Photo credit Danny Clinch
Within its breezy confines, the Backyard is a typical Austin open-air venue—a
blue-collar joint where dust clouds circle endlessly, canned beer is cheap and
strangers trade knowing glances. The vibe is not unlike that of a scaled-down
Telluride Bluegrass Festival, only with stifling Texas heat and folding chairs. The utopian
buzzkill: it’s entirely delimited by a shopping mall.
Talk about clashing cultures. Segregated
parking—concertgoers were forced to drive through numerous traffic snafus and
into a no-man’s land lot behind the chain stores—delayed Norah Jones’ entrance by nearly half an hour. “They don’t let you
park at the mall?” Jones asked later. “All that concrete—what the hell?” The
comment released some tension in the restless crowd. Jones then brightened the
mood with an elegant, sensual reading of Townes Van Zandt’s signature “For the
Sake of the Song.” It proved the ideal remedy to charm a twitchy bunch of Austin music lovers.
The evening was a welcome return for the Texas-raised singer
and Jones nearly filled the 5,000-capacity Backyard with an equal split of
soccer moms, business-casual yuppies and college-aged free spirits. Many
shouted praise often and indiscriminately. “Did I just hear someone yell, ‘You
so fine?’” a clearly amused Jones asked between spot-on readings of her new
single “Thinking About You” and a gloriously swampy turn on the Hank Williams
classic “Cold, Cold Heart.” “I think it was a girl, too.”
Quips like that made the show. There’s little question that
Jones and her Handsome Band are boundlessly skilled, but at times they’re
rehearsed to a fault. “Sunrise,”
“What Am I to You” and the opener “Come Away With Me” (with Jones on electric
guitar) were as rigid as plate glass. But Jones’ few ad-libbed moments helped
loosen the flow of her better-known songs. The newer ones, though, didn’t need
much assistance, and in particular, the Vaudevillian “My Dear Country”
resonated. Its message—“Nothing is scarier than election day”—instantly won over
this progressive pocket of Bush Country.
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