BEST BET: KEVIN GORDON
By Barry Gilbert
St.
Louis Post-Dispatch
June 21, 2007
8 p.m. June 22 at Ranch House Concerts in Olivette. $12 in advance, $15 day of show. E-mail melsona@sbcglobal.net for reservations; www.ranchouseconcerts.com.
Louisiana-born, Nashville, Tenn.-based Kevin Gordon returns to St. Louis for what promises to be a memorable show in the intimate setting of a house concert. Gordon's honest blues- and swamp-soaked story songs about life and loss are always affecting, whether he's blasting away with a full band, as he did last summer at Twangfest, or performing solo with electric guitar. His most recent CD, "O Come Look at the Burning," got a boost from New Orleans legend Irma Thomas, who covered Gordon and Gwil Owen's mournful "Flowers" on her Katrina-themed CD "After the Rain." Gordon has been on the road since his set in May at JazzFest in New Orleans was cut short by a deluge. "Like the Old Testament would dream up and put on you - high winds, purple-black sky, rain falling sideways in quarter-size drops," he writes in his MySpace blog. "Don't touch that microphone, son. I actually had that internal conversation with (myself) while we were playing - that if something bad happened then and there, well, it wasn't such a bad place to go."