Live Review: Patty Griffin w/ Lucy Wainwright Roche @ The Birchmere — 7/12/24
I’ve seen Patty Griffin many times, going to back to the Austin City Limits Festival in 2004, but I learned something new about her at her recent show at The Birchmere: She loves potty humor. (She’s just like me!) Patty told the audience how she couldn’t resist stopping at a roadside attraction in Missouri with the hilarious name of the Uranus Fudge Factory.
Sometimes, we forget that these artists, who we love and admire so much, are just people like anyone else. We often look at their ability to create as some kind of superpower, something that makes them categorically different from the rest of us. But they really aren’t! This funny, odd moment served to humanize Griffin.
While she may have a fondness for potty humor, it’s not something that finds its way into her songs. She plays it straight in her writing, telling moving, often heartrending tales of love and loss, family and faith, and struggle. Her writing is deeply admired by fellow artists: Her songs have been covered by artists ranging from mainstream country artists like Miranda Lambert and the Chicks to blues singers Joan Osborne and Ruthie Foster, pop icons Bette Midler and Jessica Simpson, and American legends like Mary Chapin Carpenter and Emmylou Harris. Her singing has been praised by critics like Dave Marsh and her vocals have been featured by Dierks Bentley and Mavis Staples.
On July 12, the first of two nights at The Birchmere, Patty presented a night of powerful songs, powerfully delivered. Griffin started things off with “Love Throw A Line,” followed by “Hourglass,” from her self-titled 2019 album. The album was her first in four years, following a recovery from breast cancer, and won the Grammy for Best Folk Album. This was her second Grammy; she also won Best Traditional Gospel Album for her 2010 record Downtown Church.
After “Hourglass,” Patty teased the audience, “So what’s been going on in Washington, DC?” She said, “I had siblings that worked in DC, different jobs times, the Congressional Budget Office. All that Washington speak. You guys are not normal.” (She’s right about me, albeit for different reasons.)
Next was “Cold As It Gets,” followed by the first of two covers, the Consoler’s “Waiting For My Child.” The evening’s other cover was a gospel tune, “Tell The Angels,” by Albertina Walker. Between songs, Griffin talked about her trip up from Austin, where she’s lived for several decades. (She’s a native of Oldtown, Maine, and she first broke into music as part of the vibrant early 90s Boston folk scene.) The trip, she said, took three days, because of the hurricane, which forced them to divert their path several times. One of the places she passed through was Tulsa, Oklahoma, which she called “sad and oddly beautiful.” (Much the same can be said of her songs.)
The audience was quite pleased to hear Patty say, “I’ve been home writing songs,” and she shared a couple of them: “Long Time,” which she called “another sad one,” and “That Was The End.” These news, I’m happy to say, are as good as anything she’s written.
“Go Wherever You Wanna Go,” she shared, was written about her father when he was dying. After playing it, she mentioned that she recently turned 60. “Getting old is weird,” she said, “but I kind of like it.” She switched to piano for a few songs, including the title track of her 2015 LP, “Servant of Love.” The set continued with “You Never Get What You Want” and “When It Don’t Come Easy,” then “Shine A Different Way.” “Heavenly Day,” the penultimate number in her set, comes from her 2007 album Children Running Through, which won album of the year from the Americana Music Association. She finished her set with “No Bad News,” and, when she came back for her encore, played “What I Remember.”
Lucy Wainwright Roche kicked off the evening with a 30-minute set. She’s the daughter of folk royalty, Loudon Wainwright III and Suzzy Roche, and her siblings Rufus and Martha Wainwright are musicians, too. The subject of her family came up when she introduced “The City,” which she wrote in her hotel room in Pataski, Michigan when she was supposed to be appearing at a show with several members of her family. After opening with “Seek and Hide,” she asked if anyone had seen her before; I had, as I knew her in passing at Oberlin. She talked about her new daughter, Mabel, and her dog Maybe. The second song of the set was a cover of Richard Shindell’s “Next Best Western,” followed by her own “Last Time” and “Heroin.” She finished her set with Tom Petty’s “I Won’t Back Down.” She’ll be with the Indigo Girls at Wolf Trap next month, singing backup vocals.
I’ve seen Patty about as much as anyone. My love for her music goes back to my teens, to hearing her on local radio. Her writing has only deepened and gotten stronger, and she’s still a powerful singer as you’ll find in the folk-Americana world.