Joseph
Arthur & the Lonely Astronauts
Live at The Middle East Downstairs, Cambridge, MA
April 18, 2007
By Scott Marlowe
Commanding the stage like a petty
tyrant genius savant, Joseph Arthur stormed The Middle East Downstairs
Wednesday night with a marathon session of tunes leaving the crowd
of around 300 spellbound. Flanked by his band The Lonely Astronauts,
Arthur materialized onstage just after 10pm like an astronaut
falling from the sky. With tight jeans, white tinted shades, a
troubadour hat, and brown blazer with lapel fully lined in white
buttons, Arthur appeared a strange cross between Marilyn Manson
and Santino from Project Runway (the latter certainly
could have designed his ensemble). But looks be damned, Arthur
and crew meticulously fired from the hip churning out no less
than 18 songs in under two hours with near half of them appearing
in the encore. It was an unconventional performance that was as
beautiful as it was strange and exhilarating.
Arthur began the night with Spacemen,
a tune from his latest release Let’s Just Be. “Here
come the spaaaaacemen… out of the sky,” Arthur grumbled
as the band filled in behind him with otherworldly whooshes and
swirls. Spacemen, indeed, and an awesomely engaging opening number
that set the tone for the otherworldly musical adventure that
was to follow. Without pause, Arthur and band launched into a
rapid fire onslaught of song after song, some soft and delicate
(Lack a Vision), others raucous and spine tingling (Chicago,
Diamond Ring), and still others just plain weird (Lonely
Astronaut) or uplifting (Enough to Get Away). Banter
was kept to a minimum with only Arthur’s relentless insistence
that the soundman adjust this or that breaking the unyielding
sonic assault. It was a folk-country new age shuffle as distinctive,
varied, and polished as any you’ll likely experience in
a venue of this size and as memorable as the most inventive stadium
performance. Arthur may not be a god, but between his religious
tinted lyrics and ability to hold his band and the crowd in his
brilliantly iron-fisted grip, you just might think he’s
at least closely related to one.
I had waited a long time to see Joseph Arthur
live and when I heard he’d be performing this tour with
a full band (he generally performs solo) and on the heals of last
year’s masterpiece, Nuclear Daydream, my favorite album
of the year, I couldn’t resist. The addition of two gals
(Sibyl Buck and Jennifer Turner) and two guys (Kraig Jarret Johnson
and Greg Wieczorek) to the mix added a fuller, looser sound to
the proceedings and allowed Arthur’s music to soar to at
least the same heights as his dense records. The diverse newcomers,
who, tattoos aside, seemed like regular Joes and Janes, served
as interesting foil to Arthur’s folksy Mick Jagger with
a shyness problem and filled out the sound perfectly. Yet, even
with the support, Arthur managed to perform a handful of exquisite
solo numbers to begin the nearly hour long encore (including a
song which featured an array of loops and delays that stretched
the limit of the one man band) putting to rest the notion that
anyone besides Arthur, himself, was calling the shots.
In all, Joseph Arthur and The Lonely Astronauts
was a wonderful evening that resembled the best country-rock vaudeville
act in outer space you could ever imagine. And as I walked out
of The Middle East with a fresh CD of the performance I’d
just witnessed for a mere 15 bucks, I was unquestionably convinced
that even if no one else seems to know who Joseph Arthur is, I
will continue to support this fascinating artistic minstrel for
years to come.
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