Billy Strings delivers an incendiary blast of blazing Bluegrass. An overload of the familiar traditional mixed with Progressive in its myriad forms and going supernova.
His debut concert in New Zealand and the young guy from Michigan was a sensation on the six-string instruments which gave him his professional performing moniker as bestowed by an aunt.
William Lee Apostol was born into a life of family hard drug use. His father died of a heroin overdose when he was a toddler.
It was his stepfather Terry Barber who was the crucial influence on his artistic direction.
Terry raised me and taught me how to wipe my ass, tie my shoes, and play guitar. That’s my fucking dad.
A skilled amateur Bluegrass musician who brought the influence of all the legendary greats of Country and Bluegrass to his stepson. From the Original Carter Family to Jimmy Martin. Bill Monroe to Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs. The Watson Family to the Stanley Brothers.
We are dropped right into the maelstrom.
Four players assemble on stage with Strings, who is carrying an acoustic guitar. Billy Failing banjo, Jarrod Walter mandolin, Royal Masat stand-up bass, Alex Hargreaves fiddle.
Fast rolling and tumbling meshed riffs underpinned by an authoritative bass bottom. Trying to tear me down! Furious flat-picking, fast and bulbous!
Without a break they slam into Seven Weeks in County and three guitars are playing.
Slow the tempo down when the fiddle steps up and they are into an extended jam with the cosmic Country interplay of a Grateful Dead, pushing it to elements of Butterfield Blues Band’s mystical East West.
Then it’s a Progressive take on Little Sadie, signalled by the banjo tolling the bells then riding off with it.
All played in one take with the players mixing it through each other like telepathy. Wow, we are in for a night!
Strings and his family spent a lot of time, when he was in his early teens, addicted to hard drugs. They eventually were able to quit the habit.
Strings has said that he is now California sober, partaking in cannabis and psychedelics only. He has written a song addressing this.
Interesting to note that there is now a lot of research going into the medicinal uses of various forms of cannabis, and using psychedelics to treat palliative care, major depression and PTSD. Music itself has direct therapeutic applications.
Strings is also a fan and somewhat aficionado of Metal in its manifestations, and admires Hendrix, Johnny Winter and Black Sabbath amongst many others. (A shout out to recently departed Ozzy Osbourne).
This would help to explain the multi-faceted nature of the music this superlative band conjures up over the course of two hours and 26 or 27 songs.
There is an old Carter Family tune they break out as an instro. Furious flat-picking with a great fiddle break and they transform it into Western Swing.
Country music is obsessed with murder and death, as much a part of the human condition as love and romance.
A strange song about assassinations and a shotgun pointed at my head. Furious forward roll banjo riffing with a more traditional vocal. The bridge takes a breather to head into heavenly strings. It must be something in the water/ I just wanna blow your brains out!
They take some time to sing some old-fashioned Bluegrass quartet. Powerful unison and harmony voices and it’s magnificent. One song is a paean to the Grateful Dead.
Billy Strings has played with Bob Weir and Bill Kreutzmann in recent times.
They take an old Stanley Brothers classic, Stone Wall and Steel Bars and make it their own.
Tennessee sounds like it comes from classic period Bluegrass and must be a cover so take your pick.
Bluegrass has been described as the equivalent of Jazz Be-Bop, analogous to Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie. Break-neck speed, stepping out to play solo riffs, keeping a tenuous hold on the melody.
Billy Strings and band have perfected this. Highly complex playing with sound that is meshed and easily lifts off into orbit. And stays there.
This is the beginning of the end. That’s what they sing before they come back to encore with Train 25.
Rev Orange Peel
Photos by Den.
