Josh Ritter

 

Some friends and I went to see Josh Ritter this past Saturday at the West End Cultural Centre. I had seen Josh open for Sarah Harmer back in 2004 so I knew he was good but I was completely gob-smacked by his performance. He was even better than I expected, and what a lovely, lovely person as well as a performer.

 

After a largely forgettable opening act (JD Ormond, who I hope is better with his band Ultra Mega) Josh opened with a stellar "Best for the Best" and never looked back. He played quite a few tracks from his new album The Animal Years including "Good Man", "Girl in the War" and an absolutely riveting version of the haunting "Idaho". He didn’t neglect the old favourites and played "Harrisberg", "Stuck on You" and, of course, the anthem for doormats everywhere who’ll do anything for love, "Kathleen". He dedicated "You Don’t Make It Easy, Babe" to the person who had made his suit seeing as how his pants split right before he went on! A highlight was his performance of the as yet unreleased "Temptation of Adam". I especially liked the line about the five-letter word for apocalypse, and the response…W-W-I-I-I.

 

I had heard that Josh is very approachable after his shows and so I convinced my friends to stick around afterwards. That turned out to be a great move. Josh signed our CDs and seemed genuinely interested in how we became friends…Dragon Boating came up and so he signed one of my CDs…"Dragon Boating, hell, hell yeah! Love, Josh". He also hugged and kissed each of us in turn. A brave man, I thought.

 

All in all, it was a great evening made even better by Josh being such a lovely guy. The world needs more guys like him!