One of the best things about retirement is you can go out to a show on a Monday night, one where the doors don't even open until 9:00 p.m., and not have to worry about getting up the next morning. The Music Desk took advantage of that last night and went down to Aisle 5 in Little Five Points, Atlanta, to see Mutual Benefit.
The doors were not yet open when we arrived, but there was no line outside and when the doors finally did open we had that surreal experience for a few moments of being the only ones (one) there. Which gave us a nice moment or two to go over to the merch table and have a pleasant one-on-one conversation with Jordan Lee of Mutual Benefit. We talked about their new cover LP of Vashti Bunyan's 1970 Just Another Diamond Day and the scooter situation in Atlanta before the others arrived.
The show started at 9:30 with a set by The Spookfish, which consists of one solo musician. The first song was a fairly outre electronic piece and, having set our expectations in one direction, he then pulled the rug out from under us by next performing a quiet song on acoustic guitar. Interestingly, he performed the rest of the set that way, alternating on each song between his d.j./producer set-up and his acoustic guitar, and only for his closing piece did he mix the two, producing n electronic drone to accompany some acoustic finger picking.
So that was cool and next up was Atlanta's Book Club. Fronted by guitarist, singer and songwriter Robbie Horlick, Book Club play country-inflected folk rock with intricate harmonies and interesting instrumentation (violin, cello, keys and two guitars - no drums).
Between the two opening bands and the 9:00 p.m. doors, Mutual Benefit didn't take the stage until nearly 11:00 p.m. But it was well worth the wait - as always, they played a simply lovely set of gentle, slightly baroque folk rock, fronted by the soft voice of frontman Jordan Lee and backed by keys, violin, guitars and bass (once again, no drums).
Part of the beauty of Mutual Benefit is their ability to almost perfectly match live the sounds they produce in the studio, no small feat for music as textured and subtle as theirs. They mostly played songs from their latest album, 2018's Thunder Follow the Light, as well as a medley of songs from their Just Another Diamond Day cover LP and several of our favorite songs from previous albums. We got sort of swept up by the beauty of the music and weren't keeping track of things, but we're pretty sure we heard 2013's Advanced Falconry somewhere in the set.
This is our third or fourth time seeing Mutual Benefit. We missed them at The Earl in February 2014, but caught them in May of that year at Shaky Knees, and then saw them again when they opened for Quilt at The Earl in 2016. We may have seen them on some other dates as well, but honestly can't recall when.
Here's Thunder Follows the Light. Favorite cut: Track 4, Shedding Skin.
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