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Thursday July 30
2020
CLOSED
The American Aquarium show is canceled.
It likely will be rescheduled next year but for now all advance tickets for the July show can be refunded.
Thursday July 30
2020
7:30PM
doors -- music at 8:00PM
•••
ALL AGES
$16 in
advance /
$20 at the door
American Aquarium
Rock and Roll, Alt-Country
TBA
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TBA
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American
Aquarium
BJ
Barham - acoustic guitar, vocals
Shane Boeker - electric guitar, acoustic guitar, vocals
Rhett Huffman - b3, piano, wurlitzer, clavinet, celeste, harmonium,
jupiter 8, minimoog, arp omni, vocals
Neil Jones - pedal steel guitar
Ryan Van Fleet - drums, percussion
Alden Hedges - bass guitar, vocals
-from Raleigh, NC
-“Country
music was the voice of the people.
It wasn’t always the prettiest voice, but it was an honest voice,” says
American Aquarium founder and frontman BJ Barham. “I think that’s where
country music has lost its way.” He pauses, then adds, North Carolina
accent thick and voice steady: “I operate in the dark shadows of what
we don’t want to talk about in the South.”
These days, those shadows are tall and wide, making it hard to
recognize a neighbor, family––even yourself. On American Aquarium’s new
album Lamentations, Barham shines light on dark American corners with
heartbreaking conversations, long looks in the mirror, and empathetic
questions, all through songwriting that is clear without sacrificing
its poetry, and direct without losing its humanity. “As a songwriter,
my number one job is to observe and then translate what I observe into
a song, a story, a lesson,” Barham says. “I’d be doing myself and the
listener a huge disservice if I didn’t talk about the things I see,
which is a country, divided.”
As much as Barham appreciates an indignant protest song or one-sided
anthem, he isn’t writing them. Instead, on Lamentations he’s making the
political personal, reaching out to humanize folks with opposing
viewpoints, and offering dignity instead of demonizing. The result is
the strongest writing of Barham’s already stout career. “I’m still very
much standing up for what I believe in––I don’t think anyone can
question what side of the aisle I stand on,” he says. “But hopefully
people listen and at least try to understand why their Sunday School
teacher wears a Trump hat.”
Barham has built a fiercely devoted fanbase hundreds of thousands
strong, fortified with 15 years of sold-out American Aquarium shows
across the country and Europe. The band’s 2018 release Things Change
strode confidently into that distinct territory where rock-and-roll and
politics meet, prompting Rolling Stone to announce Barham “earns every
bit of his Southern Springsteen cred.” In 2019, the American Aquarium
lineup also shifted again: Shane Boeker remains on guitar, and bassist
Alden Hedges, keys player Rhett Huffman, pedal steel ace Neil Jones,
and drummer Ryan Van Fleet joined the group.
A beloved live band known for consistently playing at least 200-250
dates a year, American Aquarium chose to be more selective in 2019,
winnowing the schedule to 92 shows. For Barham, sober for six years
now, is a dad to a toddler and still happily married, the adjustment
was a must. “We’re learning how to balance being in our mid-30s and
being rock-and-rollers,” he says. “Being home was the most rewarding
experience. It allowed me to be creative and write about things that
really matter.”
Lamentations reflects that elevated focus. Barham, who is no longer
religious but was raised Southern Baptist, wrote down the word
“lamentations” in 2018, and knew it’d be his next album title before
he’d written a single song for the record. He felt an anchoring
connection to the word itself––defined as “the passionate expression of
grief or sorrow”––but also to the Old Testament book in the Bible.
“Lamentations is one of the few books in the Bible where there’s this
doubt of God––this guy, crying out to the heavens, like, Why? If you
love us so much, why did you let Jerusalem fall to Babylon?” Barham
says. “I saw a direct correlation between that and a Southern man today
who voted for Trump. I wanted to write about a broken America and all
the things that lead a human being to doubting something. Every song on
this record touches on something a little different.”
Album opener “Me and Mine (Lamentations)” is brooding and stormy,
plaintive acoustic guitar undergirding Barham’s weathered vocals.
Searching, frustrated, and sad, the song was written from the
perspective of a conservative Southern voter who feels unseen, unheard,
and short on hope. The broader message is immersive and immediate:
Settle in and listen closely. Times are hard, and this record is going
to talk about it. Barham, who doesn’t agree with the song’s protagonist
politically, imbues him with respect and sympathetic fatigue. “There
are so many people who come out nowadays and say, If you voted this
way, you’re a racist. You’re a misogynist. You’re a nationalist,” he
says. “But that was my teacher, my librarian, my uncle. I know they
aren’t bigots. So instead of saying, You’re a bad person because you
did this, I want to know why you did this. I want to talk to you about
this.”
Upbeat guitar rocker “Dogwood” follows, with a tragic story wrapped up
in singalong lines. Barham points to the song and “Luckier You Get,”
with its Springsteen vibes and an ear-worm chorus, as two of the
album’s more lighthearted moments. “Bright Leaf” is another musical
moment ready for a crowd, offering a clear-eyed look at the tobacco
farms and industry of Barham’s home through sharp lyrics that thousands
will shout-sing right back at him.
Featuring wry pedal steel and a shuffling back beat, “Better South” is
an alternative anthem, written and sung by a native Southerner who
believes in change. Line after line, “Starts with You” shows off
Barham’s self-deprecating wit: “They say you’re only as sick as your
secrets / If that’s the truth then, friend, I’m dying / Spent a
lifetime salvaging shipwrecks, / Falling so long I thought I was
flying.”
Throughout the record, the only victim of Barham’s harsh tongue is
himself. Heartbreaking “How Wicked I Was” pleads for narrative
omissions when it comes to explaining the past to his little girl.
Album highlight “Learned to Lie” cuts just as deep: Barham delivers a
gut-wrenching confession over lonely piano. Raw and intimate, its look
at how we hurt the ones we love evokes the unblinking candor of 60s and
70s Loretta Lynn––that extreme honesty Barham first valued in country
music, and now misses. “That was one of the first songs I played for
the boys in the band, and they were like, ‘Are you sure you want to
record that?’” Barham says. “It’s a hard song to talk about. It’s a
heavy song. For better or worse, I’m going to be real with you live.
I’m probably going to make you uncomfortable. And that I think that’s a
beautiful part of rock-and-roll.”
“Six Years Come September” is another heartbreaker, masquerading at
first as a familiar story before a sobering plot twist. “As a
songwriter, that’s the best feeling in the world––ruining someone with
lyrics and a well-executed story,” Barham says. He points to album
closer “Long Haul” as a frontrunner for his own favorite track. Perhaps
the closest the record comes to jubilation, “Long Haul” rolls through
three steadfast commitments Barham holds true and dear.
Ultimately, Lamentations is a thrilling portrait of an artist and his
band reaching new levels of skill, consciousness, and potential after
20 years in the trenches. Unruly and sincere, Barham emerges as an
important American voice––and an unlikely peacemaker. “I’ve had to work
really hard to carry water as a songwriter,” he says. “It feels really
good to be in my mid-30s, writing songs that I think matter. I think
when you listen to this record, something is going to change in you.
You’re going to feel something. That’s the most important part of
songwriting: making someone feel.
TBA
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TBA
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