On A Steel Horse

A local radio station hosts a series of benefits Christmas concert called The Jingle Bell Series. On Thursday, I went to the Danforth Music Hall for the 1st show of the season. The headliner was husband-and-wife duo Whitehorse.

Although there were lots of instrumentation on stage including the usual drum kit, synths, guitars, and bass, there was actually no backing band. They played it all themselves, with the help of loopers, by moving from instrument to instrument. This gave a lot of their music a rhythmic quality (Sweet Disaster, No Glamour In The Hammer). But even with just the two of them on guitar, there was usually a propulsive push in their songs. It wasn't a surprise that they will be putting out an EP of blues cover because numbers like Devil's Got A Gun (with guest throat singer Tanya Tagak) clearly showed their influences.

Whitehorse claimed they've never had guest performers for any show. Because being married and touring together, their set always felt like a personal moment between them. But tonight, in addition to Tagak, they brought on several performers: Dreimanis and Fay from July Talk (Tame as the Wild One), a lucky fan on guitar (Downtown), and Doucet's father (Little Walter's My Babe). For the final song during the encore, they covered Gun Street Girl. They flubbed a lyric but as McClelland pointed out: "I mean, Tom Waits' lyrics, damn". Whitehorse certainly aimed for the same sort of timeless story-telling quality in their work.