PHOTOS: RICHIE DOWNS | On Friday April 10, Delta Rae and Greg Holden played at the 9:30 Club, providing a haven for wayward Washingtonians desperately trying to escape the tornado of tourists taking over the Tidal Basin.
Greg Holden is coming out at the right time. Some people thought he was a Christian act, some thought he was Australian, but everyone agreed that he was two things: great and good-looking. His album comes out today (4/14) and it’s perfect driving and road trip music. His harmonies are made for rays of sun hitting your Ray Bans, and his mastery over the guitar makes you wish you were sitting next to him back on your college campus or favorite park. He’s a natural when he banters with the audience. I fully expect him to become a better performer once he hits mainstream.
He also makes the natural choice for Delta Rae’s opener. If anything, he sounds the most like Eric Holljes on Carry the Fire, Delta Rae’s freshman album. Plainly put, he loves the crowd and the crowd learned to love him. Especially during “Boys in the Street,” his acoustic ballad about an out gay man growing up with a backwards, homophobic father who gets so close to shedding his vitriolic exoskeleton before the end of his life. It brought the crowd to a stand still.
And then the crowd was electrified by Delta Rae. They played almost exclusively from their new album, After It All. To make the biggest impact they brought a violinist, providing some of the most crucial crescendos and powerful whispers to Delta Rae’s folk sound. You would have thought powerhouse female singers Liz Hopkins and Brittany Holljes were on the last night of tour with the way they belted high notes, slammed the drum, and summoned the crowd in their voodoo scenery.
After a surprise mashup of one of their new tracks and Fleetwood Mac’s timeless “Rihannon” which drove people straight mad, they flexed between ballad and banger up until the end when they mixed “Dance in the Graveyards” with “I Wanna Dance With Somebody,” proving that Delta Rae doesn’t have one sound, but several interconnected sounds that makes it impossible not to feel caught in this musical gravity.
Delta Rae doesn’t just play, they perform. Their lighting is meticulously done to highlight heartbreak or conjure a New Orleans swamp sound, like in “Bottom of the River.” They either want to haunt you or love you, and sometimes it felt like both. The way they interacted with the crowd might have been perceived as cheesy, but as they said multiple times, the 9:30 Club is a special place for them as the best music venue in the country.
Both Holden and Delta Rae stayed behind for hours to greet the audience members who danced a little, cried a little, and clapped a lot. It added this human element that we don’t always have at 9:30 club. But I hope it stays.
DELTA RAE
GREG HOLDEN
