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Event
The Barr Brothers with Maryse Smith & The Rosesmiths opening
Sat, 6/11 - The Barr Brothers
with Maryse Smith & The Rosesmiths opening
(Indie Americana/Rock / Main Stage) 10pm, $12 adv/$15 day of show
The Barr Brother Bio-
One of the first Christmas presents that Brad and Andrew Barr received were two pairs of red boxing gloves. They set up a makeshift ring in their basement in Providence, RI and hung a bell from the water pipes. When the bell rang, it was the signifier that all rules of decent brotherly conduct were suspended for 3 minutes. It was the one time they could unleash the latent fury of being bound to each other without the threat of mom and dad coming to break it up. Anything goes. No noses were broken, no ears bitten, but by the end of each match, the impact and recoil, there was always some blood left on the floor. Within a year or so, the gloves were nothing more than nylon rags covered in ripped plastic. Brad and Andrew, in search of a new outlet, discovered rock n' roll. It was 1983.
They taught themselves how to play, at first on cardboard boxes and home-strung imitation guitars, then on actual, zebra-striped electric guitars and drums. "Wipe Out" and "Johnny B. Goode" were among the first songs absorbed into the repertoire. With the same energy they used to attack each other with boxing gloves, they attacked the popular hits of the day and old blues songs they found in their father's record collection. A healthy diet of classic and esoteric rock paved the way to the discoveries that lay ahead.
Skip ahead to 2004. The brothers had spent most of the previous decade criss-crossing North America, playing music with their spirited, improv-based rock trio, The Slip. That Spring, the band was playing a small club in Montreal, QC when a fire broke out in the venue. They grabbed a few guitars/drums and rushed out onto the rainy street with the rest of the concert goers. As the club's mezzanine was swallowed by flames, Andrew offered his coat to one of the waitresses from the bar. One year later, Brad and Andrew Barr were living in Montreal.
In his first apartment in the new city, Brad shared an adjoining wall with Sarah Page, a classically trained harpist from Montreal with a propensity for the experimental. As tender and visceral as she is virtuosic, her melodies would seep through the cracks of the wall and into the music Brad was writing. From this nebulous relationship, a friendship developed and the brothers, with Sarah, began recording and performing around Montreal. Soon, their friend and multi-instrumentalist Andres Vial was brought in to lend his wide array of expertise to the outfit, playing keyboards, bass, vibes, percussion, and singing. They called themselves The Barr Brothers. With Brad's songs setting the context for the agile imaginations of the other musicians, a unique sound was born, one reliant on interwoven string arrangements, wide open spaces, and a multitude of musical traditions.
Recorded in their makeshift studio in an old boiler room at the foot of Mount Royal, the ten song album The Barr Brothers recently finished, was written over the course of the brother's time in a city full of strangers, lovers, old ghosts and new friends. Along with Sarah(Lhasa DeSela/Amon Tobin), the record also features Miles Perkin(Lhasa DeSela), Elizabeth Powell (Land of Talk), Nathan Moore, Jocie Adams (The Low Anthem), Elvis Perkins and Emma Baxter. It reads like a dusty journal of a traveler at the crossroads of good and evil. Hushed Americana lonesome and future-primitive delta blues clear the path for West African polyrhythms and classical motifs. Its all tied together by the commitment to the sources of the styles and their inherent connections to each other.
Though the boxing gloves have been long since retired, and the music, for the most part, is more refined than clobbering, there's always room for some blood on the floor.
Maryse Smith Bio-
Maryse Smith is a songwriter from Burlington VT. Her songs are beautiful reflections of the love, or lack other of , within human relationships; romantic, familial, and beyond. Her delivery is stunning and inexplicably her own.
The Rosesmiths are her band.
Maryse Smith Vocals/Guitar
Paddy Reagan - Drums/Vocals
Seth Gallant Bass/Vocals
Bill Mullins - Guitar
FROM Brent Hallenbeck of the Burlington Free Press
"Maryse (it's pronounced like "Theresa") is pretty shy on stage, but her songs of love gone wrong are bold and frank. The woman who barely speaks between songs practically shouts her lyrics like a performer who's getting her songs out not because she wants to but because she absolutely has to. She has an indie-Americana sound that reminds me a lot of Sharon Van EttenI think Maryse's sound is coming together especially well right now partly because she's been doing this for long enough that she's gaining more and more confidence, but she also has an excellent band behind her, with Paddy Reagan on drums and Seth Gallant on bass."
She's a rocker.
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LocationParima
185 Pearl St
Burlington, VT 05401
United States
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