A Bloody Show: John Wesley Harding & Friends—Live at Bumbershoot 2005

Waiting for John Wesley Harding's performance on a rainy Sunday afternoon at Seattle's Bumbershoot Festival in 2005, I had the feeling that—if nothing else—the show would be unique. And that it was. Harding mixed readings from his first novel, the Dickens-esque Misfortune (sharing the narrating with Brit Robyn Hitchcock), with performances of period folk songs backed by a string quartet, a pickup band of Seattle-area all-stars, and his own a cappella folk trio, the Love Hall Tryst (the songs are mainly drawn from the latter's CD Songs of Misfortune). The resulting DVD, while not technically proficient (suffering from sometimes-glary camera work and uneven sound), is nonetheless a fine record of the concert's thrown-together feel (a bonus clip shows Harding's one and only run-through with the quartet in a dingy Seattle rehearsal space) and of its powerful combination of music and literature. One of those magical, one-of-a-kind performances that few have the opportunity to see, this lyrical, literary one-off by Harding and friends may be a curio, but it's a unique and moving one. Recommended. Aud: P. (M. Moore)