ALEJANDRO ESCOVEDO
Tractor Tavern (Seattle, WA)
April 27, 1996

GERALD COLLIER
University Sports Bar (Seattle, WA)
April 26, 1996

The date is January 29, 1989. It's a Sunday evening at Chicago House, a cozy little cafe in Austin, Texas, that holds maybe 100 people on a crowded night. A couple months have passed since the True Believers, the rock band with which Alejandro Escovedo seemed poised to hit the big time, had dissolved in the wake of being dropped by EMI right before their second record was to be released. Tonight, Alejandro is playing an acoustic set to a crowd of about two dozen friends, accompanied on standup bass, fiddle and such by a couple more friends who just happen to be among Austin's best musicians. There is no record deal, no spotlight, no future – just the voice of a great songwriter, here and now. And music has rarely been so beautiful.

It's taken a long time, and no small amount of hard work and heartache, for Alejandro Escovedo to finally receive the recognition he so richly deserved for so many years. He spent about three years doing shows like that Chicago House gig every week or two in Austin, regaining his bearings and finding a way to put the art before everything else once again. By the time he finally got a solo record out in 1992, most everyone had forgotten all about the True Believers, or Rank and File, or the Nuns, or anyone else Escovedo might have played with in his star-crossed career. On his first trip to Seattle behind that solo debut, he played to about 50 people. But he returned repeatedly, and gradually the crowds grew. He put out a second solo album on Watermelon in '93; this past March saw his third effort released on Rykodisc; in April, his picture and a full-page story graced the center spread of Rolling Stone.

So here he was, back in Seattle again, playing the Tractor Tavern – only this time the place was packed solid, even on a night that saw Richard Thompson, the Bottle Rockets, Jonathan Richman and the Amps among the competition at clubs across town. Once limited by financial resources to touring with an acoustic trio, Alejandro can now afford to hit the road with a band that reflects both his rocking intensity and his heartbreaking balladry. Hector Munoz remains from the old True Believers days, capable of hammering out reckless thunder yet possessing the Latin percussion expertise needed for the title track of Alejandro's new album With These Hands. Bassist Scott Garber brings both precision and fluidity to the rhythm, while Joe Eddie Hines plays tastefully understated guitar when it's needed and wails wildly when the time is right. David Perales' violin is a locomotive one minute and a swan the next, blending with the cello accompaniment of Brian Standefer to provide melodic textures that raise Alejandro's music far beyond bar-band basics.

New songs such as "Sometimes", "Put You Down" and "Crooked Frame" have an urgency live that fulfills the promise of their recorded counterparts on With These Hands. Ultimately, though, it's the old songs that still mean the most to me. "The Rebel Kind" is a perfect set-closer; "Falling Down Again/Gravity" still swirls magically amidst the strings and the sadness and the laughter; and when it comes time for "Wishing Well", nothing in this world could stop me from closing my eyes and singing along and drifting straight back to that Sunday night at Chicago House.

Which was appropriate, because the night before, watching Gerald Collier at the University Sports Bar, I felt like I had been there all over again. See, until a couple months ago, Gerald was in a power-pop band called the Best Kissers in the World, would-be hard-pop sensations on MCA, but they got dropped right before their second record was to be released. So here was Gerald, playing an acoustic set to a crowd of about two dozen friends, accompanied on pedal steel, fiddle and such by a couple more friends who just happen to be among Seattle's best musicians. There is no record deal, no spotlight, no future – just the voice of a great songwriter, here and now. And music has rarely been so beautiful. Sound familiar?

In a way, it isn't too surprising that Collier has gone back to basics after the Kissers breakup. He was, after all, a charter member several years ago of Seattle's alternative-country kingpins the Picketts; in addition, the Best Kissers had recently placed a track on the Willie Nelson tribute album Twisted Willie. (Joining them on harmonica on their cut, incidentally, was Mickey Raphael, who also plays on Escovedo's new album.)

Furthermore, and most importantly: Even though the Kissers were basically a straight-on rock band, it was always clear that Collier was a gifted songwriter, though that gift sometimes seemed sacrificed for the sake of the brass ring. You have to learn to make those songs marketable to the masses, the powers-that-be will tell you. Play that pop music for the kids: Rock out, be cool, take advantage of the fact that you're a "Seattle band."

Indeed, in retrospect, it's probably a shame that Collier moved to Seattle instead of Austin. Coming here, he learned how to play the major-label game, how to get a record deal in the midst of the grunge wave, how to make a living playing music until the bottom fell out on him a couple months ago. Had he moved to Austin, he'd have learned how to starve to death because he couldn't make a living as a musician – but he also would have found that, no matter how successful you may or not become, in the end, one truth shines through: The music is its own reward.

And on this night, at the hopelessly unhip yet eternally friendly University Sports Bar, it was. Collier held forth with but a nylon-string acoustic guitar, his songs, and a few pals: Marc Olsen, formerly of the adventurous trio Sage, on pedal steel; Anne Marie Ruljancich, an angel of a backing vocalist and fiddler; and Rick Levine, who doesn't really play drums but played all that was needed on his abbreviated kit.

You could sense the magic from the second song of the set, as he and Ruljancich harmonized on the chorus, "I'm on a bender / I'll be gone forever." Sometimes it's those short-yet-powerful lines that drive Collier's music; he seems capable of reeling them off in his sleep. "Why stay sober / When it's all over between us anyway." .... "After all is said and done / I apologize for having fun." .... "There's plenty of dumb fish / In the stupid sea." More often, it's his sense for a simple, memorably moving melody, and that comes across more clearly in this acoustic setting than it did when the Best Kissers tried to wham it home. Backed at times merely by Levine's snare-and-cymbal accompaniment, occasionally augmented by the countrified embellishments of Olsen and Ruljancich, Collier wisely allowed the music to stand on the strength of his songs.

And on the strength of the covers, for that matter. The main set consisted entirely of originals, but when enough not-quite-ready-to-go-home Sports Bar patrons hollered for an encore, Collier showed enviable taste for both selecting and interpreting the works of other artists. Stealer's Wheel's "Stuck in the Middle With You" spiced up with steel guitar started things off splendidly, followed by a version of "You're So Vain" that got the Stonesy treatment it has always seemed to deserve. The evening finally came to a close with a straightforward and achingly lonesome version of "Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain."

There's a long road ahead, but Gerald Collier is on the right track.

–PETER BLACKSTOCK