After the show I was talking to Mary Lasseigne, who play guitar with Susan and is an accomplished singer/songwriter in her own right, and told her how much I enjoyed their performance and she said "We had a lot of fun on stage." I don't think I could sum it up any better than that.
When you go to a Susan Cowsill show it's going to be fun. No one has more fun than Susan on stage. I love her stage banter, she'll start on one subject and veer off on a tangent and forget what she started talking about, only to remember it at the last moment and finish her thought. Her enjoyment is contagious.
I've said it before and I'll continue to say it. Susan is one of the best that we have. Her songwriting is as good or better than just about any song out there right now. Her singing is as good or better than just about anything on the radio right now. For the life of me I can't understand why she isn't a bigger name.
She's got a new album coming out this month. (She was selling advance copies at the show, but ran out by the time I got over there to buy one. Drat!) It's called Lighthouse and she did a few numbers from it. Her opening number "Dragonflies" was in memory of her brother Barry who died in Katrina. It's a sweet song, with memories of the two of them as kids. She followed that up with a song written by Barry that's become a staple of her live shows. Than a song from her former band The Continental Drifters. This woman has a treasure trove of songs to pick from
Another new song from her forthcoming album was "Oh Nola." It was written not long after Katrina when Susan and her husband were planning on leaving the city and moving elsewhere. I remember picking up an issue of Offbeat at the time with Susan on the cover and the headline hinting that she was moving and I can still feel the sadness I felt at that moment. We've lost too many musicians since Katrina, moving away for newer and I hate to say better places, and I can't blame them. When they can find a better home and a city that encourages and pays them better in their profession you can't lay blame, but it still is a sad thing when a city built on music can't support its musicians. Even though I would have understood it would have broke my heart to see her leave. I was so happy to read that they had decided to stay in the city. "Oh Nola" was written as a lament to the city when she thought she was leaving.
Along the way we were also treated to a song from the talented Mary Lasseigne. While Mary was playing she has a habit of staying towards the back and even when she sang her song she didn't come forward. But as Mary played guitar on Susan's songs you could see she was having fun too, she would pogo up and down, her hair whipping around. Mary sang her song "Rebecca Sunshine" that we featured as a Song of the Day recently. Her new album Mary Jane and the Brain Surgeon comes out this coming week.
At the end Susan had to chose between songs left on her set list, she had talked too much to fit everything in. She gave the choice to the audience. When one of the songs was "Crescent City Snow" there wasn't much of a choice. She ended with this song, written shortly after Katrina when Susan and family were exiled to Tenneesse, and an ode to life in the city. Susan may not have been born in this city, but she has become one of its true daughters.
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