Photos: Apple Summers Kaufmann
Cannery Hall Nashville, TN
Contact: [email protected]
Web: undertherugmusic.com
Players: Casey Dayan, vocals, guitar; Sean Campbell, guitar; Brendan McQueeney, drums; Colin Moser, keyboards; Brad Williamson, bass
Material: As the name implies, Under The Rug’s music shines a light on sensitive topics. Perhaps this is natural, considering the act’s splendiferous vocalist, Casey Dayan, recently came out as transgender. The Austin-based trio’s recent two-album release, happiness is easy, presents a sprawling meditation on the nature of joy – defining, recognizing, and keeping it. Genre-wise, UTR teeters on the edge of folk and Americana, yet the sound they’ve concocted is tricky to define. Balancing out this branding hurdle is their eye-catching and marketable logo.
Musicianship: UTR’s songs transmogrify between delicateness, organized chaos, and hard-rocking bombast. There are zero choruses to savor or crave-worthy beats. That said, Dayan’s voice embodies an authenticity that pierces the soul, and she’s capable of throwing down some impressive guitar fireworks. The rest of the players are also noticeably proficient. They weave a multi-prismatic sonic rainbow that delicately frames Dayan’s tales of survivorship, each of which feel like an encrypted page ripped from a discarded diary.
Performance: Everything about UTR is theatrical. Choreographed movements, such as everyone leaning in to emphasize a contemplative passage, work without being hokey. Dayan invests ample time connecting with the audience, setting up each song with personal anecdotes as riveting as they are intimate. At one point, the entire band sat on the lip of the stage as the sparse group of fans was invited to draw closer, amplifying the moment. While effective, one can’t help but wonder if this technique would lose its power at a larger venue.
Summary: It’s evident that Dayan uses music as a vehicle for self-discovery and achieving inner peace. As such, the singer takes listeners by the hand and invites them to come along on a transformative, soul-baring journey. Yet featuring subject matter that is exclusively heavy and eschewing anything purely buoyant and carefree makes for an emotionally oppressive set. UTR would reach more souls by offering the occasional tune that satisfies the desires of a general crowd.
