I met Nerissa Nields in the bathroom and didn't say hi

[rymenhild]

I went to the legendary Berkeley coffeehouse Freight and Salvage last Thursday night, to see Nerissa and Katryna Nields perform. When I got there, the opening band (an excellent folk-country duo called Common Rotation) was playing, so I ducked into the ladies' room before the Nields started playing.

It was a relatively small ladies' room, and I was the only one there. In came a woman with dyed-blonde hair just below the shoulder, slightly frizzy, and an angular face. She looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn't place her. I walked out of the bathroom without saying anything.

Of course, as I realized about thirty seconds after it was too late to chat, the woman was Nerissa...

The Nields played an excellent set, mostly based on the new album This Town is Wrong. They've become much less rocky and more country, I think, over the years. The change has something to do with their ditching the backup band, of course, but I don't think that's it. When I saw them as a pair in 2002, Nerissa and Katryna still hadn't quite figured out how to optimize their sound on an acoustic level. Love and China, the Nields' first duo album and the one that had just been released before the concert I saw, has excellent songwriting but is occasionally flawed by songs out of the women's voice ranges. During the last two years, they've really learned how to sing and play to their best advantage. All of the new songs are on the appropriate keys for Nerissa and Katryna, and the harmonies and guitar riffs are lovely.

Comments

[caffeinediary.livejournal.com]

ooh, Nerissa! :) Both women are friendly although I get the feeling Nerissa is shy. I've met Katrina a few times (and seen her beyond adorable little girl, Amelia).

Edie Carey is playing in Berkeley soon-ish. if you go to her website, you'll see it.

[earis.livejournal.com]

Hey!

Common Rotation played a couple of weeks ago at The Pint, a coffe house in Bryn Mawr.

Furthermore, my AP US history teacher was Abagail Nields, the sister of the Nields sisters.

Connections every where.

[goblinmouse.livejournal.com]

you SO stole what I was going to say.

It is also interesting to note that their little sister, while a very sweet girl, has really terrible musical taste for someone with such talented older sisters. She played the backstreet boys at us in class.

[rymenhild.livejournal.com]

That's really funny. I would not have thought that a Nields sister was constitutionally capable of hearing the Backstreet Boys without some kind of explosion involved.

[muchabstracted.livejournal.com]

Hmmm. I heard WUMB (91.9) play a song of theirs from The Town is Wrong, and noticed that it was country. Fortunately I like country more than I used to.