(photo cred)

(Please welcome Ric Hickey to Each Note Secure and enjoy his writeup of last nights PJ Harvey & John Parish show below)

Though PJ Harvey’s first album appeared in 1992, until this week she had never performed in the Cincinnati area. Appearing at Covington’s Madison Theater, Harvey finally graced a tri-state stage with her old friend John Parish in tow, the two on tour in support of their new release A Woman A Man Walked By.

Her bare feet flitting about the stage, her tousled black mop atop, and only a small black cotton dress draping her slight frame, PJ Harvey’s sly dervish trance dance held the audience enraptured for 2 hours Wednesday night.

Harvey and Parish were accompanied by a band of well dressed men including drummer Jean Marc Butty, guitarist Giovanni Ferrario, and alt-rock legend Eric Drew Feldman on bass and keyboards. Feldman has worked with Captain Beefheart, The Pixies, Polyphonic Spree, Pere Ubu and countless others. Straight-faced and stoic throughout the evening, Feldman’s deadpan demeanor was matched by Butty and Ferrario as if the three were locked in a deathly serious staring contest. Like Harvey and Parish, the serious sidemen wore only black, greys and dark browns, each man sporting a fine dark fedora as well.

Drawing only from the two records Harvey and Parish have recorded together, the show was nonetheless well-received by a passionate and responsive crowd of people who clearly had waited years for this night. Indeed, this writer heard countless concert attendees remarking on what an amazing blessing it was that Harvey was playing in the area at all. The omission of her perhaps better known ‘solo’ material seemed to bring no frowns or complaints.

The crowd seemed helplessly under Harvey’s spell all night long as the band’s setlist ran through all the extremes of human emotion, from the flat-out Rock of the show opener “Black Hearted Love”, to the peaceful pleading silent prayer of “Cracks In The Canvas”, and the hilariously chaotic and unpredictable jagged edge rants like “Taut” and “Pig Will Not”.

After each song the house lights would dim then slowly rise again to reveal Harvey and band stock still, graciously absorbing the roar of applause. Late in the set, Parish’s subtle grin finally crept wide across his face. With her pretty and peculiar voice booming beautifully, crooning, crying and creaking in her songs, yet soft spoken and demure between numbers, Harvey peeped polite gratitude and sheepishly grinned back at Parish, old friends tacitly acknowledging a good time had by all.