James McMurtry Performs Some of the Greatest Story Songs You'll Ever Hear at White Water Tavern

by Julian Spivey

Julian Spivey Photo

Singer-songwriter James McMurtry brought his brand of literary Americana folk-rock music to the White Water Tavern in Little Rock, Ark. for a two-night stand on Wednesday, October 4 and Thursday, October 5.

I attended the Thursday night show and, as always seems to be the case at the White Water, it was a magical evening of terrific music in a nice communal atmosphere.

I feel like I was pretty late to the McMurtry game. He’s been recording music since the late ‘80s but I’ve come to know him over his last two albums: 2015’s Complicated Game and 2021’s The Horses and the Hounds. He’s an extraordinary storyteller, something that no doubt runs in the family as his father was famed novelist Larry McMurtry of Lonesome Dove fame, and his mother was an English professor. Prose is in his blood.

I might be a simpleton, but music has always been my favorite form of literature, so McMurtry’s brand of storytelling set to music is just perfect for me.

From the very moment I heard “Copper Canteen” and “You Got to Me,” off Complicated Game, they immediately became my favorite McMurtry songs, as I have a feeling that’s never going to change. They are perfect short stories set to music that I can see in my mind’s eye every time I listen and sing along, mentally putting myself in the shoes of the narrator. “Copper Canteen” actually has lines that remind me of my own life and relationship, though I’m younger than the narrator telling the story and I have no desire “to kill one more doe” before the end of deer season. But it’s almost as if: “Hold on to your rosary beads/leave me to my mischievous deeds like we always do” was written directly for me and my wife.

“You Go to Me” is the story of a gentleman who ends up as a guest at a wedding in a once-familiar location that instantly brings back the memory of a long-lost love. This is not a scenario I’ve ever found myself in personally, but damn if I don’t feel it in my bones as if somewhere and sometime in this universe I was again in the narrator’s shoes. That’s the kind of lived-in, true-to-life storytelling McMurtry is capable of.

Thursday night wasn’t the first time I’d heard him perform these wonderful songs. A few years ago, he opened a show for Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit at the Robinson Center in Little Rock and performed both – but on Thursday night it was like hearing them again live for the first time. I’ll never tire of hearing “Copper Canteen” and “You Got to Me.”

What made me the most excited to see McMurtry on Thursday night, other than the hope he’d perform those two songs again and the White Water Tavern becoming my favorite live music haunt, was the fact that I hadn’t seen him live since he released The Horses and the Hounds, which was my favorite album period of 2021.

And McMurtry certainly did not disappoint when it came to performing his latest album getting to seven of the 10 tracks on it and, by God, if they weren’t probably my seven favorites on the thing.

The first one he performed on the evening was “Canola Fields,” which is one of my two favorites on the album (it’s so hard to decide between it and “Blackberry Winter”). “Canola Fields” is similar to “You Got to Me” in recalling a lost love, but unlike in the previous songs, this love eventually finds its way back to him. Speaking of “Blackberry Winter,” it was potentially the most magical performance of his entire set with his three The Heartless Bastards bandmates – Tim Holt on guitar and accordion, Darren Hess on drums and his bassist who simply went by “Cornbread – stepping away for a bit and McMurtry even walking away from the microphone to perform to a stunned, hushed crowd. He’s not the first artist I’ve seen do this at the White Water and it’s always a spine-tingly moment no matter who does it. For him to do it on one of my favorite songs of his just added to the beauty of the entire evening.

The other songs from The Horses and the Hounds performed on Thursday night were “Operation Never Mind,” “If It Don’t Bleed,” “Vaquero,” the hilarious “Ft. Walton Wake-Up Call,” with the crowd singing the refrain “I keep losing my glasses” and the tragic “Jackie.”

Among the many other fantastic performances of the evening was the band rocking through a “medley of their hit” as McMurtry wryly stated – don’t worry though folks he didn’t smile! – of “Choctaw Bingo” which just about burned the place down, as well as “Childish Things,” the title track off his 2005 album, and “No More Buffalo,” from 1997’s It Had to Happen.

McMurtry and The Heartless Bastards ended their set with a rip-roaring performance of “Too Long in the Wasteland,” the title track off his debut album in 1989.

McMurtry was coaxed back onto the stage for an encore, something I honestly haven’t seen much at the White Water Tavern, for a performance of a new song he’s been working on called “Pinocchio in Vegas,” which was both humorous and touching as hell and I can’t wait to see on a future album.

Amazingly, McMurtry left the stage again and took the stairs to the second story of the small barroom venue before once again being begged back downstairs for a second encore, this time performing the beautiful “These Things I’ve Come to Know,” off Complicated Game, before finally calling it a night.

BettySoo, a singer-songwriter out of Austin, opened both nights at the White Water for McMurtry with her terrific songwriting and beautiful voice. I had never heard of BettySoo prior to Thursday night’s show but I’ll definitely be following her now. Always pay attention to the openers when you go to concerts. I promise you will find new favorites. She began her set solo with quiet, contemplative tunes before being joined on stage by Hess and Cornbread for a thoroughly rocking second half of the set.