Will Hoge's debut, 2001's Carousel made me feel terrible. His new Blackbird on a Lonely Wire doesn't make me feel much better. It's
not that Hoge, a Tennessee rocker with a bluesy rasp in his throat, can be faulted. Cornering the market on dry-mouthed heartbreak
where the tears fall with the impact of a four-car smash up, Hoge translates emotional turmoil into pure adrenaline-pumping rock and
roll. 'Carousel' is a perfect example. A throbbing epic ballad full of defeat and abandoned dreams like you've heard before, but
painted in broad sorrowful strokes. It's ragged, elegant and irresistibly sincere, but it also makes you want to stay in bed for weeks.
And there sits Hoge in ill-fitting jeans, three crumpled oversized shirts, and two days worth of stubble, looking like a sweet mess. Hard
not to like him ... or root for him.
Blackbird opens at a crescendo of heartbreak and gets more operatic by the track. 'Not that Cool,' like Mark Watson's 'Darwin
Was Right,' is a barroom pick-up song that has nothing to do with romance and everything to do with needy sex. But Watson's take
was a joke, Hoge not only plays it straight but uncomfortably close and the effect is sad and pathetic. 'Be the One,' about a party girl
in overdrive, skids from a rollicking drinking song into backroom sordidness with sly ease ( 'Everybody wants to be a star in
somebody's dream/but you can't get there darling down upon your knees...' ) . 'Secondhand Heart' just comes right out with Hoge
begging in a dripping sweat, 'I want and I need/Do you really want to see me bleed?' A soundtrack to close the last pick-up bar at
3:40 a.m. on lonely street in anywhere USA? Yeah, but Hoge's show at Schuba's made him and Blackbird far more complicated.
Hoge started the show at a dramatic crest with ... 'Carousel.' Almost better than the studio version, Hoge gave it a hushed
measured reading and then shot it through with a blast of crisp harmonica. Then he tore the roof off the place. 'She Don't Care,'
'Doesn't have to be that Way,' 'Ms. Williams'—they all got a furious workout. But if Hoge's songs have bite, his band has personality
to spare. The sloppy 'yeah yeah yeah's that punctuate 'Be the One,' the sexy shuffle of 'Doesn't Have to be That Way,' bassist Tress
Sasser's throbbing bassline on 'Hey Tonight' and other small delights make Blackbird solid twangy rock with juice and wit.
Loose on stage, Hoge didn't get ( real ) rowdy until the half-way mark. Shirt-tails flying, stomping about in a tantrum, his stance was to
throw everything on the floor as if nothing mattered and he had even less to lose. But his choice in covers was particularly revealing.
John Lennon's 'Jealous Guy' was just as desperate as his own music, but 'Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow' was a revelation of
his depth. Generally considered a 'chick song,' the male covers that I've heard are either too stylized ( Bryan Ferry ) or too jokey ( Jinx
Titanic ) . But Hoge was so vulnerable that he defied gender; the woman that he was singing to became the aggressor and he the
possible victim. But if all this heartbreak and woe seemed to paint him into a corner, 'Rock and Roll Star' set him free. Recorded
before he got signed to Atlantic Records last year, what was cynical and barbed as a projection of life 'under the Sony tree' from the
outside, now from the inside had a smirking irony. Hoge tossed it off like a used hankie, then the band tore into the Stones' 'Jumping
Jack Flash.' Sticking his butt out, hands on his hips honey chile style, waving that pointed finger like a magic wand with his knees
locked together, he did a dead-on Mick Jagger. It was the show's biggest laugh, but also an indication that Hoge is on an ambitious
trajectory. I may be wrong—but I doubt it—Will Hoge is the shit.
