When you are finally given the opportunity to follow through on a tour that was originally scheduled for 2020, then you jump in with all guitars locked and loaded. It was in March 2020 when Thomm Jutz and Eric Brace found themselves on Irish shores as news of lockdown hovered in the air and cases of Covid virus began appearing on the news. Deciding to abandon their tour before a single chord had been played the duo just made it back home to the USA before everything changed in our lives for the succeeding two years.
Their return is a celebration of all that is good in contemporary roots music as they perform in the intimate surroundings of Chandler’s House in the picturesque village of Rathfriland, County Down. To say that the duo have a gift for both live performance and songwriting is perhaps the greatest understatement of this review. Both artists possess a track record for album releases that would make your head spin and each has a storied career to their name. Eric was a journalist with the Washington Post before forming the superb band Last Train Home, eventually moving to Nashville where he met fellow journalist and songwriter Peter Cooper. Together they wrote songs and toured while Eric also formed his own record label, Red Beet Records.
Thomm was born in Germany and eventually made his way to Nashville where he became a guitarist for artists such as Nanci Griffith, David Olney and Mary Gauthier, among others. As a popular session musician Thomm went on to launch his own recording studio and also to teach songwriting at Belmont University in Nashville. He joined with both Eric and Peter, out of mutual admiration, to form a powerful trio who delivered some fine music up to the untimely death of Peter Cooper in 2022. To honour their great friend, both Eric and Thomm decided to keep playing live as a duo and to keep the songs alive for everyone to celebrate both life and music as sweet therapy for the soul. Peter Cooper is remembered tonight in songs such as King Of the Keelboat Men, Hartford’s Bend, and My Sally.
The themes of transport and storytelling are well explored in the songs with lots of reference made to railroads and trains, steamships and riverboat days, air travel and some flights of fancy woven into the detail of the songs. The creative writing process is unlocked, as both artists trade stories of how the mystical muse comes to visit; it may be a random comment caught in a restaurant or a conversation on the street, whatever can inspire a song. Indeed, what defines a musician more than that of travelling minstrels, forever roving, always looking for connection and inspiration.
Five songs are included from the most recent album Simple Motion, released in 2024 and included in the set are superbly played versions of Frost On the South Side, Just A Moment, Can’t Change the Weather, Arkansas and What You Get For Getting Older. It’s a very generous set of twenty songs and the fluent lead guitar lines of Thomm Jutz are a joy to witness. He is more than complimented by the more rhythmic playing of Eric Brace and the pair dovetail superbly around the melody. Their harmony vocals are also finely tuned and the audience was certainly fully engaged with every performance throughout.
A very funny song Middle Aged Women is delivered to great amusement and extols the benefits that a little experience can bring. Other songs feature authentic tales of quiet heroes, the marginalised unemployed, hobos, gypsies and hanged men; crop workers, riverboat captains, whiskey makers, booking agents and tributes to both Tom T Hall (Living A Life Of the Mind) and Jimmie Rodgers (Jimmie Rodgers Rode A Train). Thomm sings I Choose You which is a co-write with Tammy Rogers and one that is repeatedly used in both marriage and divorce proceedings (that invariably lead to 2nd marriages). Such is the great banter from the stage and among the receptive audience throughout. Dear Lorraine is a Last Train Home song that Eric introduces and he also sings powerfully on Tranquility Base, a song that reflects upon the moon landing and the life of Neil Armstrong. The encore is dedicated to popular local promoter Andy Peters and the Jackson Browne song Late For the Sky is performed with great subtlety and reverence to the original. This was a most enjoyable evening of timeless music played by consummate musicians to a greatly appreciative audience. It was a real pleasure to be part of it all.
Review by Paul McGee Photograph by Eilis Boland