Josh Ritter, Gregory Alan Isakov
2/25/14
Taft Theatre, 317 E 5th St, Cincinnati, OH
$25 adv, $30 dos, 8pm, Buy Tickets
Critically acclaimed singer-songwriter Josh Ritter has embarked on an acoustic tour with special guest opener Gregory Alan Isakov. These intimate shows feature Ritter performing stripped-down alongside band-mates Zack Hickman and Josh Kaufman. A recent video of “A Certain Light” featuring the trio can be viewed/embedded here. See below for complete dates.
The tour is in celebration of Ritter’s new album, The Beast In Its Tracks, which debuted at #22 on the Billboard 200 and #8 on the Top Rock Albums chart earlier this year (Pytheas Recordings). In addition to this commercial success, the album continues to receive widespread critical praise—NPR Music calls it, “…gorgeous and glorious,” while Pitchfork asserts, “Beast is contemplative and forgiving, a means of burying one relationship to commit to another, and Ritter nicely evokes the excitement and resignation of such a transition.”
Of The Beast In Its Tracks, Ritter says, “In the year after my marriage ended, I realized that I had more new songs than I’d ever had at one time. Far from the grand, sweeping feel of the songs on So Runs the World Away, these new songs felt like rocks in the shoe, hard little nuggets of whatever they were, be it spite, remorse, or happiness.” Recorded during 2011-2012 at the Great North Sound Society in Parsonsfield, Maine, the album continues Ritter’s longtime collaboration with producer and keyboard player Sam Kassirer. As Josh describes, “I hadn’t composed this stuff, I’d scrawled it down, just trying to keep ahead of the heartbreak. They needed to be recorded like that. We needed to work fast, make decisions quickly, keep the songs as spare as they could be kept, and above all never allow ourselves to blunt the sharp edges. Some of the songs were mean or evil. So be it.”
The new album follows Ritter’s 2010 release, So Runs The World Away, of which Bob Boilen from NPR Music declared, “I’ve come to expect good records from him…but this one took my breath away,” while The New York Times praises, “Josh Ritter has a way with metaphor. It’s one of the literary touches in his music that have established him among the cream of the young singer-songwriter crop.”
In 2011, Ritter made is debut as a published author with his New York Times best-selling novel, Bright’s Passage (Dial Press/Random House). Of the work, Stephen King writes in The New York Times Book Review, “Shines with a compressed lyricism that recalls Ray Bradbury in his prime…This is the work of a gifted novelist.”
JOSH RITTER 2014 WINTER ACOUSTIC TOUR
*with special guest opener Gregory Alan Isakov
January 29 /// Calgary, BC /// Knox United Church*
January 30 /// Banff, AB /// Banff Centre*
January 31 /// St. Albert, AB /// Arden Theatre*
February 1 /// St. Albert, AB /// Arden Theatre*
February 3 /// Saint Paul, MN /// Fitzgerald Theater*
February 4 /// Iowa City, IA /// The Englert Theatre*
February 5 /// Stoughton, WI /// Stoughton Opera House*
February 20 /// Chicago, IL /// Fourth Presbyterian Church*
February 21 /// Chicago, IL /// Fourth Presbyterian Church*
February 22 /// Bloomington, IN /// Buskirk-Chumley Theater*
February 23 /// Saint Louis, MO /// Sheldon Concert Hall*
February 24 /// Louisville, KY /// Headliners Music Hall*
February 25 /// Cincinnati, OH /// Taft Theatre*
February 27 /// Glenside, PA /// Keswick Theatre*
February 28 /// Washington, DC /// Lincoln Theatre*
March 1 /// Washington, DC /// Lincoln Theatre*
March 2 /// Lewiston, ME /// Olin Arts Center @ Bates College
March 4 /// Lebanon, NH /// Lebanon Opera House*
March 5 /// Somerville, MA /// Somerville Theatre*
March 6 /// Somerville, MA /// Somerville Theatre*
March 7 /// New York, NY /// Town Hall*
March 8 /// Brooklyn, NY /// Music Hall of Williamsburg*
