"I have done things that made me shudder," Brent Best sang Friday night in a tune from his haunting new solo album Your Dog, Champ. Talk about an understatement.
A Southern Gothic song cycle with a body count, Your Dog, Champ is the heaviest album he's made in 20 years of recording. It's also a deft balancing act, with Best's grim tales wrapped in elegant chamber-folk packages.
Best began his CD-release concert at a sweaty, sold-out Dan's Silverleaf on a deceptively light note.
Performing solo on guitar and harmonica, he played up the jaunty side of his work with Denton's legendary Slobberbone, including "Gimme Back My Dog," the 2000 tune which novelist Stephen King proclaimed one of the three greatest rock 'n' roll songs of all time.
Best gave his old "Dog" a playful new vibe by adding the "la-la" chorus from Elton John's "Crocodile Rock," and he set up the tune by doing a comic spit-take.
But the mood darkened at the drop of a drum stick when Best and his backing band launched into "Daddy Was a Liar," the opening track from Your Dog, Champ. In the very next song, "Good Man Now," the protagonist literally nails his father to the bed: "Blood on my mind and anger in my eyes/I'm going to shoot the man I was brought up to despise."
The dark family drama continued with "Aunt Ramona" dying in the back seat of the car, and the young "Robert Cole" coming of age in a song with another fatal ending. Yet as bleak as the stories were, the songs never felt morbid, thanks to Best's bittersweet melodies and poetic lyrics, and his band's lovely arrangements.
Drew Phelps bowed his upright bass in perfect unison with violinist Petra Kelly and banjo player Andy Rogers, while keyboard ace Scott Danbom added just the right textures on piano and organ. Pedal steel player Burton Lee and drummer Grady Don Sandlin rounded out the band.
Best led the group on acoustic guitar and occasionally stopped to mop sweat from his face and the long, gray beard he's sported in recent years. The beard made him look more like an old Civil War colonel than a 44-year-old rock 'n' roller, but his sandpapery tenor sounded strong and youthful in a show full of stark ballads that allowed his voice to shine.
By THOR CHRISTENSEN. Thor is a Dallas writer and critic. Email him at thorchris2@yahoo.com.
