Review: Marc Cohn at the Highline Ballroom

As is my wont whenever Marc Cohn wanders into the New York-Philadelphia corridor, I went to see him perform — this time, at the Highline Ballroom in lower Manhattan. True to form, it was a fantastic show with Marc the consummate showman. The opening act was Amy Correia and this time, Marc played with a full band.

More below the fold.

Before anything else, let’s take care of the playlist.

As you can see, it was quite an extensive set. Obviously, one purpose was to promote the new album, Join the Parade — although, truth be told, Marc had already sold that album to just about everyone in the house. Beyond that, though, unlike the past few shows I’d seen, he ranged all over his body of work: Fully a third (five songs) were from the debut album Marc Cohn (or, as Marc has joked, aka his Greatest Hits package). Just one song from The Rainy Season (though, I’ll admit, I think it’s the best song from that one). The third album, Burning the Daze gave us three songs. And the new album yielded seven songs. (If you’re wondering why that doesn’t add up to the 17 songs played, he also played “One Safe Place”, which has not appeared on any Marc Cohn album yet.)

As has become de rigeur, early in the set, Marc played what he’s called his Ghost Quartet. As always, Fontayne’s liquid guitar turned “Ghost Train” from a borderline-sappy ditty into a truly haunting, maudlin dream landscape. Amy Correira’s raspy ethereal voice made “Giving Up the Ghost” truly effective. (I also love the line “Just got a letter in vanishing ink.”)

I was a little disappointed that we didn’t get “Dig Down Deep”, one of my favorites. That’s also the song during which Marc morphs into a song of his youth (often Van Morrison’s “Brown-Eyed Girl”). To make up for that, sort of, he added a riff to “Testify” that was “No Woman, No Cry”.

We got a little bit of Cohnacana before “Walking in Memphis”, when he told us a little about the legendary Muriel. Apparently he was in a writing dry spell before going to Memphis and hearing, among other things, Muriel playing gospel at the Hollywood. After a soul-moving evening singing with her, he suddenly could write and produced the rest of the album. Whenever he went back to the Hollywood, he’d play the latest creations for Muriel. But she always told him to just “play that song about me”. 🙂

All in all, it was another wonderful show that justified my personal policy of seeing Cohn in concert whenever it’s at all feasible. Here’s to hoping we don’t have to wait another decade for a new album.