Concert Review: The Everybodyfields – The Handlebar, Greenville, S.C. – 9/26/08

Playing to a sparse crowd on one of the first days of fall, East Tennessee's The Everybodyfields brought their brand of modern moonshiner's folk to Greenville, S.C.'s Handlebar. Filling the headliner’s spot after tourmate Will Hoge’s scooter accident and subsequent hospitalization, Sam Quinn and Jill Andrews, with help from their hired guns, meandered through nearly two hours of pitch-perfect autumnal melancholy. Whether Everybodyfields devotees or Hoge holdovers, audience members were treated to an intimate, down-home performance of recent standards and new material.

Backed by a buoyant rhythm section and incorporating pedal steel, keyboards and lead guitar, Quinn and Andrews traded between acoustic guitar and electric bass, pausing to share musings on the life of a touring band in the Southeast. Quinn, bearded and bedecked in thrift store couture, charmed with his goofy and afflicted warble, but was ultimately overshadowed by his female counterpart. Andrews, who performs with the coy manner of Emmylou Harris or Neko Case, lets her radiant voice and songwriting compensate for any lacking pretense or showmanship. The lithe and sandy-haired chanteuse stole the show, even during the tense moments she shared the microphone in harmony with Quinn's trembling tenor.

Playing with the earnest aplomb of a rural bar band, The Everybodyfields’ set varied to blend the familiar and the fresh: wistful tear-jerkers, celebratory two-steps and modern mountain ballads. Hitting a dynamic stride on the numbers "Aeroplane" and "Everything is Okay" from 2006's Nothing is Okay, the band started to live up to the promise on which their label, Ramseur Records, is banking.

With studio time scheduled for their fourth album, Quinn expressed to me over a post-show bourbon his excitement about the upcoming sessions, hinting of fertile ground for songwriting. With former labelmates the Avett Brothers enjoying a meteoric rise to stardom, it's not hard to imagine The Everybodyfields following that model, crafting a compelling set of folksy AM pop tunes and cultivating their own cross-section of Carolina devotees.

By Drew Harkins.