A late announced country show at the Slice provided to be a great night of country music for those who missed Dallas Smith at the Enmax, March 3.
Ottawa based country musician Trevor Alguire, kicked off his latest tour by knocking the rust off, fighting with tuning a finicky rented acoustic guitar, enjoying Lethbridge’s mild winter weather, eating the Slice’s pizza and putting his band through the paces.
He threw song titles at them and strummed the first few chords, which they instantly picked up on, even whe
n he “sang the wrong waltz.”
He played songs from throughout his career, but also enjoyed the opportunity to introduce a handful of audience members to a lot of brand new material. He sounded like a mix of the Northern Pikes with veteran roots rocker Rodney Crowell and just a touch of Corb Lund.
His Calgary based band, including drummer Jay Bradley, lead guitarist Todd Maduke and bassist Andrew Bueckert were excellent. In addition to easily following his lead Bradley and Maduke added sweet vocal harmonies.
There were a lot of catchy highlights, especially the new songs, which would be at home on CKUA at the very least. He played a few waltzes and plenty of uptempo, crunchy roots rockers like “ Flash Flood,” “Hold On” and especially “North Wind.” “Wasting My Time With You” (not the Default song Dallas Smith was famous for before going country) was another highlight.
In between singing and fighting with tuning his guitar, he told stories and cracked jokes including telling a story about playing Olds, Alberta “Where the trucks are dirty and the guys driving them are dirtier.”
He plays the Twin Butte store on March 11.
