Cuff The Duke Still Winning People Over

Horseshoe Tavern

Toronto, ON

on Oct 16 2009

Kate Harper (CHARTattack)

10/19/2009 4:43pm

Cuff The Duke's first of two nights at Toronto's Horseshoe Tavern on Friday began with a fairly average set from Boys Who Say No. The Toronto country/folk/indie quartet were without their customary banjo, which made their set sound far more indie than country. While their set might have been ordinary, the banter was not.

"Fuck you!" one of their fans shouted from the crowd towards the end of their set.

"No, fuck you!" multi-instrumentalist Mike Lobel shouted back. "You want to have a fuck fight? Well, I'll fuck right back."

Brooklyn, N.Y.'s La Strada, who are Cuff The Duke's labelmates south of the 49th parallel, were up next. Unfortunately, their brand of accordion, cello and violin-accented pop was thoroughly annoying, and that's mostly because of frontman James Craft's voice. While there was a yawning gap in front of the Horseshoe stage throughout their set, a rather over-enthused young man dressed in a three-piece suit (perhaps drunk, since he was holding a beer) made good use of it to dance and skank around and perform all sorts of other confusing interpretative-dance moves.

By the time Cuff The Duke took the stage just after 11:30 and opened with "If I Live Or If I Die," the Horseshoe was packed full and had become a fairly sweaty mess of people waiting impatiently. Singer/guitarist/bassist Wayne Petti, guitarist/pedal steel player Dale Murray, bassist/fiddle player Paul Lowman and drummer Corey Wood came on stage accompanied by The Hylozoists' Francois Turenne, who played keys and guitar for the band throughout their set.

Cuff The Duke played a varied and interesting set that reached as far back as their 2005 self-titled sophomore album. While the set mostly drew from the recently released Way Down Here, the band did an excellent job of interspersing old fan favourites in with the new tracks during its first half. "Follow Me" and "It's All A Blur" were followed by "Remember The Good Times," while "Listen To Your Heart" and "Rockin' Chair" (which featured a guest appearance from Christina Martin) were broken up by "Rossland Square."

By far the highlight of the evening, though, was when Cuff The Duke invited Blue Rodeo's Greg Keelor, who produced Way Down Here, on stage with them. It would have been far too easy for Keelor to accompany the band on one of their songs, and Keelor's far too famous within the folk/alt.country circuit to take a bit part on stage, anyway. Cuff The Duke accompanied him as he ran through a new Blue Rodeo song that will appear on the band's upcoming new album, along with a cover of The Byrds' "You Ain't Goin' Nowhere."

During the set, it became pretty clear that Petti is the next indie rock heartthrob, whether he likes it or not. While there were no stage invasions from over-zealous females wanting to grind against him and Murray, there was a pretty good contingent of ladies professing their love for him from the front of the stage.

The latter half of the set was filled with older tunes like "The Ballad Of Poor John Henry," "Can You Hear Me Now," "The Future Hangs" and "Failure To Some" before the band ended with new single "Promises" and "Another Day In Purgatory."

It became very clear throughout the show that strong songwriting and the band's collective chops are the reason for their success. The extended jam on "Failure To Some" has always translated well live and continues to do so, while "Another Day In Purgatory" also features a similar Crazy Horse-inspired rock out. That the Way Down Here songs, which are more Blue Rodeo-esque than the band's previous output, sound different but didn't hinder the band's set when played next to older tunes, is also testament to their great songwriting skills.

During the encore, the band invited Martin, Keelor, Boys Who Say No and La Strada back on stage, and managed to get the crowd to sing along to Way Down Here's After The Gold Rush-esque opener, "You Were Right."

That the entire Horseshoe was singing along that loudly to a song that's technically just been released should demonstrate that Cuff The Duke's success and popularity only continues to grow, and good on them. Hopefully that continues.