March 3, 2007

Hold On (with Jack Ingram)
If It Makes You Happy (with Jack Ingram) (Encore)

Photos

Photo: smalltownkid

Reviews and Recaps

If there's ever been a Texas artist determined to punch through Music Row's mainstream, it's Dallas' Jack Ingram - a veteran of three Nashville labels, nominal success and a never-say-die attitude. That resilience, toughness and learning curve netted the rocker/writer his first #1 hit on country radio last year - the sweeping midtempo “Wherever You Are” - and a stint opening for Brooks & Dunn.

But with the defiance singular to those Texas acts, Ingram might be willing to do what's necessary to get on the radio, but the white-hot flame of his live show isn't something he'll turn down under any circumstance. With thin-legged rockers in calf-gripping backing him up, it was a raw intensity to the playing that brought the songs of the past 15 years to life on a stage Imgram first mounted in 1994.

Drawing on a relentless rock edge, it is the populism of a Texas John Mellencamp that defines Ingram's truth and perspective. These are songs of hardwon recognition (“Biloxi,” “Keep On”), utter disgust (“Barbie Doll”) and broken-in tenderness (the acoustic set closer “Good Night Moon”).

It is the same no-holds-barred, no reason to pull-up-short charge that ignites the common into a flashfire that's scorchingly hot and overpowering strong. “Mustang Burn,” a hip-cocked challenge to a bested objector, is covered in kerosene and consumed by the flames of an electric guitar that won't even stop for the line breaks - and singer that dares the taunted to “try it,” for the invitation is all our protagonist whose stolen the girl and set fire to the prized car wants to bludgeon the focus of his attention.

Not that everything is quite so aggressive, or nasty. “I Want You To Be My Girl” is the urgency that can only come from the most innocent, throw-yourself-over-a-cliff-in-pursuit desire. Which is the beauty of Ingram as a performer - beyond peppering his set with personal sharings about the things he's found along the way that mattered - he inhabits the emotional center of the songs he sings with even more ferocity than recorded.

Joined not once, but twice by rocker Sheryl Crow - who took Ingram on the road as her opening act this year - for an especially kinetic “If It Makes You Happy,” her voice tart and expansive, his gruff and raspy from the show. It was a moment of churning mutual respect: her acoustic guitar chiming against the cushions of B-3 and melody-reinforcing base.

His special guest was the embodiment of a truth that Igram defines onstage: the notion that basic rock & roll is much closer to what Hank, Haggard and even Emmylou Harris intended than today's lite hair metal and sodden '80s AC. Though his measured recreation of Hinder's “Lips of an Angel” appears to be working on country radio, the largely aggie frat-roots aficionado audience gave it the evening's most tepid response.

Balance that truth with the idea that “Measure of a Man,” a brand new song that had distinctively Springsteen prongs to the lyric - which painted a picture of how one's worth is weighed by how one lives - and a starkness to the muscular arrangement that left nothing obscured, earned him solid listening from what could be deemed “a true bar crowd.” For while his audience comes to party, they also come to have their souls fed, their truths told and their reasons to believe reinforced.

If Ingram can figure out how to incite that fervor in the mainstream audience - the same ones who revered Hank Jr in his prime, or Garth Brooks' Everyman pageantry - he could pull off the ultimate: turn into an arena act with high-impact performing in a way that's transforming, yet still communicate to the mainstream in a way that takes them deeper into the lives they live without always understanding why.

-- Holly Gleason

Source: AngryCountry.com

"The highlight of my trip was the Exit/In on Saturday night, where I saw Jack Ingram perform onstage and then Sheryl Crow jumped up onstage with him. That was the most fun thing that I did here." - Hannah Storm (Tennessean.com)

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