My schtick at the concert is walking by people who are drinking wine and saying loudly to AJ, it’s crazy they’re not serving wine tonight. The show is at a Vineyard in Sonoma and they are definitely serving wine. AJ gets us a bottle of rosé that matches her summer dress on today the last day of summer.
We’re here to see Waxahatchee in a valley filled with grapevines nearing harvest. It’s a small stage set up on a small hill. We find a place close up on a patch of dry grass and compliment the forethought of everyone else in the crowd who thought to bring blankets. We sit on our jackets and appraise the crowd while the light still carries. Our assessment: high levels of norminess. AJ asks whether it’s the venue that brings them out in such volume or the band. I say the latter, she says the former, and we both admit to our snobbiness. When the sun goes down and the band begins to play, we all become the same, a collection of human shapes dark against the hillside, here to share in music and wish the summer an easy goodnight.
Waxahatchee is the project of Katie Crutchfield who released an album St. Cloud and then there was a global pandemic. Almost two years later and this is her first tour to perform it. Her support is a four-piece from Detroit called Bonny Doon, two guitars, bass, and drums, traditional for the folk rock that this is. Like AJ and half the crowd, she is in a summer dress and barefoot.
From the first song, her voice is full and resonating. St. Cloud was my favorite album in the pandemic year and I am happy to hear it live, to witness her voice travel beyond the confines of a recording. And it does that, vibrating outward from her place on stage. More often than not, she sings with her eyes closed and when she is not playing guitar dances expressively with her hands, arms, and shoulders.
I am not a music reviewer and I cannot tell you to like Waxahatchee, but what I like about her music is how in it I hear a clear legacy in The Band and Joni Mitchell, but updated convincingly to our times; I hear Americana music that is more parts ripping than strumming and lyrics that hold meaning without relying on understanding. Her music makes my shoulders sway without awareness and that is as much of a review as I can give.
I drain the last of the wine right from the bottle and close my eyes, enjoying just the music, wanting only that her band let the songs breathe more, give space for Waxahatchee’s voice to find its edge and maybe even push beyond it. But who am I to wish someone go beyond themselves? That would be like asking the summer to extend into the fall. In some years that will happen, and in others it won’t. The show ends and we blend into the crowd of normies walking towards their cars. A couple times I say loudly to AJ, that was great, but I wish she’d played Red, Red Wine. My year-round friend in her summer dress just rolls her eyes.