As soon as the Felice Brothers straggled on to the stage and took up their instruments in the Showcase Lounge of Higher Ground, James Felice set the tone for the evening by offering a jolly holiday wish and expression of thanks to the comparatively small but adoring crowd. Seconds later this motley group of upstate New Yorkers’ dispensed their customarily rambunctious musical melange, while still allowing for moments of reflection as befit Easter Sunday.
But to say the Felice Brothers did nothing new on March 27th in Vermont is to pay them compliments of almost the highest order. While they are, in some significant ways, a different band than they were almost a decade ago when they began playing the South Burlington venue– Simone Felice left the group in 2009, a move that necessitated not just the reconfiguration of the rhythm section (which bassist Josh Rawson and drummer Will Lawrence have now accomplished with authority), but the dual assumption of on-stage leadership by guitarist Ian and his aforementioned sibling on accordion, keyboards and vocals.
The two couldn’t be more dissimilar looking, the former a wan but good-natured waif, wry in his audience repartee, the latter a burly high-spirited fellow who, in keeping with his intro, not to mention the uproarious nature of his lead vocals on songs such as “Whiskey in My Whiskey,” occupied a place at the merch table to meet and greet fans post-performance. Rawson, Farley and Lawrence are extensions of those dual dispositions in their demeanor and style of play, so the unity of the group couldn’t be more obvious–or solid as they parlay a mix of styles as ramshackle as it is eclectic.
Seemingly conceived on the spot during between song conference, the Felices’ set mirrored their two namesakes’ general demeanor, further suggesting the quintet engages in some furious rehearsals to allow for the level of spontaneity they maintain during the course of such ninety-minute concerts. And it isn’t just fiddler Greg Farley, during “Cumberland Gap,” egging Ian on to a guitar solo to a frenzied guitar solo: this band looks and sounds like they’re about to fall apart at any minute , but they never do. Rather, the shared vocals circle around the stage in quick timely succession, while the cold stops on a number like “Take This Bread” ratify not just their level of practice, but how closely they listen to each other while in the constant motion they maintain as they play.
And while the greater proportion of the Sunday night set-list contained originals like “Cherry Licorice,” the covers they chose were ultimately the highlights, flashpoints of intensity for the songs that came before and after. In contrast to his somber approach to “Saint Stephen’s End,” (performed as a duo with Rawson), Ian was a man possessed during Jimmy Cliff’s “Many Rivers to Cross.” And while he sounded a bit tentative leading into the encore of Neil Young’s “Tonight’s the Night,” he eventually declaimed the story in such a foreboding way it not just connected to the reggae icon’s number from a half-hour prior: it was an object lesson in dynamics as the Felices followed it with high-spirited abandon of Rev. Gary Davis’ “Sally Where’s You Get Your Liquor From?”
More than just a comment on delivery of drinks to the stage early on, the joyous effect was no doubt magnified for those in attendance who’d seen the Felice Brothers before. But even for newcomers to the group, this had to come across as yet another moment in a series of shared pleasures, the cumulative effect of which resembled nothing so much as the reunion of old friends relishing the past, savoring the present and delighting in the prospects of the fut
