Hurray for the Riff Raff

See URL - The Times of London

By JON CARAMANICA
Published: August 27, 2012

Normally it works like this: A band comes to town, does a soundcheck on its stage for the night, maybe grabs a quick meal of debatable quality, plays a show, then squeezes in some carousing before it is time for its car or van or bus to depart for the next carnival.

Alynda Lee Segarra, the frontwoman of Hurray for the Riff Raff, had a much different schedule leading up to her band’s headlining Sunday night show at the Mercury Lounge.

Hurray for the Riff Raff is part of the loosely cohered movement of younger musicians embracing and reframing — but only slightly — American roots music, giving it a polish of currency but otherwise leaving its bones intact. Most of the announcements on the band’s Facebook page last week were not about its own performance but instead about other artists’ shows that Ms. Segarra was performing in or just checking out: Shovels and Rope at the Mercury Lounge; Spirit Family Reunion at Sycamore in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn; a night at the Jalopy Theater in Red Hook, Brooklyn, with Feral Foster.

Community matters a great deal to Ms. Segarra, who was raised in the Bronx but now calls New Orleans home. Right at the beginning of Hurray for the Riff Raff’s Sunday night set she asked for a prayer for her adopted city that it might escape the worst of Tropical Storm Isaac, which was bearing down on it.

She was just as earnest in her singing. The group’s hourlong set drew from all of its three albums, with an emphasis on the most recent, “Look Out Mama” (Born to Win). “Blue Ridge Mountain” evoked Woody Guthrie and traditional bluegrass, and “The Junebug Waltz” recalled straightforward country of the 1950s. There was a cover of Jimmie Dale Gilmore’s wry “Dallas,” dedicated to a friend in the audience, and also a cool, knowing take on “Be My Baby” by the Ronettes.

Live, Ms. Segarra’s voice cuts and punches in a way that the band’s albums don’t fully capture. She’s powerful if not nimble, and the band’s songs rarely do more than mosey, which means she has little competition for attention.

Earlier in her career Ms. Segarra sang on her own, or with a rotating supporting cast. It was notable, during this show, that the one song she sang unaccompanied, “Small Town Heroes,” was impressively potent, standing apart from the rest for its intensity.

In Hurray for the Riff Raff she’s built up a band of people with similar taste but who don’t get in her way: Yosi Perlstein, who alternated between fiddle and drums; Sam Doores, who alternated between drums and guitar, with some harmonica thrown in; and Dan Cutler on upright bass. During the songs when Phil Sterk sat in on pedal steel guitar, his presence was loud and even ostentatious, but also advanced the songs — especially “Slow Walk” — in a way the others didn’t.

For the last song before the encore, a cover of the New Orleans standard “Time Is on My Side,” the group was joined by members of Clear Plastic Masks, one of the opening bands, and also Stephen Weinheimer, of Spirit Family Reunion.

During the song’s breakdown Mr. Weinheimer exuberantly told a story of seeing Ms. Segarra on the street many years earlier, then finally connecting with her some time later, and now being onstage with her. Everyone onstage laughed along, all moving in the same direction. - The New York Times

2. HURRAY FOR THE RIFF RAFF

Forget the fact that they're blessed with one of the worst names in the world right now, and concentrate on Alynda Lee Segarra and her New Orleans troupe's ability to pen irresistible country-folk vignettes. The appallingly abbreviated HFTRR turned in a heart-stopping performance at the MOJO Bootleg BBQ this year and served up a new tune, Soul Song, which underlined their immense potential and seductive power. Watch for them when they tour the UK in May and dig into their self-titled debut that is out on the Loose label now. - MOJO Magazine

2. HURRAY FOR THE RIFF RAFF

Forget the fact that they're blessed with one of the worst names in the world right now, and concentrate on Alynda Lee Segarra and her New Orleans troupe's ability to pen irresistible country-folk vignettes. The appallingly abbreviated HFTRR turned in a heart-stopping performance at the MOJO Bootleg BBQ this year and served up a new tune, Soul Song, which underlined their immense potential and seductive power. Watch for them when they tour the UK in May and dig into their self-titled debut that is out on the Loose label now. - MOJO Magazine

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See url below - New Orleans Times-Picayune

See url below - New Orleans Times-Picayune

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