Review: Eilen Jewell at The Grey Eagle
Eilen Jewell is my musical spirit animal. I discovered her by Pandora-induced accident during the most intense years of marriage and early parenting when I felt like I was being shucked, ear for ear, like corn plucked too early and tossed into a pressure cooker. With snakes.
Jewell’s discography carried me through countless tension-laced evenings when, between making dinner, grading essays, tending to precocious children, and shutting out unsolicited commentary on how I juggle all the things, the elixir of her nectar-like vocals accompanied by lyrics evoking the open road would soothe my raw, sleep-deprived nerves like the first sip of top shelf tequila after dry January. Songs like “High Shelf Booze” helped me transcend the misery of domestic labor and dream of escapes as mundane as drinking with girlfriends: “If my man asks 'bout what I'll do / Now that he's turned me loose / Tell him I've gone to meet all the girls / And drink all that high shelf booze.”
Others, like “Where They Never Say Your Name,” took me far away without leaving home: “I rode 16 wheels all the way / 16 nights and lonely days / I'm going back, I wish I never came.” As much as I adored my new pumpkin-sized roommates, there were times when I felt so trapped that jumping a train or hitchhiking from a truck stop felt like a desirable alternative. Let’s just say her songs saved my household a number of broken dishes.
I missed many live shows during those years, and as soon as I came up for a breather (when my youngest turned six), I vowed to never again miss a show when this Idaho rambler girl came to town. I call it a win that her Grey Eagle performance on May 12 was my second time seeing her live. And what a treat! Her own story of heartbreak, resilience, and taking control after life-turned-upside-down in her new album Get Behind the Wheel resonates all too well.
As an intimate space, The Grey Eagle draws people who want to truly listen to the artist on stage, and the quiet, attentive audience at Jewell’s show was no exception. The seating was much tighter and fuller than my first Jewell experience at the Eagle a year prior, a sign that word about her distinct blend of Americana — a craft cocktail of roots noir, feminine grace, minor key, jazzy rhythms and rockabilly beats — has gotten around.
With my oldest son in tow, I joined the crowd of folks mostly not younger than me (and also not much older), decked out in flannels and jeans with the occasional black dress and leather jacket, awkwardly navigating the full house without sloshing their full pints to nestle into folding chairs with only slightly more legroom than airline coach seating. By the time I located my trusty church pew against the wall, the night’s headliner entered the stage with her bandmates Jerry Miller (guitar), Jason Beek (drums), and Matt Murphy (bass).
Dressed head-to-toe in black with the exception of her denim jacket, Jewell opened with “Crooked River,” a soulful, pensive ballad about recovering from lost love and staring down loneliness “straight in the eye.” Intoxicating is one way to describe her vocals. The audience moved easily into the place Jewell sends you when, spoken in her own words that night, she can “slow it down and give it a groove — you know, the Eilen Jewell treatment.”
Even though Get Behind the Wheel (released just a week prior) deals with traumatic loss, plaintive ballads like “Crooked River” and “Come Home Soon” give way to upbeat rockabilly, steely surf guitar, and psychedelic riffs on tracks like “Lethal Love” and “Winnemucca,” which feel like the vocalist is driving top down on sunny Route 66, letting go of what’s behind and beelining on the journey ahead. As a whole, the album reminds us to take control when life gets tough and remember that we are the drivers of our own destiny.
Jewell then moved on to her own classics like “Rich Man’s World” and family-favorite covers such as Eric Anderson’s “Dusty Boxcar Wall,” which featured amazingly transcendental guitar solos from guitarist Jerry Miller, whom she introduced as “the Killa Milla.” She then gave us a taste of the macabre with her new song, “Lethal Love,” which comes with a video Jewell describes as “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas meets Alice in Wonderland.” After the show I checked out the video on YouTube and can attest that her description is on point. Featuring mysterious “drink me” vials, burlesque dancers, bar fights, and a blood-red tattoo, the video reveals a darker, irreverent, and adventurous side of Jewell’s repertoire that I hope we’ll see more of in the future.
After covering Jackie DeShannon’s peppy “Breakaway” by slowing the pace with her signature mournful vocals, she plugged their gig the following day at the Albino Skunk Music Festival in Greer, SC, where she promised an as yet-undetermined set list of Loretta Lynn covers. She then teased the crowd to “Come see us wing it.”
One thing I love about Jewell is the dissonance between her sweet, feminine vocals and the darker story her lyrics tell us. A woman who can sing “I’m over here / with a rusted .44 / sitting on the steps / of your front door” is surely a powerhouse of confidence, swagger, and don’t-mess-with-me style. So I was surprised when, at my first show, her stage presence was dominated by comic humility that she repeated this time, but with a sharper edge.
This is all to say don’t let her self-deprecating jokes fool you — Jewell’s incisive wit will cut you to the quick (in the most agreeable way). Whether producing albums or performing live, she resists navel-gazing and myopic entrapment in her own struggles by engaging with her audience and inviting us to see the bigger picture. And anyone who can share the stage with her own ex-husband and manager — in her case, drummer Beek —surely possesses a superpower.
Better yet, Jewell uses the stage to make a statement while connecting the rich history of her own female folk genealogy. Her cover of Lynn’s “The Pill,” which Jewell called “the bannedest of all banned songs,” drew the audience out of our quiet trance. Sung from the perspective of a mother with multiple unplanned children, as a message to her husband, the song celebrates reproductive justice by putting women back in the driver’s seat when it comes to procreation.
And what a crowd-pleaser it was, the audience belting out the chorus “Now I’ve got the pill” along with Jewell, erupting into cheers accompanied by sporadic whoops and applause. I could feel Ruth Bader Ginsberg and the legendary Lynn herself smiling down on us like proud, approving mothers.
Beyond her rootsy, hybrid musical genius and charismatic stage presence, it’s this dance of partnership Jewell gracefully two-steps between paying homage to her folk foremothers and forging resilience and solidarity with her bandmates — ex and all — that has galvanized her rightful place in the repertoire of Americana. I’ll be sure to catch her standing-room-only Grey Eagle shows as long as they last, because one day soon, she’ll need a bigger venue with much more leg room.
(Photo by Beth Herzhaft)
