The thing about seeing Willie Nelson in concert is, you’re never really expecting him to break out and kick ass all over the place. Whereas with a band like West Chester, PA’s Hoots & Hellmouth, you’re just kind of waiting for the musical ass-kicking—because you know it’s going to happen.
Hoots, (Sean), Hellmouth (Andrew Gray) and Rob “Dr.” Berliner (not a real doctor), are the trio who recently released their eponymous debut disc, and are in the middle of a Wednesdays-in-July residency at Pete’s Candy Store in Brooklyn. They play a combination of rock, funk, gospel, soul, country and revival that sounds way too complicated on paper. Thing is, the combinations never get too tricky. The opening track, “Want on Nothing,” sounds like it could be an alternate Blues Brothers theme, thanks to the electric organ and backup choir.
Meanwhile “Home in a Boxcar” feels like it would be played just as the barn raising was heating up and the sheriff was uncorking the good moonshine. “Rattle These Bones” has a foot-stomping, fast-strumming intensity that matches the well-phrased and strongly-worded lyrics. Halfway through, the track makes a hairpin turn and becomes a passionate and private ballad.
Some of the band’s best songs didn’t make it to the album, but in concert, yell out for “Asleep on the Couch” a song of breakup and redemption if there ever was one. “I’m in the middle of/what you might call/a fantastic kind of breakdown,” is how Hoots sets up the problem he’s about to tackle musically—through hooting, hollering and, yes, more foot stomping.
The band’s appearances at tinier venues in NYC let them descend from the stage at the end of their sets to play guitars, bang blocks of wood they jammed into their belts and clap their hands and say yeah for “It’s Close, I’m Undone,” usually the last song of the night. A p.a. malfunction at Hanks’ Saloon saw the band look at each other, mumble something like “fuck it,” completely unplug and rollick through the transfixed crowd, breaking strings and probably their vocal chords as they filled the bar with their unamplified pipes and fingers.
The “fuck-it-we’re-doing-this-thing-no-matter-what” attitude is what makes songs like “This Hand is a Mighty Hand” erupt in person. Hoots, Gray and Berliner growl and yell the lyrics, barely keeping control. They chug cold beer and their skin sweats. A Hoots & Hellmouth concert is a loud, obnoxious, sweaty, thrilling, revival of a show. It is a nightly barn raising, in fact, whether they’re playing in Memphis, Austin or Brooklyn.
Hoots & Hellmouth are not channeling the latest hipster ethos in their return to the sounds of the South. Several quieter tracks show the musical past is not a gimmick to them, making songs like “The Good I Know You Know” sound of their influences, but not stolen from them. It’s that multi-dimensionalism that allows listeners to savor the uniqueness of each track, knowing the next one will be different but cut from the same emotive cloth. In essence, this band isn’t an act: The plaid from their shirts might as well be tattooed on their bodies, the pearl snap buttons attached directly to their flesh, the belt buckles, well, you know.
July 18, 25, Pete’s Candy Store, 709 Lorimer St. (at Richardson St.), B’klyn, 718-302-3770; 10, free.
