The Cave Singers: Religious Experience

Cave Singers
Duchess and Duke
Moondoggies
The Independent
San Francisco, CA
March 9, 2010

The Cave Singers: Religious Experience

This is now the fifth appearance for the Cave Singers on MV&R. Pretty soon, I am going to quit banging on about the awesomeness of this band and just keep them as my own secret musical source of redemption. Unfortunately, Tuesday night was perhaps their weakest performance of the shows I’ve attended, getting off to a stuttering start with sound and light problems and some bizarre heckling from the crowd. (“Tell us about your mother.” WTF?) In addition, there was a loud-talker standing just behind me- not very conducive to the quiet introspective music of TCS. I guess these are the growing pains of success as more people discover the band and this was the largest audience I’d seen yet for one of their shows. Things did kick into gear once they hit At the Cut. Then, they were destined to satisfy once again. One of the best shows I ever attended was Tom Waits in Seattle, WA when he opened with “Jesus Going to be Here Soon” thumping a handheld drum with a puff of dust as he stomped across the stage and proclaimed religious salvation is at hand. To listen to the Cave Singers is to be equally transported.

Opening for the Cave Singers, were the Duchess and the Duke, a folk singer duo that seemed out of time from the 1960s. And the Moondoggies, who have an awesome name, but who I missed because of an appointment with Tsuname Sushi a couple blocks away. To quote the Cave Singers, “Next time, next life down the road.”