Dana Fuchs

Now in it’s 7^th year at The Harmonie WDR’s Crossroads Festival is always a great place to discover rising talent.  This year was no exception as I caught Blues Rocker Dana Fuchs and Country Roots Rocker Cory Chisel onstage.

WDR introduced its Crossroads Festival into Rockpalast in 2000 but it’s become something of an institution at the Harmonie in Endenich since it moved there in 2003.  It’s where I discovered Novastar – big in Belgium but relative unknowns outside.  Where I first heard  Karl Lagerfeld darlings ‘Moke’ and finally got to hear Eric Sardinas play his killer slide guitar riffs.

This year’s highlight was earmarked early on.  Dana Fuchs made her name in the Bluesrock world in 2007 co-starring in the Golden Globe winning ‘Across The Universe’ – a film centred around the late sixties and the Beatles back-catalogue.  It put her name out there in the States as guitarist and co-writer Jon Diamond told me later.  But ‘Out there’ was The States and it’s only now with the release of her acclaimed ‘Live from NYC’ that Europe is discovering the power of DF’s vocals.

As always at Crossroads gigs there are two acts on the bill and as always the audience passes time arguing over who should be on last.  It would certainly be unfair to dismiss the evenings other act as a ‘support slot’.  Cory Chisel was listed as one of the Bands to Watch in ‘Rolling Stone’ in 2009 – so let battle commence, and may the best man/woman win…

As it turns out Cory Chisel and his band Wandering Sons are first up.  Chisel came to music via Baptist preachers in Wisconsin and admits that ‘The gospel of Johnny Cash’ was also a major influence.  Actually Cory Chisel himself has been a musical influence too as a fan wrote to his forum: “There’s a kid who works at grocery store I frequent… He got into playing music because Cory came to his elementary school class and inspired him. P.S. That same kid couldn’t come to Cory’s show the other night because he was playing one of his own”.
Cory Chisel puts Johnny Cash and his own Gospel past to good use in producing a distinctive Country Roots Rock style that tips its hat very strongly to Tom Waits too – and he includes a fine rendition of Waits’ ‘Rosie’ as an encore to tonights show.

Chisel also owes a debt to Dylan’s musical influence and admits that maybe you can sing almost any lyric in a Dylan way and it sounds profound.  When he actually does a ‘Dylanesque’ number afterwards I am left wondering if indeed he did make it up on the spot -  it was good, and sounded deep and meaningful in that “What was THAT all about?” way of all Dylan’s best material.  It’s an easy going set that is enjoyable without quite catching fire as  Chisel sips red wine between numbers (what would his Preacher Father make of that?) but I suspect the CD is more rewarding.  The band have an easy charm about them but when I find myself thinking more about their hats than their music then I realise I’m not being grabbed by the sound the people under those hats are making.  Nice band, probably a very good CD but…

Dana Fuchs also has her roots in a Baptist Gospel Choir but in her case other family members played Rock music in their New Jersey garage and it shows.  She moved to New York and in a City not short of useful musicians established herself as a regular act in major Clubs.  Then came the ‘Across The Universe’ film and fame, Stateside at least.  Finally interest is happening in Europe, thanks to a live CD, so hearing Dana Fuchs live would seem a good bet and here I am at the Harmonie.

Dana Fuchs is also very popular with cameramen (yes, ‘men’ is definitely the correct term here!).  There’s a row of WDR Video cameras, then a row of photographers and, somewhere behind all these heads are the audience – although if they are able to see anything I’m none too sure since every time DF strikes a Rockmusic pose she seems to be engulfed in seconds by Rockpalast camcorders.  These people must end up with one shoulder six inches deeper than the other with those monsters in tow!  Whilst I have to shoot between the bodies I can at least hear the music at all times.  Last time I saw someone pose so gracefully with long flowing hair onstage it was David Coverdale so I would like to have seen more for longer.

It’s an evening of great rock numbers done proud by a powerful vocal that got Fuchs a part playing Joplin in the off-Broadway ‘Love-Janis’ Musical and rightly so.  ‘Almost Home’ is an anthem about driving – a much loved topic for American songwriters it has a tinge of sadness and longing about it.  This air of sadness floats delicately in the air around many of the songs Dana Fuchs sings and she jokingly admits to it even as she introduces “My love song” which is titled ‘Misery’…

I’ve recently been reading ‘Last Man Down’ by Richard Picciotto.  It’s the harrowing story of what happened on 9/11 in New York as lived by one of its senior Fire Chiefs.  When Dana announces ‘Moment Away’ as her homage to fellow New Yorkers on that awful day it is particularly moving to hear the song tonight.  A woman who recalled kissing her husband goodbye never to see him again.  A song that could easily seem schmalzy but Fuchs carries it off beautifully like it was a star track from Springsteens 9/11 opus ‘The Rising’.  A clue to how Dana Fuchs findes her soul in the song comes later when she dedicates ‘Songbird’ “To my sister who took her own life”.   The family that taught her Rock music in the garage also taught her to dig deep emotionally and that’s what makes Dana Fuchs music so compelling.   That emotion also purs out in the pure rock numbers and created an incendiary finish with ‘Helter Skelter’ and ‘Whole Lotta Love’.

Dana Fuchs is still signing autographs and chatting to fans long after the show is over.  I mention reading ‘Last Man Down’ and she is genuinely moved that fate has me reading it right now since“It’s really ages since I last sung it”   I suggest to Dana that maybe it’s Kismet which has me reading it this very week of her show and I’m thinking that maybe Kismet had her discovered for her role in ‘Across the Universe’ where she met Joe Cocker, who now has her down as support act for his Museumsplatz show this year.  Or maybe someone up there is looking after Dana Fuchs – thats how you start thinking after an avening of gospel inspired Rock I suppose.  Thank the Lord for Music, for Blues and for Dana Fuchs.

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