event
Asylum Street Spankers
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Todd Williams
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Mon Nov 16
8 pm,
Asylum Street Spankers at Varsity Theater
These days, it's always a new conceptual gimmick for the Asylum Street Spankers, but it's smart to pick a strong theme when your act's an unwieldy hybrid of old-timey string band and spring-heeled variety-show comedy. The Spankers' last tour, behind the 2008 album, What? And Give Up Show Biz?, affectionately satirized the life of a touring band, but this time they're taking on religion, apropos of the new God's Favorite Band. A mix of original and traditional material, the album is as musically accomplished as it is cheeky: It begins with an acoustic instrumental tribute to bluesman Blind Willie Johnson, then plunges headlong into gypsy jazz, folk spirituals, and even a Gershwin tune, with fiddles, washboard, and mandolin ablaze.
Varsity Theater 1308 4th St. S.E., Twin Cities, MN
These days, it's always a new conceptual gimmick for the Asylum Street Spankers, but it's smart to pick a strong theme when your act's an unwieldy hybrid of old-timey string band and spring-heeled variety-show comedy. The Spankers' last tour, behind the 2008 album, What? And Give Up Show Biz?, affectionately satirized the life of a touring band, but this time they're taking on religion, apropos of the new God's Favorite Band. A mix of original and traditional material, the album is as musically accomplished as it is cheeky: It begins with an acoustic instrumental tribute to bluesman Blind Willie Johnson, then plunges headlong into gypsy jazz, folk spirituals, and even a Gershwin tune, with fiddles, washboard, and mandolin ablaze.
Updated 11/05/2009
