503 Social Club Hoboken, NJ
Contact: [email protected]
Web: gracepettis.com
Players: Grace Pettis, vocals, guitar.
Material: In her own words, Grace Pettis labels her music Americana, with a caveat: a blend of styles that doesn’t fit any mainstream radio format. There are influences of folk and blues, but mostly Pettis puts her unique stamp on each song. Topics range from the pain of divorce and navigating life as a single woman to lamenting losses and ultimately finding joy and achieving self-actualization. She opens the show with “Rain,” caught in a cycle of unhappiness: "How to be happy/ With or without him/Just a shade of grey/So I don’t sing about sunshine/All I write about is rain, rain."
“Wild” laments the notion of forces within and without corrupting what’s beautiful and innocent: "Something wild/Why can’t they leave it the way that they found it? /Why did they do that to love?/ Why did they do that to us?" In “I Take Care Of Me Now,” she moves on to the realization that we must attend to our own well-being before we sacrifice ourselves in the service of others’ needs: "I take care of me now/I know how to take my time/Pour a glass of wine/And write my own love letters." Letting us into a brief slice of music history, is “Vivian,” an ode to Johnny Cash’s first wife, based on the thousand love letters he wrote to her, a period of time that often gets omitted from his iconic story.
Musicianship: Demonstrating great vocal prowess, Pettis transitions from the ethereal to the full voiced always following the emotional roadmap of each song. Coupled with that skill and guitar in hand, you don’t miss a backing band, in fact, it would have detracted from the impact of her performance.
Performance: Pettis turns her deeply personal experiences into our often-shared ones. She talks almost as much as she sings and while at times the stories seem tangential, they are in the service of bringing us further into the songs’ narrative. She often deviates from the planned setlist adding a feeling of spontaneity and a surveying of her mood, the mood of the audience, and what serves the moment best.
Summary: While it can be challenging to listen to a collection of an artists’ original songs, especially ones with so many personal themes, Pettis overcomes that hurdle with her natural storytelling and performance style. Her vocals are spot on, and the overall presentation is a unified and an ultimately moving one.
