Raleigh, North Carolina band American Aquarium played at Oddbody’s Music Room in Dayton, Ohio on March 4, 2016. The band opened their set with the title track from their latest album, Wolves. Throughout the 17-song set the band played a mix of songs from “Wolves” and 2012’s “Burn.Flicker.Die” as well as a fantastic cover of Willis Alan Ramsey’s “Northeast Texas Women”.
Midway through the set, lead singer BJ Barham gave most of the band a short break while he played two of the songs from his upcoming debut solo album, Rockingham, with Whit Wright backing him on steel guitar. While on a European trip, Barham wrote a collection of songs that he felt were more intimate and personal and decided they would work better as a solo acoustic project than with a full-band production. Barham and Wright began with “The American Tobacco Company”, a song Barham wrote about his grandfather. The short acoustic set ended with “The Unfortunate Kind” before the rest of the band came back to the stage.
The band closed out their set with five more songs, ending with fan favorites “I Hope He Breaks Your Heart” and “Burn.Flicker.Die”. After leaving the stage briefly, the band returned for an encore. Barham mentioned that John Prine was one of his favorite songwriters – Prine seems to be a favorite songwriter of many Alt-Country and Americana bands – before the band played a cover of Prine’s “Spanish Pipedream”.
This was my first time seeing American Aquarium and it definitely won’t be the last. The band played a great show and Barham’s acoustic set has me looking forward to his debut solo album. American Aquarium continues its tour through April before Barham plays a run of solo shows in May.
Barham’s debut album can be pre-ordered on PledgeMusic (http://www.pledgemusic.com/projects/rockingham), where it has already reached its funding goal. “Wolves” is available as a free download for a limited time athttp://noisetrade.com/americanaquarium/wolves.
Originally posted here.
