My first experience with Martin Sexton was at the expansive, glorious Winnipeg Folk Festival several years back, about 180 degrees from the primly restored Pantages Theatre in downtown Minneapolis. Sitting in a crowd of well-scrubbed white folks in jeans, I felt like a tourist in my head-to-toe black (hey, you try to dress for an evening of multiple venues and music genres).
I felt more touristy when the lights dimmed and the crowd went positively nuts. I'm a mild yet dedicated Sexton fan after the series of Folk Fest performances I absorbed; The Pantages throng was a serious group of fans (you must be if you're yelling "rock this bitch!" in the relative quiet between songs). His live shows are the penultimate: an artist like Sexton translates well on CD but you get full-throttle soul in person, particularly when it's just him, a guitar, various pedals and a couple of mikes, as was the case Saturday night. No band, just him filling up the theater's nooks and crannies, stirring the crowd with his evangelical sound.
Sexton is a grassroots performer, relentless tour-hound and the sort of artist who garners loyalists who recognize every song and screech out for their favorites in between. I quickly fell into the spell of his bluesy, folksy, soulful sound launched by the lazy ballad "Where Did I Go Wrong", just one Sexton song showcasing his high-voltage, honey falsetto, one of the most amazing qualities of his repertoire. It's the sort of vox that creeps up your spine to explode out the top of your head into a shower of goosebumps.
Sexton melds together many genres and influences, at times slow and bluesy, then busting out head-bobbing folky jams. A pensive song like "Wasted" ("wasted/not strong as I am now") sidles up comfortably next to a more amped-up "Angeline" and "Beast in Me" ("the beast in me/is the best in me".a handy motto for all). At his most upbeat he tosses in some beatboxing and percussion via thumb slaps on the guitar. It's about this point you realize he's all the band he needs; solitary on stage yet a sheer powerhouse of beautiful sound.
His second set started off with a few songs dedicated to various women, including the wistful "Candy". Sexton is not the biggest in-between chatter guy, so he jumped from song to song: "Things You Do to Me" (mixing it up with a little "Raspberry Beret"), "I'm Comin Home", "Over My Head", "My Maria". As if we weren't already impressed by his spate of talent, Sexton occasionally did vox soloing a la Hendrix by switching on an effects pedal while singing, a technique that turned his "Gypsy Woman" into a lengthy ride. Introducing "Diner", he drew cheers when telling the crowd the first line was inspired by the ubiquitous dining car in St. Paul, Mickey's.
"Black Sheep" rounded out his second set, a radio-friendly, sweet tune that always makes me wish I was sitting around singing it with my nearest and dearest. The crowd raucously demanded a couple of encores. His first was campfire-style with Sexton perched on the edge of the stage, doing it like "it was meant to be" in the Pantages venue-no amplification. "The Way I Am" was positively mesmerizing (or maybe we were all just straining to be as quiet as possible, tense and giddy in our seats). His final song pleased the hometown crowd-"Purple Rain". His Minnesota performances are usually peppered with Prince references. (See David de Young's review of last November's Sexton appearance at the Cedar Cultural Center.)
The Pantages show was apparently Martin's last on this leg of the tour, a tour supporting his own label's live release, "Live Wide Open" (his four other releases also available at the shows). Support Kitchen Table Records (named after matronly wisdom of his youth)--pick up a copy as it'll give you a recorded slice of the entrancing Sexton soul, but next time listen live. Wear jeans like Sexton does and come prepared for conversion to full-on fan-dom.
Location Info:
Pantages Theatre
Artist Info: Martin Sexton
Share this story:
Article comments powered by Disqus