By: David Schultz

The Band used to famously sing about life being a carnival, two bits a shot. Keeping the spirit of the Helm/Danko-sung classic alive, the travelling road show that is Tea Leaf Green likens itself to the circus coming to town. Without resorting to death defying stunts or sideshow freaks, Tea Leaf Green generates the equivalent wide-eyed excitement and exhilarating sense of wonderment as a night under the big top. Getting past the red and white tent that adorned the cover of last year’s Raise Up The Tent, Trevor Garrod has always filled his picaresque songs with the mindset of a self-aware, rakish vagabond and on “Criminal Intent,” Josh Clark’s demand to be taken to the circus comes straight from the seamy underbelly of the carnival. Just recently, the Tea Leaf Green three ring circus returned to New York City for a Saturday night show at The Fillmore NY at Irving Plaza as a stop on their just-concluded "Got No Friends" tour.

On their return to Irving Plaza, Tea Leaf didn’t stray far from their bread and butter, the complementary styles of Clark and Garrod, the yin to the other’s yang. For bands to be a true cohesive unit and propel themselves along a path to longevity, there needs to be more than one personality of intrigue. The Velvet Underground’s most inventive period occurred when John Cale was around to play the foil for Lou Reed, The Grateful Dead could become a different band depending on whether Jerry Garcia and Bob Weir were up front and the academic analysis of the Lennon/McCartney dichotomy has been run well into the ground. Throughout their two sets spread out over three hours, Tea Leaf moved between Garrod’s easy-going songs, filled with bucolic images and rural bonhomie, and Clark’s edgy bursts of primal, swaggering rock and roll. All the while, drummer Scott Rager and bassist Reed Mathis, who has returned to the band on a more permanent basis after splitting the past year between Tea Leaf and his commitments with the Jacob Fred Jazz Odyssey, provide the framework that allows the music to travel in any direction they choose.

In a nod to their surroundings, Tea Leaf scattered hints of The Big Apple throughout the night: the show’s opener, "Carter Hotel," one of Clark’s most complete songs, takes its name and casts a rosy glow on one of Manhattan’s more infamous hotels and their encore, a heartfelt cover of Bob Dylan’s “Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues,” openly pines for a return to the familiar confines of New York City. More subtly, Clark worked in the distinctively angular licks commonly associated with Talking Heads into “Soldiers Of Kentucky.”

After the “Carter Hotel” opener, Tea Leaf moved through a upbeat first set that played out with a sense of immediacy. An early run through “Incandescent Devil” and the live gem “Mistletwo” got the majority of the crowd moving and a measured run through the catchy “Don’t Curse At The Night” involved the rest. Easy going fare like "Papa's In The Back Room" and a cover of Dylan's "If You Gotta Go, Go Now" yielded to a mighty take on “Can You Guess It” which segued into Garrod’s steamy “The Devil’s Pay.” Normally an engaging stage presence, Mathis, who also opened the night with the Marco Benevento Trio, remained a sedentary, yet no less potent force on this night. More importantly, he and drummer Scott Rager, are starting to find a very comfortable zone together, coming together as a more cohesive unit.

Perhaps the most striking thing about Tea Leaf’s gig at the Plaza, especially the second set, was its tempest-in-a-teapot passion. Clark’s normally raspy voice tends to give his songs an air of confidence but the added bite with which he snapped off the lyrics to “Stick To The Shallows,” his effort at writing a Garrod-style tune, imbued the song’s folksy wisdom with an adamant mandate. Garrod seemed particularly moved by the spirit: at Clark’s urging, Garrod emerged from behind his keyboard setup during “Let Us Go” to uncharacteristically prowl the stage for his harmonica solo. Pumping one fist in the air in a slightly geeky fashion, Garrod got into Mathis’ face, much to the bassist’s delight, before riling up the crowd by taking his harmonica solo up onto Rager’s drum riser. The excitement of Garrod doing something unexpected and the cheers and smiles it provoked fulfilled the purpose that all good circuses serve: it truly made children of us all.

Labels: Tea Leaf Green