From: chip@chinacat.unicom.com (Chip Rosenthal) Subject: concert review: 3/8, Austin Terrace To: shot-of-rhythm@chinacat.unicom.com Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 17:13:02 -0500 (CDT) [The Austin Chronicle is *the* weekly paper here in the ``Live Music Capital of the World'' (coff coff). They are so cool, they even have a net address . They reviewed the 3/8 concert at the Terrace (one of three shows he performed during his trip through the Austin area), and I got permission to copy their review to the list. BTW...I saw this show and it was a very very very good gig. -chip] Copyright 1994 by The Austin Chronicle Corporation. Reprinted by permission. John Hiatt & the Guilty Dogs The Terrace, March 8 Oh, how I hate having to share John Hiatt with a rock crowd. Nothing against rock & roll, but all you really need to please the people is a solid backbeat and a string bender who plays lots of notes or makes lots of noise. God meant rock to be heard and not understood. Hiatt, on the other hand, is a lyrical craftsman of subtlety and grace -- which is why his songs turn up on so many country albums. Lines like ``I feel the cold that can follow the first kiss/Shall I try to turn what's been frozen for years/Into a river of tears?'' get buried when the guitar is wanking out feedback and the sound board is trying to make the vocal sound like the guitar. How can they go smashing a perfectly good lyric? But Hiatt's a rocker and proud of it. Though his own guitar playing wouldn't cut it at an open mike, he sounded terrific backed by his power trio, The Guilty Dogs. In his current incarnation, I'd place him in the Springsteen-Petty vein, writing a melodic rock that draws on the period from Elvis to Janis. Put it another way, Hiatt's a musical historian, one of those classical, disciplined writers who sums up a generation in its sunset phase. He sprinkles allusions like stolen moments, ranging from ``Not Fade Away'' to ``Born to Be Wild.'' Even ``Perfectly Good Guitar'' carries a whiff of age -- when's the last time you actually saw one smashed at a concert? Nary a sound at The Terrace was created after 1980. Guitarist Michael Ward threw in every lick from the Bad Company songbook, along with snatches of ``Iron Man'' and even ``Witchy Woman.'' The profound irony of Hiatt is that he's rejuvenated himself by celebrating middle age. Like The Boss, he's finding ways to pull rock from its smells-like-teen-spirit roots to deal with the paunchy realities of forty-plus. ``Stolen Moments'' reflects wistfully on a gloriously misspent youth, while ``Your Dad Did'' captures the horrifying-yet-strangely-comforting moment a guy boomer realizes he's turned into his father. It's wise rock for parents who don't get what their kids are listening to. What will he write about when he gets false teeth? - P Steve Brooks -- Chip Rosenthal 512-447-0577 | I figure the odds be fifty-fifty Unicom Systems Development | I just might have some thing to say. | -FZ