• Del Barber – CBC Studio 700 (Vancouver – February 20th, 2014)

    Skot Nelson Posted On February 27, 2014
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    “It’s been three years since you left this tired town” is how Del Barber started his Vancouver show. “All the folks still ask why you never come around.” The song was Can’t Turn Around from his 2012 album Headwaters and about half way through the Winnipeg singer-songwriter let out a resounding call of “Hit it boys!” as call to the band…only there was no band. Barber tours with one occasionally, but this time the man took the stage solo.

    It hadn’t been three years since Barber’s last stop in Vancouver: he played both the Vancouver Folk Festival and the City of Vancouver’s outdoor concerts celebrating the birthday of Stanley Park last summer. This time though, Barber is touring to promote the release of his very new and quite fine album, Prarieography. As the title suggests, the album is a bit of a love letter to his prairie home. It’s got a spare, stripped down sound that lends itself well to being played solo and the round of applause following the opening number was a nice welcome back to Vancouver.
    Armed with a single guitar, a quick wit, and a cowboy hat Barber got quickly to work charming the attentive audience. Noticing a drink spilled in the front, he commented “That’s OK, I’ve spill lots of beer in my time.” When he was corrected by the drink’s owner that quick wit kicked in: “Oh, it’s Perrier. How Vancouver of you.” It was a nice light moment to start the show.
    The next hour or so was filled with a collection of songs that focused on the new material of Prarieography but didn’t ignore his earlier albums. Favourites like Right Side of Wrong and The Waitress (a song written when Barber “started confessin’ his sins to the ladies that work the all night truck stops”) came early and gave the show a chance to warm up for before the newer less familiar material came along. It wasn’t really needed, mind you: as a performer, Barber seemed entirely in his element and comfortable with himself on stage. He sings and plays with a self-assuredness that belies the fact that he’s barely thirty years old.
    Peter and Jenny Lee from the new album was introduced with a story about the song’s two lovers that Barber swears is 100% true, and I won’t repeat it because it needs to be heard in the flesh. It’s a great song, and Barber’s running commentary throughout had the audience in stitches. 

    The night took a quieter turn when Barber chatted about his thoughts on Canada’s oil industry, something that’s been in the news recently following a series of fairly scathing and angry comments by his fellow Winnipeg singer-songwriter Neil Young. Barber expressed a more balanced viewpoint on the topic than Young’s fairly polarizing one, saying that “It seems like the Canadian way is too look for better questions” which is a rather nice Canadian sentiment about an issue that is, in reality, fairly complicated.

    With the night drawing to a close Barber launched into the opening chords of Prarieography’s addictive Big Smoke, it’s opening verse of “Blinded by the city lights no one can see you stalling / It’s been so long since you’ve seen the prairie stars” expressing a sentiment that anybody who’s visited the wide open skies of that part of the world can appreciate. It’s typical of Barber’s songs—a simple, honest message told in an uncomplicated way, and it’s one that resonated with this Vancouver audience well. 
    A set full of original material was quickly followed by an encore of two covers. Someday Soon by Ian Tyson was a solid choice—Barber is a fan, and spends as much time fishing in Ian Tyson country (a loosely defined cross border region that includes Southern Alberta and Montana east of the rockies) as he can between gigs. This was followed by a song which Barber’s father claimed was “the greatest song every written”—Richard Thompson’s 1952 Vincent Black Lightning. 
    It was a fantastic end to an evening with a fantastic storyteller, and there may be no better testament to that fact than the audience’s laughter during the long introduction to that last song. Barber’s an engaging performer whose songs, on this particular night, sent the audience in this mountainous city out into the cold winter air dreaming of the prairies—what more could you ask for?
     
    Prariography is available on iTunes in Canada or from Del Barber’s web site directly (including vinyl copies.) The album is scheduled for release in the United States on April 13th.
    Del Barber is continuing to tour around Canada in support of Prairieography and the tour will be moving into the United States soon. Complete tour dates are on the web site.




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