Marah at Glen Ridge Train Station

Saturday night I went to see Marah for the first time (actually just Dave Bielanko and Christine Smith but that is the core of the band these days it seems like). Venue was, believe it or not, the train station in Glen Ridge, NJ ! Original info for concert was that tickets would be limited to 75 but when we showed up, there were about 25 seats or so set up and there was no way the room could hold 75.

Arrived at the station early and ran into Dave Bielanko having a cigarette outside. Since we were so early, we took off and came back about an hour later. When we arrived, we saw that Dave was still standing outside and smoking but was not now joined by Christine Smith. Dave looked pretty bored, I guess it was not the most exciting venue for them to play! We grabbed seats and as I sat down I noticed that the guy behind me was the guitar player in Joe D'Urso's band (The Stone Caravan) which I thought was pretty cool.

We sat through a short set by the opening band fronted by the guy who booked the show (seems like this is an annual charity gig) - they sounded pretty good to me with some nice harmonies. After a short break, Dave and Christine came in and kicked off a tremendous set. They played for 1:45 and put everything into it as if they were playing to a packed club rather than a group of people sitting around in the waiting room of a train station. I had heard great things for years about Marah's live show and have a few bootlegs as evidence but to witness up close the powerful sound that the two of them were able to produce was truely amazing.

The only disapointment from me was that Christine did not play anything from her excellent solo release of a few years ago, "Tomorrow Blues".  I know she has played "Evil" from the CD at some of the Light Of Day shows and was hoping we would get to hear that on this night. I have to make special mention of how amazing she was during this show. She was playing keyboard while keeping the beat on a tambourine with her foot and also playing the occasional harmonica part all at the same time!

Dave mentioned that they had just finished mixing a new CD and played a bunch of songs from it. He was glad to be out of the studio and excited to be playing live again. The band has 2 sold out shows coming up at Bowery Ballroom in NYC which are apparantly sold out already so this was a rare opportunity to catch the band in such a unique setting. The new CD is titled "Life Is A Problem" and is due for a June 22rd release. This year is shaping up to be a promising one musically with many of my favorites having releases lined up for the next few months: The Alarm, Willie Nile, Jesse Malin, Gaslight Anthem, John Mellencamp's long awaited boxset, and now Marah.

Below are a couple of YouTube videos. This first one (which I did not take) is Dave and Christine performing "Walt Whitman Bridge" at the Glen Ridge show - quality is not the best, but it will give you a taste. There are more videos from the show on YouTube if you are interested enough to search.



The second video is Christine Smith performing "Evil" at Light Of Day concert in Wales back in 2008.



Links:
http://www.marah-usa.com/
http://www.myspace.com/marahusa
http://www.myspace.com/christinesmithnyc