Review: The Civil Wars

Photos by MATT COOK/Friend of B2R

LAWRENCE -- We’ve seen and heard acts like the Civil Wars many times before.The Wars are John Paul White and his duo partner Joy Williams, songwriters from different regions of America (he’s a Southerner; she’s from northern California) who met in Nashville, started writing folk song about love and heartache and hit a gold vein when one of them, “Poison and Wine,” got some prime-time play in an episode of “Grey’s Anatomy.” Since then, the duo has become darlings in the National Public Radio universe. 

The Wars have sold-out two venues in our area in less than seven months. In late June, they packed about 300 people into the now-gone Crosstown Station. Tuesday night, they drew a sell-out crowd of almost 1,100 to Liberty Hall in Lawrence -- a big crowd that, for the most part, gave the duo’s stripped-down folk songs the silence and attention they require. Between songs, the duo was treated with all kinds of fawning responses: cheers, whistles, sustained applause and plenty of appreciative laughter.

We’ve seen this act before, most recently with the Swell Season (Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova) and She & Him (Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward): girl/boy duos who sing about the politics of romance and the casualties of love. What separates the Wars from those acts is they perform without a band behind them, accompanied only by White on acoustic guitar and, once or twice, Williams at the piano. 

Williams has a voice that frequently resembles Alison Krauss’; White has a creamy tenor that can muster some grit when needed, as on the bluesy “Birds of a Feather.” Together they blend in harmonies that are as pleasant and fetching as their song’s melodies.

The minimal approach -- guitar and vocals -- gives their songs a deeper resonance and a keener sense of intimacy, and intimacy was what this duo and its music are most about.

The Wars write almost exclusively about people in various stages of romantic love, but mostly the stages where someone in pain or locked in a tortured state of co-dependency. Thus, their songs are filled with lines like “You can sink to the bottom of the sea / Just don’t go without me” or “Your mouth is poison, your mouth is wine” or Oh, I don’t love you, but I always will” and “Why are you so far from me / In my arms is where you ought to be.” Others, like “My Father’s Father,” convey a yearning for other deep attachments, like home: “So here’s my hope, my tired soul / Here’s my ticket / I want to go home.” 

Williams and White are not a couple and have never been one; each is married to someone else. But they perform as one, flirting and jousting with each other and looking hard at  each other as they sing their confessional lyrics and pretty harmonies. And both are attractive, to boot. 

That chemistry is a vital component of their live shows. It gives their songs a personality and a face. But in a sense, that chemistry between them is an act, fiction. It’s not Hansard and Irglova singing about their fractured romance or George Jones and Tammy Wynette singing “We’re Gonna Hold On” or “We Loved It Away.” It’s not Lindsey Buckingham glaring at Stevie Nicks, singing “Go Your Own Way.” 

So a leap of faith is required, and the crowd this evening took it, buying the act, wholesale, tapping reverently into the blue moods and heavy sentiments. Couples held hands or embraced and swayed to the music’s gentle rhythms. Others stood alone with 1,000-yard stares, mouthing the words to numbers like the Jackson 5's “I Want You Back”: “Trying to live without your love / Is like one long sleepless night.” 

They dropped two more covers into the setlist to help fill out the 80-minute set (they have only one full-length recording, the 14-track “Barton Hollow”): Smashing Pumpkins’“Disarm” and a novel but feckless acoustic-blues cover of Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean.” Those came towards the end, when a sameness was starting to settle in and people in the back of the room were showing signs of restlessness. 

 

“Poison & Wine,” one of the duo’s best songs, recaptured their attentions. So did the closer, “Dance Me to the End of Love,” a jaunty ballad about loving unconditionally until death -- or something else -- do they part, and one of the evening’s rare expressions of longevity and hope: “Oh, dance me to the wedding now / Oh, Dance me on and on / Dance me very tenderly / And dance me on and on.” 

Set list: Tip of My Tongue; Forget Me Not; From This Valley; 20 Years; I’ve Got This Friend; My Father’s Father; Barton Hollow; Falling; C’est la Mort; I Want You Back; Birds of a Feather; To Whom It May Concern; Disarm; Poison & Wine; I Want You Back; Billie Jean; Dance Me to the End of Love.

The openers: The Staves are a trio of sisters -- Emily, Jessica and Camilla -- from Walford in Herefordshire, England. They write porcelain folks songs and sing them in crystalline, tack-sharp three-part harmonies, accompanied only by guitar and/or ukulele. They were a perfect appetizer for the Civil Wars.

| Timothy Finn, The Star

Comments

[TK]

Excellent review. Lovely show, once again, but unfortunately, I had a couple of Joy Williams wanna-bes stepping all over her on nearly every song. I'm all for some enthusiasm, but some self-recognition that most people don't want to hear YOU singing over an artist singing soft and nuanced melodies would be appreciated. The occasions they encouraged sing-alongs are fine to chime in, but I had two girls in stereo from my spot up front loudly imitating almost every word of every song. Some shows just don't deserve that...

[GG]

Hey, Tim, second to last song was Billie Jean, the second MJ song of the set.
I can't tell if you liked it or not. I certainly did! And I loved the Staves, who served the venue well.

[LW]

A agree with the above-mentioned comment in regards to the sing-along session. I also undertsand the enthusiasm amongst concert-goers, but it was rather bothersome. The Civil Wars put on an outstanding show once again and it was nice to see them in a venue like Liberty Hall; their performance was was flawless and aside from the audience distraction, I could not have asked for a better night. The Staves were a special treat and their encouragement to buy their EP paid off because they sold out of them by the night's end.

[pellboy]

These guys are very talented and while their music isn't really my thing, I do have a huge crush on Ms.Williams. I do take advantage of every opportunity to catch them on TV. Shoot me, I'm shallow.

[Big Joe]

I didn't attend this one as it was all sold out, but I feel your pain about crowds at quiet shows. Amos Lee's Liberty Hall show was similar, but it was talking more than singing along. At one point, Amos even said "kind of annoying when people talk over every #@!$ing song."

Lots of people cheered, then the crowd got better.

[dave heaton]

Do you not know that "Dance Me to the End of Love" is a cover, too? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ye6JssTdnvw

I just don't get the appeal of the Civil Wars. I watched a friend's video of this exact song, from last night, and found it horrifying, right up there with Jon Bon Jovi's cover of "Hallelujah" (which is from the same Leonard Cohen album as "Dance Me..."; you should get it).

[News flash]

I laugh so hard at all the cry babies who keep going to quiet, lame, mellow shows and every single time, EVERY TIME... they whine and cry and pound on the floor about the mean people who are too loud for their tastes.

It is NOT a news flash, it is old.

Admit that the problem is with your crappy taste in quiet mellow musi and not the people at the show.

Solution-
You will never hear a talking complaint at a Green Day, My Morning Jack or Motley Crue type of show.

[C. Haslouer]

Enjoyed reading the review and the photos were great !

[fiddlebee]

Hey! The crowd, with me, in the balcony was the best. They were there to listen. Great show, great venue. I think The Civil Wars thought so too, as they remarked several times, they would be back.