Last week Hot Buttered Rum made another appearance in the cold and snowy northern Arizona town of Flagstaff. The show at the Orpheum Theater however, was anything but cold.
The wide spectrum of sound was quite evident as the night started with a fired up set by the opener Reverend Peyton’s Big Ass Band, and included a guest appearance by the headlining members on “Two Bottles of Wine.”
As Hot Buttered Rum began their set, there was no doubt a traditional bluegrass feel was in the air, reverberating a sound that could easily hail from high on the Rockies or deep in the Appalachians. With each member bringing harmonizing vocals and toting the more typical tools of bluegrass to the stage, the five piece band kicked off the night calling out the perils of low-point beer with the HBR classic “3.2.” Soon to follow was a rather fitting song for the little powder covered town, with the ever crowd pleasing “High On A Mountain Top.”
As the evening progressed, it quickly became evident that this band likes to take it well beyond the traditional realm of bluegrass music by including a grassy version of The Beatles’ “Rocky Raccoon." However, it was toward the end of the first set during “Idaho Pines” and “Molly Put the Kettle On” that HBR placed their signature spin on bluegrass as Erik Yates added a bit of flute to the mix.
The band opened the second set with a cover of “Rosalee McFall,” followed by a step’n version of the Grateful Dead’s “Cumberland Blues.” The two set triple encore evening ended with a trio of unplugged tunes including Dylan’s “Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right, “ followed by “Kissin’ Cousins” and ending with an acapella “Birds and the Bees.”
Throughout the night, influences of Ellington and Parker overlapped with Dylan and Garcia, all somehow wound tightly around a bluegrass core. Call it what you would… progressive bluegrass or even new grass, but Hot Buttered Rum is successfully melding jazz, rock, blues and folk in a way that few are doing right now.
