Bromberg at the State

Lola and I caught David Bromberg (and the “Angel Band”) last night at the newly refurbished (and magnificent) State Theater. I couldn’t stop marveling that I had last seen him some 27 years ago, at a long-demolished bar here in town called the Brickhouse. So apparently had a fair number in the crowd; several voices yelled out "Brickhouse!" throughout the evening, to no response from the stage.

The crowd was relaxed and a little rowdy. (Before the band came on, one guy hollered at the M.C., “Can we smoke pot?” “Not unless you have enough for everybody,” was the retort.) The show began with a short set by the Angel Band, a sweet-harmonizing female trio made up of two sexy young things and Bromberg’s wailing, witty wife. “Obi Wan” Bromberg she called him, introducing him with the rest of her back-up band.

After intermission, Obi and his sidemen reassembled as the David Bromberg Quartet. It was quickly evident that the old master can still bring it. He is thick-waisted now, and gray-bearded, and his antic side has been diminished, but he still sings, plays, and performs with great soul and wizardry, and that old wicked wit. He still plays country blues guitar like Robert Johnson and vamps like Bo Diddley. Still has that nasally, textured, mercurial voice that runs from a full-out blues shout to a a falsetto whisper and back again, accompanied by an amazing range of funny, tortured grimaces as he wrings blazing notes from the neck of his guitar. Still does “Sharon.”

No surprise that his sidemen on mandolin and fiddle are brilliant. The two sets made an appealing contrast: the sweetness and sass and hymn-like qualities of the Angel Band followed by the rambunctious low-down blues and ball-busting virtuosity of the Quartet. Only Bromberg remained on stage all night. He played ‘til he was tired, and left his old fans smiling.