When flannel shirts collide with twangy pedal steel harmonies, it can only mean one thing. There’s a folk and/or indie show about. Robert Francisalong with Noah and the Whale, brought their plaid pre-requisites to the Majestic on Wednesday, Oct. 28 and performed precisely the show one might expect.
It’s not that Robert Francis is untalented or unentertaining. In fact, he has a powerful genre voice with ample range, not to mention some deeply captivating melodies. While he easily performs at skill level with the headliners, Robert Francis is capable, but unoriginal. Wanderlust indie/folk/country bands are a dime a dozen, and Francis makes 13. He sounds like any Fleet Foxes, but without the unique beauty that is Robin Pecknold’s voice.
That being said, his emotion is heavy and well played on stage. Francis holds a demanding, albeit clich?d, presence with his furry lumberjack hat and jerky chord strikes. He certainly feels what he sings. Lyrical authorship is evident in his generic, predictable lyrics, but also in the fierce passion with which he belts them.
A few inspired gems padded stock songs about love, mountains and being a simple man. His sincerity is evident, although sincerity alone is not enough to credit him as a top-notch poet. He flirts with the idea though, and hopefully the audience could feel it. Noah and the Whale may have generated the crowd and applause, but Francis may have performed well enough to snatch a few more fans for himself.
From across the Atlantic, London’s Noah and the Whale followed Francis’ set with more of the same swaying, western plaid-rock.
It appears at first that Noah and the Whale could learn a thing or two from 22 year-old Francis. The opening song starts out with a drawn out “Blue Skies,” which transitions into an interesting pick-me-up. That style permeates the set: tired folk jams interrupted by blunt, uptempo originality. Unfortunately, the spots of originality rarely transfer over to a lyrical dimension. “This is a song for/ anyone/ with a broken heart/…I’ll do anything to be happy.” Oh, thanks for letting us know. The rest aren’t?
Singer/guitarist Charlie Fink’s voice obeyed a similar up and down rule. A British croak that is at times tragic and beautiful, at other times laughable, can’t seem to decide if it supports the music or not. It takes a few songs for him to get warmed up, but once he does, it usually meshes agreeably with the music. At the very least, it makes for a unique fusion of a London accent embedded in Americana flows.
Trudging through a set list of strange arrangements and alternating audience opinions (between boredom and head bobbing), they still managed to create a thick atmosphere full of ditties about love that keep the crowd nodding along. Their weak lyrics leave plenty of room for full, rich music, which Noah and the Whale deliver. Tom Hobden’s violin melodies certainly add to the ambience the other four members start.
The encore brings another shift in style. They return with two upbeat, nearly poppy songs that generate more audience energy than the entire set. It is good to finish strong, and while it may as well have been a different band onstage, they leave the crowd feeling satisfied with a second wind after a long night of basking in sound.
