Two years have passed since Paul Luc released his last album, Tried & True. After hitting the road and traveling to Nashville to record his newest masterpiece, Bad Seed, he threw an incredible release party at Mr. Smalls on March 10th to celebrate this incredible piece of work. Joined by Andre Costello and Emily Rodgers, who opened for Luc, it was a night to remember for sure.
Andre opened the night with a solo set, featuring some of classics, as well as his newest single, Broken Noses which is NOT a song about the shape of Costello’s nose, as he joked. Its really a great tune and you can check it out now as an instant download, when you pre-order his EP “Resident Frequencies”, expected out May 11, 2018 on Misra Records. Costello ended his set with “NSA”, engaging the crowd for this one, singalong style.
Emily Rodgers, who was joined on stage by her violinist Megan Williams, delivered a beautifully haunting set. Her powerful, yet subtle vocals, combined with classic music undertones and raw lyrics were reminiscent of Tori Amos. Playing some more recent work, as well as some older pieces that they hadn’t played in a while (though they were all new to me), Emily and Megan spilled their emotions on that stage in the most beautiful way. I’m looking forward to seeing them again and you can catch them at their next show at Get Hip Recordings on March 24th…in fact, you can catch Andre Costello at that same show!
Throughout the first two sets, more and more folks began to pour into the Millvale theater and before Paul Luc took the stage, the place was packed. Just as his set was about to start, his band took their places and prepared for Luc to join them. This wasn’t just any band, either. Paul pulled together incredible support for this show, with Nathan Zoob guitar, Read Connolly on steel guitar, Jesse Prentiss on bass, Joey Waslousky keeping beats and Randy Baumann on keys. After the band took their places, Luc joined, dressed for the occasion with a blazer and red rose boutonniere. Opening the set with “Desire”, the crowd was instantly consumed with high, infectious energy.
After getting things going, Luc’s monitor went out but he kept the crowd engaged while others were troubleshooting the technical issues. It was actually pretty impressive how the down time didn’t feel anything like down time at all. Things weren’t moving along quite quick enough though, so he swapped mics with Prentiss and did few songs from stage left. Paul owned that left sided mic, as well as he does center stage. Eventually, things were sorted out and he migrated by to his mic and more importantly, his pedal board and the show continued on for a 13 song performance with both full band, solo acoustic and acoustic + keys tunes, including “Restless Mind”, “Good Time” and of course “Bad Seed”, before closing out with “Stranger to Me”. Paul will be heading out to Missouri in April, but you can catch him (semi)locally again at Flood City Music Festival on August 4th.
Paul Luc
André Costello
Emily Rodgers
Paul Luc Set List:
Desire
War Is Hell
Lone Wolves
Restless Mind
Slow Dancing
Fork in My Road
Good Times
Shores
Where All The Time Goes
Driving Rain
Bad Seed
Vengeance
Stranger To Me
Andre Costello Set List:
Tumbleweed
New Song
New Song
She Took My Hand
Places
Broken Noses
NSA
Emily Rodgers Set List:
This Town
Two Years
In Spring Alchemy
In This City
Hurricane
Hurt
No Way Out
