Deer Tick 
July 15th, 2009
at The Empty Bottle

by Justin Valmassoi

John McCauley had a frog in his throat this time around, which took some of the punch out of Deer Tick’s live show. I mean, normally he has a baby dinosaur or a huge cicada in there, which is part of the appeal, but a little too much hollering and whiskey found him rolling into Chicago scratchy-throated and raspy, doing his best to compensate with good old fashioned rock and roll.

This is, of course, a wise approach since the latest and apparently solidified Deer Tick lineup doesn’t know how to do anything but rock and roll, and the more robust sound of the recently released Born on Flag Day takes some of the focus off McCauley’s love-it-or-don’t singing voice.

After an opening set by the underrated and musically complementary Dawes, Deer Tick kicked it off with Flag Day lead single ‘Easy.’ Apparently, since the last time they were in town the band has subscribed to the Afghan Whigs school of live performance, stringing their songs together with familiar guitar riffs and instrumental passages from the likes of Black Sabbath and Willie Nelson before cutting into their own hits. It makes for a seamless and enjoyable show, and lets Deer Tick give a nod to their influences without becoming a cover band.

Doing double duty as merch gal and part-time vocalist, Rhode Island native and D.T. collaborator Liz Isenberg was along for the ride, joining McCauley & Co. to duet on ‘Friday XIII’ and generally stand around looking cute.

Covering most of 2007’s War Elephant and the standout tracks from Born on Flag Day and filling the gaps with cover songs, instrumental segues and banter, it is apparent that the band is far more comfortable and confident than during their previous tour. ‘Dirty Dishes’ devolved into a five minute instrument-swapping party with Dawes’ Taylor Goldsmith joining the fray to play guitar behind his back while McCauley attacked the drum kit. A bit of Nirvana riff turned into ‘Baltimore Blues.’ What everyone thought was the intro to Tom Petty’s ‘Breakdown’ turned out to be a cover of Tom Petty’s ‘Breakdown’ which was easily one of the best ideas they’ve ever had. A near acapella rendition of ‘Ashamed’ ended up as a 100 person singalong and by the time they pulled out ‘Diamond Rings 2007’ for the encore no one in the band was wearing a shirt and the crowd was either drunk, in love, swaying/shouting along or some combination of the three.

Even with their frontman at half-strength vocally, Deer Tick pulled off another excellent show, and shame on y’all who missed it. Also, you might want to snag that Dawes record, because they could be the headliners next time around.