BAEBLE CONCERTS: Bobby Bare Jr's Young Criminals Starvation League at The Bowery Ballroom

Surrender yourself over to the power of your wildest imagination for a moment. Fantasize about winning a Grammy…perhaps even before your 7th birthday. Imagine bumbling over to your next door neighbor…let's say she is country legend Tammy Wynette…to ask her for a cup of sugar. Now pretend you are a singer songwriter. What if someone like…oh, I don't know…children's author Shel Silverstein critiqued every one of your songs until the day he died. It would be a pretty fascinating way to spend a childhood, wouldn't it? Even more fascinating is that it is something Bobby Bare Jr. can lay claim to. And where so often, the sons and daughters of famous folk waste away the incredible hand they have been given, the powerful pedigree and lifetime of influential relationships bestowed upon Bare Jr. can be heard in this performance at the Bowery Ballroom.

Blown to New York on a carefree combination of crude oil chords and sweet summer melodies, Bare Jr. delivers a well-versed take on authentic country blues and rebellious southern rock. Humid and hazy at time, fearlessly grungy at others, Bare Jr's music let the little whiskey running through my blood do its' job. Whether lamenting for a “Flat-Chested Woman” in two part harmony, moaning and whaling like a real singing cowboy, or rolling through a set of rock and roll barn burners, Bare Jr's accomplished approach rolls on nice and easily…every bit as good as his fathers. Tack his free wheeling' live show on to this, and Bobby Bare Jr's Young Criminals Starvation League rollicks like a southern fried Guided by Voices. - David Pitz