Jazzfest: Timber Timbre @ Marion Dewar Plaza
The longest day of the year did seem to drag on as we waited for Timber Timbre to hit the Marion Dewar Plaza for Jazzfest’s OLG After Dark Series. When the exuberant trumpet of Chris Botti closed off the Conferedation Park with a standing ovation, the foursome of Timber Timbre took to their stage just after 10:30 p.m. Without a word, but with a deafening welcome from the audience, they broke into “Grand Canyon” that began a darkly lit & themed concert.
Taylor Kirk, frontman & founder of Timber Timbre, brandished his bass & guitar like scythes, swiping sounds out of his instruments as he danced by himself. Songs we knew and loved from their self-titled album, as well as Creep On Creepin’ On & Hot Dreams took on different shapes than the laments of his recorded music. He shivered with the energy of a deep inflection and shrieked his lyrics quite a few times, coyote-like.
All photo coverage of Jazzfest discourages taking pictures of a concert’s intimate moments, which made it doubly hard to photograph under an approximate 15 watts of purple light. I’d argue that Timber Timbre’s set was just one long intimate moment that ended around 11:45 p.m. with incessant applause & screams from the crowd. We didn’t shut up until a jacketless Kirk came back on stage solo for a five-song encore that went into June 22’s earliest hour.
The only two introductions to songs were during the encore that began with Kirk playing “Demon Host” alone with his guitar. It was a blurry snapshot of what it was like before Timber Timbre became a band. He continued with “Run From Me” by saying, “This song sometimes comes off as a celebration of misogyny… It’s really not supposed to.” Near the end of its contemplative country sound, Simon Trottier, Mathieu Charbonneau & their drummer replacing Olivier Fairfield came back out to blast us through the final three songs. At the third song Mr. Kirk said simply, “This song is called ‘Creep On Creepin’ On’.”
