The big country show was at Average Joes, Dec. 4 with Claresholm’s Shane Chisholm and Julian Austin.
I always enjoy seeing Chisholm play, if only because his home made gas tank stand up bass is a sight to behold and hear. Gas tanks have a lot of resonance, and Chisholm brought the spirit of rockabilly to a good sized audience.
He began his set with a song called “Taking The Trash Out,” about spousal abuse and carried on though several cuts from his CD “Hitchhiking Buddha” and sent out “Kicking Up Dust,” to ex-cons and truckers.
In addition to a lot of his CD, he let his lead guitarist show his chops on a couple country rock jams on “Walk This Way,” and This Flight Tonight.”
His band also played their country version of Big Sugar’s “All Hell For A Basement,” and asked the audience to request his country Christmas song “Christmas In The Country,” followed by a traditional country song about drinking he wrote with Patrick Ballantyne who co-wrote “All Hell for A Basement.”
Calgary based country musician Julian Austin wears his influences on his sleeve, not to mention his shirt.So I caught Austin at Average Joes in the middle of a rousing rendition of Queen’s “Fat Bottomed Girls,” wearing an Iron Maiden T-Shirt and big , black cowboy hat, and it was awesome.
He played a lot of classic rock covers for a singer billed as country, but played a couple of his own songs as well including several of his mostly covers CD “One For One,” but also his hit “If Houston Doesn’t Want You,” for which he filmed the video on the roof of the former Henotic a couple summers ago.
He had the crowd captivated in the palm of his hand by the time his band took a break, leaving him to control the stage and command the audience’s attention with a solo medley of hits beginning with “Night Moves,” and ranging from Bryan Adams to Whitesnake.
Local country star Trevor Panczak sat rapt at attention at the foot of the stage, watching intently as the band rejoined Austin midway through “Copperhead Road.”
