 by Julian Spivey
Jason Boland and the Stragglers brought their Pearl Snaps 20th Anniversary Tour to Little Rock’s The Revolution Room on Saturday, February 22 for a night focusing on the 20th birthday of the group’s debut album Pearl Snaps. Boland remarked early on during the show that the album was almost old enough to legally drink. Pearl Snaps is a modern classic and an incredibly important album in the Texas Country/Red Dirt subgenres of country music. Much of Boland’s setlists over the last 20 years have featured tracks from this debut and have become incredible sing-alongs every night for his dedicated fanbase. Saturday night was either my fifth or sixth time seeing Boland and the Stragglers live (I’ve lost count) and I knew I had to attend the show to see the group pay tribute to such a fantastic album. I thought going into the show that the band would perform the entire album from start-to-finish and that didn’t end up happening, which was a slight disappointment, but the entire show consisting of tracks from that album along with what amounts to Boland’s “greatest hits” was far from a let down and left me feeling that Boland and the Stragglers are the best active live band in any version of country music. Boland and the band began the evening with the first five tracks off Pearl Snaps in order: “Somewhere Down in Texas,” “Drinkin’ Song,” “Pearl Snaps,” “Proud Souls” and “Ponies.” Being the entire reason for the tour I’d have to say the beginning of Saturday’s show was my favorite portion of the evening. Just singing along to stuff like “Somewhere Down in Texas” and “Pearl Snaps” with a crowd of like-minded music lovers in a jam-packed, intimate room is among concert memories I’ll never forget. I would’ve loved to hear Pearl Snaps tracks like “Backslider Blues,” “Devil Pays in Gold,” “No Damn Good” and “Change in the Weather,” but I’m sure Boland has his reasons for leaving these tracks out of the setlist. However, the one omission I just couldn’t believe was “If I Ever Get Back to Oklahoma, a frequent among his sets. I was shocked when his encore was finished, and it wasn’t performed. I’ve seen him perform it live multiple times and it’s always a crowd favorite. After beginning the show with a run through the first half of Pearl Snaps, Boland and the band would play tracks from the rest of their outstanding repertoire. “Comal County Blue,” “Blowing Through the Hills,” “Tennessee Whiskey,” “Electric Bill” and his excellent cover of the Don Williams hit “Tulsa Time” prove to be huge hits for the crowd, as they always are. Boland and the Stragglers are a raucous honky tonk group, but Boland wasn’t afraid on Saturday night to slow things down a bit with ballads, including “Ludlow,” a song about the Ludlow Massacre in Colorado in 1914 when the Colorado National Guard attacked striking coal miners and their families. Boland admitted the song was depressing. He would also perform terrific slower numbers like “Fences,” about the plight of Native Americans, and “Hard Times Are Relative,” the title track of his most recent album from 2018. It wouldn’t be slow ballads for long though as the band would throw foot stompers like “Pushing Luck,” “When I’m Stoned” and the punkish “I Guess It’s Alright to Be An Asshole,” one of my personal favorites of the evening. The group finished their set with a fan-favorite off of Pearl Snaps in “Telephone Romeo,” but had to stop momentarily when a fight between concertgoers broke out not too far from the stage. Boland remarked, “way to fuck up the last song” before launching back into the tune. With uproarious chants of “Jason Fucking Boland” from a crowd that had been well-served throughout the evening, the band didn’t stay gone for long before retaking the Rev Room stage for a terrific encore that included “Dee Dee OD’d,” Boland is obviously as inspired by punk’s The Ramones as he is old school country acts like Merle Haggard and Gary Stewart, as well as “Gallo del Cielo,” the greatest cockfighting song of all-time, and “Outlaw Band,” my personal favorite from the group and a song that I’ve often called “the finest concert ender” I’ve ever heard/seen. Boland and the Stragglers always finish their shows with terrific performances of “Outlaw Band,” which ends with potentially the finest fiddle solo you’re ever going to see from the fantastic Nick Worley, who everybody who listens to Red Dirt country music should be familiar with. Opening the show for Jason Boland and the Stragglers is up-and-coming California country singer Jesse Daniel, who seems very inspired by the Bakersfield Sound popularized by Buck Owens and Merle Haggard. Daniel even covered Haggard’s “Ramblin’ Fever” very aptly on Saturday night. Daniel also reminds me a bit of Canadian country singer Corb Lund, especially in his voice, which is certainly a plus. Daniel definitely seems like a name fans of non-mainstream country music are going to be hearing more and more soon. He had one album under his belt thus far – 2018’s Jesse Daniel – and will be releasing another one very soon. Oftentimes it’s hard for an opening act to keep the attention of a crowd that’s come primarily for the evening’s star, but Daniel didn’t seem to have an issue keeping the crowd engaged with songs like “Hell Bent,” “Soft Spot (For the Hard Stuff)” and “SR-22 Blues.” He finished the night to a large ovation on his most recent single “Rollin’ On.” I definitely looked forward to his upcoming release.
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