Blitzen Trapper

Blitzen Trapper

Apr 19

FEASTING ON CURATE’S EGG ROCK

When: 10 April 2018
Where: King Tut’s
Support: Steve Grozier

Will the real Bitzen Trapper please stand up? This Portland five-piece (voc/gui/harm – gui/bvoc/syn – kyb/bvoc – bs – dr/bvoc/voc) are great musicians and put on an excellent gig that covered many different rock styles: country rock, Stonesy rock, psychedelic rock, Dylan folk rock, Springsteen rock, folk rock. Whilst I thoroughly enjoyed it the continual jumping between styles certainly left some audience members nonplussed. Perhaps the oddest moment came when the drummer sang ‘One’ (my favourite version of this is by Aimee Mann). Wiki bizarrely categorises them as ‘Alternative Country’!

Eric Earley is a very engaging frontman and for the first couple of encores gave a very good early Dylan impression (just him on stage with guitar and harmonica). Erik Menteer is a versatile guitarist and some of his more psychedelic leaning solos would not have been out of place at a The War On Drugs gig. Marty Marquis on keyboards provided a lot of the colour to the songs (in contrast to Erik’s muscle) and the rhythm section underpinned everything with an easy flexibility.

This is a tight band that has come a long way from when I last saw them at The Troxy in East London supporting Wilco in 2009. That was when their new album Furr suggested they may be destined for great things (like Wilco – in many ways a similar sort of band) and whilst subsequent albums have maintained a high standard, great things never came. Instead they have evolved into an excellent live band who keep putting out quality music.

 

Band page
Sample video