On the first of two sold-out nights at the Basement East, Wall made the crowd of 400 forget his young age (23) to reveal a songwriter ready for his brand of lean prairie country to take wider hold.
Wall’s openers were a little less enterprising but generally inoffensive. Kristina Murray of Nashville (by way of Statesboro, Ga.) played some lean modern country on the path blazed by Kacey Musgraves. Vincent Neil Emerson of Fort Worth came from a more Texas swing/outlaw country approach.
The unassuming Wall took the stage quietly, wearing the same rumpled black cowboy hat and blue workshirt from his album cover. He opened with several solo songs, including a few covers. First came Bury Me Not on the Lone Prairie, a traditional song not on his new record but a perfect fit thematically. John Beyers (Camaro Song) details the feud between two small-town plainsmen who shoot up each other’s cars.
When the band emerged, they were provided the same delicate touch as on his records - pedal steel and dobro, electric bass, harmonic and barely-there drums. They gave his songs a firm rock foundation when necessary, but they showed their best work when taking more subtle roles.
Wall’s music effortlessly mingles with his original songs with covers. Plain to See Plainsmen, Saskatchewan in 1881 and Thinking on a Woman all have a timeless feel, belonging to both 21st century Nashville and 19th century Canada. 1881’s call of Mr. Toronto man reminds me of the clash between Easterners like Theodore Roosevelt (known initially as the Dude from New York) heading to the northern Plains in the U.S. and not knowing what they were in for.
Songs of the Plains hearkens to the Marty Robbins’ classic Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs, a sparsely instrumented theme record. In his sporadic banter, Wall confirmed that Gunfighter Ballads was one of his favorite records.
All the emphasis on Nashville in modern country leaves out a huge swath of other country hotspots, and our neighbor to the north has its own on the Canadian Plains. Wall explained the origins of the Calgary Round-Up, a Wilf Carter cover about the Calgary Stampede, the rodeo and festival that takes over Alberta’s largest city every July. I only knew the stampede from the reputation of one of its chuckwagon race announcers, Billy Melville. Wall exposed another influence when the band turned from Me and Big Dave straight into Willie Nelson’s Red-Headed Stranger. Their version was a bit more rocking than Nelson’s bone-dry original, but still a pleasant surprise.
Wild Bill Hickock sounds like it should be a traditional tune, but it’s a Wall original in the vein Jesse James that chronicles the western folk hero, tracing him from his Illinois roots to his death with aces and eights in his hand at Nuttall’s No. 10 Saloon in Deadwood.
Wall concluded with a brief encore, energy of the main set intact. In Nashville, Wall won’t touch such an intimate stage again after this two-night stint.
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