M. Ward @ Town Hall: He's Got One Magic Trick

As expected, M. Ward was fantastic last night at his Town Hall debut. A perfect venue I could not think of to perfectly showcase his incredible voice and talent for storytelling. Opening the hour-and-a-half set with a 10-minute long steadily building guitar frenzy, he then quietly broke into Post-War fave, 'Chinese Translation'. And from the first few vocals of the tune, we all knew we were in for something special.


With just one or two dim lights on Matt the entire time, the show felt extraordinarily intimate. In fact, it was one of the few shows that I've been to recently where I can actually say that I felt engaged throughout the entire performance.


The set featured a bevy of tracks from last year's Post-War and his 2005 release, Transistor Radio, as well as a handful of covers, including a brilliant rendition of a Daniel Johnston tune (its name escapes me). Bouncing back and forth between guitar/harmonica/looping and the signature Town Hall Steinway piano, the whole show was really just beautiful. I don't know what other words to use. Respectful crowd, amazing talent, and relatively low ticket price. Oh and a great seat didn't hurt things either (row E center for you nosy folks!).


To top it off, M. Ward had some special guests during his encore. While I don't quite know which two performers joined him for 'Magic Trick' (which he actually changed lyrically from 'she' to 'I' during the song), they did a great job; the collaboration really worked quite nicely. Then, as you can see above, Mr. Bright Eyes himself, Conor, came out joined M. Ward to perform 'Vincent O'Brien' to close the show.


And there's Conor again for your visual pleasure. Amazing amazing amazing.

MP3: M. Ward - Poison Cup (sendspace)