It always gives me a warm feeling when the music community comes together to help a friend in need.
So I was pleased to see a good sized crowd at Average Joes, Dec. 27 having a good time by raising money for concert promoter Todd Lacharite, who was admitted to hospital for heart troubles shortly after the last big show he put on — Mother Mother and USS on Dec. 2. 
The whole night was a reunion of friends, both listening and playing a variety of music.
While I missed local pop band Stars From Streetlights, I got to see a couple of the band members, bassist Ray Banman and singer Austrian Graf, try their hand at country music with The Old Man River Band.
They opened with “Wagon Wheel” and played a variety of modern country hits and a few classics.
I was very impressed with Austrian Graf’s voice as always, but had never heard her sing country music.
She sang an excellent duet with Evan Herbst on Johnny Cash’s classic “Jackson,” and and an excellent version of Pistol Annies’ “ Hush Hush,” as well as some Miranda Lambert.
Lead guitarist Kevin “Justice” Bradshaw sing lead vocals on a couple songs, while rhythm guitarist Dave Khallil sang Waylon Jennings’ “Lonesome, Ornery and Mean.”
But most of their set stayed in the modern country vein including a couple of Keith Urban hits including “You Look Good in My Shirt.” But they get extra cool points for their set ending cover of White Cowbell Oklahoma’s “Put the South In Your Mouth.”
They made way for the annual reunion show of folk rock collective the Necessities.
The necessities are always a lot of fun. So for extra enjoyment, they added fiddle player Megan Brown to add extra strings and spooky ambiance to their brand of friendly indie folk music. Bassist Felipe Rodrigues was locked in with drummer Dustin Gergel while Devin Gergel added extra voice, as well as guitar and accordion on some of the band’s many crowd favourites including “ Death To The Sun (The Cricket Song).
Thomas Woodman sang a beautiful “ Old Folks Home” and Steve Foord strummed his mandolin and sang lead vocals on most of the songs including my favourite “Tin Can Soup, the Goat song.).
Everybody sang along with “Death To the Sun.”
They wound down their show with Thomas Woodman bringing out the didgeridoo as the Necessities finished up their set with their song about circus freaks.
