[ATTENDED: August 25, 2022] Jake Xerxes Fussell
The Decemberists are one of our favorite bands and yet we have seen them very few times. We were supposed to see them on their last tour but they cancelled our show because Colin lost his voice.
Then last year’s show was postponed for COVID.
Finally it was rescheduled. Originally the support was from Brigid Mae Power who I don’t know. But at some point she backed out and the new support came from Jake Xerxes Fussell who I also had never heard of.
For whatever reason, we arrived pretty late and decided to get merch since the line was short. We walked in half way through Fussell’s set. It was just him and his electric guitar
So, Jake Xerxes Fussell is a guitarist who sings traditional folk songs. No, that’s not exactly right. He songs untraditional folks songs–songs that were literally sung by the folk, most of which were never recorded until a chronicler like Folkways came along.
The first song we heard was also the first song he played on his recent Tiny Desk Concert and this is how they described it:
Jake Xerxes Fussell’s Tiny Desk (home) concert opens with the eyebrow raising lyric, “I’ve got fresh fish this morning, ladies. They are gilded with gold and you may find a diamond in their mouths.” It was originally sung by a fishmonger in Florida and captured in a field recording. Coming from Fussell, it sounds as lived-in as his worn Telecaster looks. It’s immediate, but somehow out-of-time. Fussell found the tune at the Library of Congress, part of his process of collecting and curating traditional, public domain folk songs, and reinterpreting them through his own lens.
His voice is deep and old-sounding. He fills these songs with the appropriate feeling that the original singer intended. His guitar playing was quite good as well.
He won over the audience pretty easily, too. If I had been there to see him or, more importantly, if I wasn’t super excited for The Decemberists, I would have enjoyed his set a lot more. As it was I enjoyed the set quite a bit, but I really wanted to hear the main band.
I’m not sure I’d listen to his records, but I would enjoy seeing him live.
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