Not to be one of those people who brags about how talented her friends are, but there’s no use in skating around it here: Evan Kenney and I go back a minute and I’ve loved every song he’s sung since the day we met. The first Bodega Girls show I went to was back in the winter of 2009. Since then, I’ve watched this guy teeter on top of Austin bar tables before running off the stage in the middle of his own SXSW set, push his vocal chords to the point of nearly snapping in Bushwick basements with Thunderbloods, and dance like a fool at a number of the DJ nights he’s lent his pop fanboy tendencies to in Boston and beyond. I will forever associate Evan with poster paint, as he and Carmen O’Connor used to get all geometric on each others faces with that stuff for Bodega Girls shows — it photographed better and showed up stronger under black lights — until they found out it was super toxic and stopped. That was a pointer from our first official interview together. The conversations have derailed a bit since then.
I’m putting this all out there because though I come from a biased place in that I’m an eternal Bodega Girls superfan, I love that Evan is capable of doing pretty much anything and doing it well — even when it’s a chill, approachable, modestly lo-fi EP called War & Oates that does little more than showcase his voice and songwriting chops. Clearly, somebody’s been listening to a lot of Bob Dylan’s Greatest Hits Vol. II as there’s a sage, troubadour-esque vibe going on here. “Night of the Prairie Fire,” especially — those troubled brows and earnest eyes squinted shut just appear before you, don’t they? And extra points for a lovely cover of the Boss’ “Dancing in the Dark.”
If you love Bodega Girls and can’t stop listening to the few songs Thunderbloods put out there, this’ll surprise you, in that Evan in no way is copping any sort of stage bravado with War & Oates. He’s singing for his supper because that’s just what he’s gotta do sometimes, and we’re all ears.
