Quoting song lyrics isn’t a helpful way to sum up a musician’s work: music succeeds or fails based on sound, not clever ideas. But it’s a critical vice that’s hard to avoid when writing about Eef Barzelay. The former Clem Snide songwriter, now a solo performer, writes material that weds sharply turned phrases to memorable country/rock tunes and plaintive guitar lines. In this sense he’s similar to other over-quoted acts like The Mountain Goats or Silver Jews; he’s also been compared to Woody Guthrie and Robyn Hitchcock. Even so, that’s about as far from bad company as you can get. Barzelay was born in Tel Aviv but now lives in Nashville, and that cultural mash-up sometimes informs his music—as in “Jews for Jesus Blues,” where he laments, “Now that I’m saved, I wish I was damned.” (Well, one little quote can’t hurt.)
Sat., Aug. 15, 9 p.m., 2009
Sat., Aug. 15, 9 p.m., 2009
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