborative event.”  I personally could not sum it up any more precisely.

Ragan has tapped in to and brought forth an amazing idea.  Last year’s tour saw the likes of Tom Gabel, Ben Nichols, Tim Barry, Ragan, and a few others.  This year’s tour added significantly to the lineups with some artists playing relatively exclusively to all dates and other special appearances during other dates.  Chuck Ragan, Digger Barnes on upright bass, and Jon Gaunt on fiddle were the only ones that were on the last tour that came back to Little Rock this year, and it was strikingly obvious that over a year later, they are playing as tight with each other as one could hope for. 

The show started off with every artist on stage playing and singing along to a couple of songs.  Obviously that would be too much of a mess for the whole night, so the show was further broken down in to solo sets with backup from fiddle, upright bass, or another one of the musicians on tour. That way there is something for everyone in the audience, especially if someone really likes that one guy from that one band.  I commend Ragan for organizing it this way, because where else would I get to see all of these living legends play on one stage. 

I’d like to say my favorite set of the night was by an up and coming man named Frank Turner.  At first glance, this English man didn’t seem like a formidable force with his boyish good looks and his “oops, I was drunk…” Texas tattoo, but I was blown away with how great his music and demeanor was.  He sings of friends & enemies, booze, and general other trials of life but with a zest and charm that one cannot keep their eyes off of him.  He entertained us with several stories from here and there, which only made him even more likeable. 

Like a lot of the other Revival members, he had been doing his punk rock thing before and not making it as far as he would have liked to.  However, he dropped his band, started doing solo shows, and relentlessly toured.  People started to take notice of his new brand of punk tinged, acoustic folk and he has steadily gained popularity in his home country and now in the US.  This man is literally an entity not to be reckoned with.  That being said, if you get a chance, I highly suggest you check out his music.  

Jim Ward, of Sparta, At The Drive In, and Sleepercar, put on one hell of a show.  Really, I could say that about every last one of the musicians up there.  Ward in particular was able to emote his feelings to a tee where you were completely in line with them.  It certainly takes an awfully talented person to do that.  I’ve listened to Sleepercar for a bit now and never had any good reason to check who was in it, but I’m glad Ward ended up being on those credits.

I was also highly looking forward to Chad Price & Jon Snodgrass.  In the last year or so, I’ve gotten really in to Drag The River, and since their untimely break up a couple years back, I was wondering if I’d ever get to see them.  I knew DTR had been through Little Rock several times prior, but I was unfortunately not old enough to go or familiar with them.  So, in seeing them it made one of my small wishes come true.  I personally wished they’d played a longer set, but a handful of songs were better than none. 

The show was a success even if it was for only a crowd of twenty people give or take a few.  I personally liked the fact that it was so intimate, even though that definitely hurt the money intake to keep the tour on the road for the rest of its dates.  One of the few things that was really touching and just all around bad ass was that one of the guys wandered off stage, grabbed a huge bottle of Jameson’s whiskey, and passed out shots to those who wanted them.  Little things like that don’t happen during huge shows, or at least not to the same effect.  Even though the audience was already united in thought and passions for the show, that simple gesture just made us even closer.  I can say that only a handful of shows have ever done that, and this just felt like we were one big family.

Ragan has done a magnificent job of bringing his show on the road and touching people’s lives.  I wish him and whichever musicians choose to be part of his group of troubadours the best of luck for the future.  I’ve seen  the first and second year of The Revival Tour and can only hope to see many more in the future.

 

-L

 


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