Katie Pruitt Brings Cathartic Joy to Brooklyn Bowl

Americana rocker Katie Pruitt brought the first leg of the tour for their stellar second album Mantras home to Brooklyn Bowl Thursday night. After the cycle for Pruitt’s first record Expectations was derailed by the pandemic, it’s great to see their latest project launch into the world unabated. 

Opener Jack Van Cleaf was on tour with Pruitt & Co. for the past few months, and they closed out the run together in their shared hometown. A Nashvillian by way of California, Van Cleaf might just be what would happen if you took Noah Kahan out of Vermont and brought him to the South. An especially touching interaction happened during the song “Terrestrial Man,” written about Van Cleaf’s father, who is a pilot, and the feeling that you don’t have any one place to belong.

A cute family moment ensued: The elder Van Cleaf was in the audience, filming the performance on his phone, and he made sure to interject an assuring, “You were!” when Jack sang a line in which he admits to being an asshole. The songsmith rounded out his set with a few new tunes and a pop-in from Pruitt for a duet on “Wild Roses.” 

After the crowd bopped along to a set-change playlist that was at least 50 percent Chappell Roan, Pruitt hit the stage again with a three-piece band in tow: guitarist Johnny Williamson, bassist Taylor Ivey and drummer Aaron Lawson. No more than 30 seconds into the set, newcomers were made aware of what longtime Katie Pruitt fans know so well: They have a voice you’ll never recover from. It swoops and soars adeptly, just as it pierces deep beneath your skin with surgical precision. 

In their songwriting, Pruitt has a knack for hitting you where it hurts and then healing you right back up again. There’s no better example than “White Lies, White Jesus and You,” a hard-hitting critique on the weaponization of faith against marginalized people. If you grew up in church and have any kind of complicated feelings about it, you won’t get through the song without your eyes getting a little damp. The song also showcases Pruitt’s stunning guitar work, with riffs and a rocking rhythm that make you wonder how they aren’t a household name. 

While I haven’t seen Pruitt’s name on any arena marquees yet, it seems that day may be swiftly coming. The show attracted fans from every walk of life, from groups of wine moms and middle-aged dads to Gen Z music lovers and at least one queer couple actively going through a breakup (y’all OK?). The crowd was a bit chatty, but every time Pruitt’s mouth opened and lyrics started spilling out, the room silenced, hypnotized with awe. 

For the last portion of the set, Pruitt brought out an array of special guests to join the show — it’s Nashville, what did you expect? Lockeland Strings (minus Lydia Luce) performed as a quartet on a chilling rendition of “Standstill,” and Jess Nolan and Hadley Kennary sang harmonies together on “Expectations.” Each backed up Pruitt on some songs on their own — Kennary on “Worst Case Scenario,” and Nolan on “Phases of the Moon” and encore “Out of the Blue.” 

It’s not easy to be in or believe in the music industry these days. Leviathan corporations and monopolistic practices have all but ruined the live-performance ecosystem, decent pay is unfairly hard to come by, and it often seems nearly impossible to rise above the noise. But musicians like Pruitt are a reminder of the good that comes out of Music City, as broken and infested — literally, thanks to Brood XIX — as it may be. 

Listening to their songs reminds me why I fell in love with music in the first place. It breeds connection, bringing people together who might never have met otherwise, reminding us of how much we have in common. Music is cathartic and joyful, the purest form of human expression. And Pruitt does it so well, as a little corner of Nashville learned Thursday night. If loving Katie Pruitt is wrong, what’s the point in being right?

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