Show Review: Tyler Childers @ The Troubador

Tyler Childers performs at legendary Los Angeles venue, the Troubadour.

Show Review:
Tyler Childers
@ The Troubador

  It must be hard for middle aged major label record label executives these days, especially those from the rock era.  I'm not saying that I feel sorry for them, but you can't help but wince on their behalf when you look at the artists who have captured the pop star/rock star label in the internet era.  Take, for example, the micro genre turned chart topper world of internet rap:  drug addicted young adults, funded by gang money, topping the charts without a physical record, let alone an album or a major label backed album campaign.

   I'm pretty sure that there is no coming back from the precipice opened up by the streaming era.  Soundcloud rap provides strong evidence that if one is simply popular enough, you can leverage the rest of it. I'm not sure that really was the case before Soundcloud rap started storming up the actual charts, the model was more that one would bring oneself to the attention of the "real" music industry via promotional tools like Soundcloud, not that one would actually use those formats to become a top 200 most popular artist in the world type person.

  The thing is though, is that all those rock and roll guys are still around.  The way the cultural industrial complex works, if you make a lot of money for a large corporation over an extended period of time, you get to stick around.  If you don't make anyone money, you are out, but if you do, you get to become one of these guys (very few are women).  My point being that there were a LOT of these guys there.   

   Specifically, Ian Thornton, the Huntington West Virginia based manager of Tyler Childers.   When I walked in with Amy (Monotone) he was with Bill Bennett, former Warner Bros Nashville exec and current Hollywood/country fixer.  They were shortly joined by others from Monotone, and label executives from Interscope, RCA and Sony. zero mentions on Stereogum  Also present was Jeffrey Azoff, son of Irving Azoff.  So, to be clear, Ian Thornton manages Tyler Childers.  Tyler Childers does not have a record contract.  Many people are both interested in managing Childers and signing him to a record contract, and it is clear that he a) has a manager and b) perhaps isn't that interested in signing a record contract.

  All of this took place in the front bar of the Troubadour, during the set of opening act Blank Range.  There was also a description worthy mix of fans, guy in an NRA shirt under his denim vest, Ezra Koenig of Vampire Weekend, a guy wearing a "Make Nashville Rock Again" hat. And women! It was not the sausage fest of a Jamey Johnson or Sturgill Simpson concert.  I honestly don't know if Ezra Koenig of Vampire Weekend is a fan or if he just decided to hang out with his manager Ian (Montone, not Thornton).

  It was a lot of what might be called "feeling out," but there is no question that Thornton is running that ship. The show itself was a triumph.  Not the immortal triumph of his first appearance at the Ryman Auditorium, opening for Margo Price, earlier this year, but a triumph.   The buzz in the audience was palpable.  Childers opened with his hit, Whitehouse Road, which seems like something he didn't have to do.  I sensed that he was nervous, and a little bit unsure of the crowd.  It was different at the Ryman Auditorium, which he owned like he was born to play there.    If I had a chance to say something to him, I would have told him not to worry, that the crowd was with him and that he could do no wrong.

    I would say that his live show is not quite as developed as Stapleton or Margo Price, but that he is better life than Sturgill Simpson, who I've now seen in "jam mode" twice.   I think ultimately it is the quality of his voice, as supposed to his lyrics- which are really good- or the band- which is just ok, that has given him his viral quality.  He is an astonishing internet era story of an artist from the most outsidery of outsider places, who has developed outside any publicized "scene."

  Even more astonishing that he nets a total of zero mentions on Pitchfork, zero mentions on Stereogum, only Brooklyn Vegan has been tracking his unlikely rise.   It is both shameful and embarrassing that Pitchfork has slept so long on Childers.  Certainly, if you are going to cover artists like Willie Nelson, Chris Stapleton, Margo Price and Sturgill Simpson, you have to include Tyler Childers on that list.  He belongs there, unquestionably, beyond debate.

    How incredible, also, that, like Price and Simpson (but not Stapleton) he has come from wholly outside the formidable Nashville music industry.   This really is THE indie/local music scene story of this decade, in my mind.   It is something that is really happening, generating interest among audiences and professionals/corporations alike.  That is the succesful combination that you need.