Gig played on 08/06/05

Now poster boy for a generation of bedroom misanthropists, Bill Callahan remains a singular figure, even among the tear-in-my-beer compatriots of Americana, the genre he's usually slipped alongside in the record racks. In reality, Callahan is somewhat of a singular talent. Having mined his well of hound dog misery for more than a decade, he is - to milk the metaphor further - something of a lone wolf among men. Purveyor of a mordantly bone dry wit, Callahan has more in common with Morrissey or Leonard Cohen than, say, Ryan Adams.

Drawing mostly from new album "A River Ain't Too Much To Love", tonight's performance is stripped-down and immediate. Backed by a quietly efficient band, you can hear every creak and groan in Callahan's rocking chair voice and with nary a thankyou or word to his loyal audience, he launches into "Say Valley Maker" and "I Feel Like The Mother Of The World" with all the passion of a farmer pulling some particularly stubborn weeds.

Like a schoolboy torturing a fly, Callahan seems to view us with almost perverse amusement and takes delicious delight in wringing every ounce of meaning from each syllable he chews. This is to particularly sly effect on "Rock Bottom Riser" where he also imitates trotting on a horse with shrewd comic timing. It's not exactly backslapping stuff, but there's definitely a rich vein of humour (albeit of a camp, coal dark variety) in most things he does.

And the crowd lap it up. Seeing as listening to Callahan's records is arguably an experience more appropriate for life's more private moments, there seems something slightly wrong about being amongst quite so many Smog fans, but they seem a strangely well-balanced bunch, and not at all the quiet loners you'd expect. Perhaps even more intriguingly, female to male, they're split pretty much 50/50.

When he finally breaks free of the new record and into such old favourites as "Blood Red Bird", "Justice Aversion", "Bloodflow" and "Held" the whole lot of them cheer and stamp. It's hardly Beatlemania, and Callahan suppresses the urge to break into scissor kicks, but the relationship between audience and artist is actually quite affecting to witness. It's a one-sided love affair (Callahan gives away nothing and his fans give everything back) but one everyone seems comfortable with.

And so as he slinks off quietly, with everyone baying for more, you know his carefully-developed enigma is assured for some time yet.

by Adam Webb