I Just Read About That…

[ATTENDED: September 25, 2019] Derek Ted

I had never heard of Derek Ted when it was announced that he was opening for Pinegrove (along with Boyscott).

I arrived plenty early to get to Pinegrove because the show started at 7:30 and a lot of people didn’t show up until 8.  So I was right up font when Derek Ted started.  He came out and it was just him and his guitar.

He played the first song and it was fine.  I didn’t love his voice but I thought the melody and lyrics were really nice.

After that first song, the rest of the band came out–another guitar, drums and bass.  I can’t find any band member names online, but they added some amazing components to the music as you can hear in “Waves on the Lake.”

The drums were minimal and yet relatively complex–unexpected time changes and a bunch of song that ended abruptly with a smacking snare drum.

His bassist did a lot of harmonies with him and she worked perfectly with his voice (which I also felt was a lot better with a band backing him).  You can hear them on “Sew Me Up” from his soon to be released album, Better Spirit.

And the lead guitarist added some really nice grace notes to his already pleasant melodies.

I have only been able to determine one song from the show and that was the really lovely “Hourglass Sand”

By the time the set was over, I was really interested in buying one of his mixtapes (that he had just burned on his computer at home before coming out to the east coast).  I grabbed one at the merch table for $5 and really enjoyed it so far.  I was quite amazed that there were 24 songs on it (his bandcamp. catalog totals 33 songs, although there’s a new album due shortly).  The only problem with the mixtape is that it doesn’t have any song titles.  So I don’t know which songs are which.  I wonder if I put it in my computer if he copied the song titles too?

Once again, the stage lighting at Union Transfer has killed what I thought were good pictures.