Show Review: Frank Smith

After my friend Ashod politely scolded me yesterday for not following through with what I say I'm going to do, I realized I needed to tell you what I thought about the Frank Smith show.

It was a low-key evening, there were just a handful of people out at the Mohawk after midnight last Wednesday.  It was funny running into someone from San Francisco amongst the small crowd; apparently Matt from High Road Touring moved here about a year ago to get married.  See, I'm not crazy for leaving San Francisco for Austin!

Frank Smith is essentially Brett Saiia and Aaron Sinclair, plus they had a bass player sitting in with them on this occasion.  When I say "sitting in" I mean that literally -- Brett stood, and Aaron stood, and the bass player sat down on a chair in between them, kind of in the back where a drummer would normally be.  For some reason this really distracted me.  Because I would look at Brett for a while and think "nice banjo playing" and then I'd pan to Aaron and think "I really like his voice", but in the midst of that I'd have to see this guy just sitting there, on a chair, playing his bass, staring off into the distance.  It wasn't that I noticed if he was a good or bad bass player, I was just distracted by his positioning.  Brett and Aaron were standing but they didn't move around much either.  I think I would have liked to have seen either everyone standing up, or everyone sitting down like, hey this is a folk show, pull up a chair, it's casual.

Distractions and lackluster stage presence aside, I did enjoy the music.  Brett is an apt multi-instrumentalist and Aaron's got character in his voice.  The two sing well together and they have good songs.  I'm looking forward to see what these guys do in Austin and beyond. 

I need to get my hands on their latest record Heavy Handed Peace and Love.

Frank Smith mp3:  Listen to "Liar and a Thief"

Comments

[jess]

You should go to their show at Emo's on 1/17. They have a full band now!

I like your blog. I'll have to get on the mailing list.

[Krissy]

Thanks Jess! My roommate saw them play with Zookeeper the other night and they had a full band setup. He said they were really good. I'll definitely check them out again.