Adam Faucett & the Tall Grass @ Bugsy's Wings N Things, Russellville, AR March 23, 2012
There are two reasons I attend concerts. Reason number 1 is the music…period. Reason number 2 is the peripheral experience(s) associated with attending concerts – the people who attend with you, the pre-game meal, the crowd, and the venue itself. We knew that when we decided to go see Adam Faucett and the Tall Grass, that we were in for a good night of music. On the other hand, when we heard that he was playing in Russellville, Arkansas at a chicken wing joint, I got ready to chronicle the items under reason #2 above.
Bugsy’s Wings and Things sounds more like the restaurant in a scene of Porky’s than it does a venue hosting one of Arkansas’ musical acts voted “Best Of the Year” by the Arkansas Democrat Gazette – the state’s flagship newspaper. However, here we were, in Russellville, Arkansas, just off the exit taking you down the main drag.
However, it now seems funny that when locating the venue, me and my travel partners all mentioned that we were going the opposite way we would normally go on this stretch of Arkansas Highway 7 (the ‘correct’ direction would take the driver toward Arkansas Tech University, and the more popular destination, Feltner’s Whataburger). Oh, there were many things about this night that would be the opposite of normal.
Since the venue doubled as a chicken wing joint (they had other items on the menu as well), we decided to go ahead and grab our dinner at Bugsy’s. From the outside, we ascertained that Bugsy’s used to be either a former Elk’s Lodge…or a strip joint. We walked in to find wall-to-wall cedar planks scored diagonally like the paneling in an old cabin in the woods. In the foyer, we were greeted by an elderly man with a very visible plastic oxygen line running to his nose. As if the former strip-joint-or-Elk’s-Lodge-venue wasn’t enough, we had Amos here to give it a little more legitimacy.
After signing us up for new memberships at Bugsy’s (Russellville is in Pope County Arkansas, a dry county, requiring all patrons of an establishment selling alcohol to become ‘members’ in order to drink), the three of us, being the only patrons of the restaurant at 7:30 PM on a Friday night, sat down at a table and waited to be served. After appetizing ourselves with fried pickles, and then stuffing ourselves with three orders of “flappers” (boneless wings) and two plates of fries that probably had Idaho calling and saying “easy on the taters, y’all” we started taking in our surroundings. The walls were adorned with your typical bar fare, along with some not-so-typical accouterments such as an old wooden George Dickel Tennessee whiskey crate, and what looked like the distiller barrel from a moonshine still. Eventually, folks started to trickle in to the venue.
The first group of folks to show up were obviously musicians, as indicated by their carrying of instruments. One poor fella had “roadies” (and by “roadies” I mean his dad) carrying his stuff because he hobbled in on crutches. One by one some other fans started showing up. It was my guess that most of these fans had traveled from Little Rock to see AdamFaucett, as most of them approached Adam (who had arrived by this point) to say hello.
By 9:30, and with a bar about ¼ full, the opener, who, incidentally, was the fella on the crutches, sat down n a chair on stage, B.B. King style and began to sing and play. The soft-spoken gent was plagued with inaudible banter in between songs, such that I never caught his name. A skilled guitarist and mandolin player – and a fine singer to boot, it was unfortunate that his set was unremarkable. It may have been because I was amped up to see Adam Faucett and the Tall Grass take the stage momentarily.
During the middle of the opener’s set, I spotted AdamFaucett at the bar and decided to go introduce myself. Adam and I had been communicating back and forth via the Book of Faces social media site, and I thought it apropos to say ‘hello’ in the flesh. We chatted about the upcoming show in Fayetteville with Damn Arkansan, and the misfortune of his needing to reschedule the Hot Springs Arkansas show we were originally set to play the night before Fayetteville.
Faucett is a humble character, which makes him very approachable. I am not sure if I was more shocked by this, or if Adam was more shocked to learn that we drove down to Russellville that night just to see him play. After letting him know that we were big fans of his music, especially the latest record More Like a Temple.
After bidding him “good show,” I returned to our table in the corner, scarfed down one more fried pickle, and joined my friends and the rest of the crowd who were gathering in front of the stage. As the band checked their sound and tuned their instruments, I heard a familiar voice on the microphone greet the crowd. However, gone was the somewhat shyness in Adam Faucett’s voice from when I had spoken to him earlier. If you believe, like me, that a stage can transform a shy artist into a rock star, then you would have seen it on this night. After a quick set up and sound check the band launched into the set.
Unfortunately, I have yet to purchase all of Faucett’s records (I only have the latest), and the opener must have been from a previous record, because I didn’t recognize it…but it was an appropriate kickoff…gritty, swampy, driving rock-n-roll accompanied by an almost operatic howl coming from a guy who seemed like any other shy dude just 10 minutes earlier.
As I sit here streaming one of Faucett’s previous records (The Great Basking Shark), it is funny because adding this to my knowledge with More Like a Temple, Faucett’s records are kinda breezy and slow…but not at all in a bad way. More in a sip-cold-beverages-in-the-shade-of-your-porch-in-your-Arkansas (or other Southern)-home. Adam Faucett’s music has been described as “Southern Swamp Opera” which I think is fitting. Something about the sound for me evokes images of a dimly-lit back porch at an old house in central Arkansas on a river somewhere, it’s muggy, there is a bug zapper on the port to keep the mosquitos at bay, there are frogs croaking, crickets chirping, water trickling – all set to the soundtrack of Adam Faucett. Perhaps part of the imagery is the voice…rising to a full wail like a haint in the swampy Arkansan night.
That said, the slower songs work well in Faucett’s live set, especially "T-Rex T Shirt" which was a little more amped up toward the end of the song than it is on the record. Even songs like “Morphine,” which musically sounds like it could be a B-side from an A.A. Bondy record, was given a little more pop and jazz in the live setting.
But the more up-beat songs had the crowd moving and bobbing with the beat. Probably the highlight of the night was when the band played my favorite song on More Like a Temple, and quite possibly one of the best rock-n-roll songs I have heard this year: "Blood is Blood." The thing that shocked me is that this song was played in the middle of the set. To close with this song would have been choice. I think Adam even realized this after the song was over (and the roar of the crowd died down) because he looked at the band and said “shit, now what do we do?” "Blood is Blood" is one of those songs that will leave the stage smoldering. It is my hope that when the band plays in Fayetteville, they will do just that…if so, Damn Arkansan will have a hell of an act to follow.
We got about an hour and a half of music, including the encore, and the band then quietly said their goodnights. Turning around to go settle our bill and hit the merch table, I was instantly reminded that we were in this former supper club, that was now also populated with what one would assume are “regulars” who seemed glad that the music was over. There appeared to be a line of demarcation near the restrooms and the mounted elk head on the wall (just kidding, there wasn’t a mounted elk head, but seriously).
We got shut out at the merch table when we learned that the supper-club’s credit card machine was not working, so we had to use our cash to settle our food/drink bill. We promised Adam that we would give him our money when they play Fayetteville on Saturday April 7th at the Smoke &Barrel. If you’re local, I hope to see you there. It will be MORE than worth the $3 cover.