Legendary KISS Gutarist Ace Frehley Dies at 74
Golden Age Thursday: Redd Kross Turn Pop Excellence Into Raw Punk Energy Live
LISTEN: Caleb L’Etoile Brings Eerie Experimentation To Post-punk Prowess On “Darling Pt. 2”
LISTEN: Jack Manley’s “Wind in a Kite” Is Sleek Indie Rock With Poetic Undertones
John Moreland Doesn’t Know Where He Fits — and That’s the Point (FEATURE)
Jerid O’Connell of Rousers on The Energy of The Punk Scene Surrounding Their Unreleased ‘1979 Sire Sessions’ (INTERVIEW/ALBUM PREMIERE)
Sierra Hull Talks New Album ‘A Tip Toe High Wire’, Outlaw Fest & Earning Her Own Signature Gibson Mandolin (INTERVIEW)
Guitar Legend Vernon Reid Talks New Album ‘Hoodoo Telemetry’, Playing Ozzy’s ‘Back To The Beginning’ & More (INTERVIEW)
David Gilmour’s Memorable 2024 Tour Captured On ‘The Luck and Strange Concerts’ (ALBUM REVIEW)
A Heavyhitting Music Veteran Flies Below Radar: Songwriter Mike Viola Captivates a Reverent Crowd at John & Peter’s (SHOW REVIEW)
New Documentary ‘Simple Minds: Everything Is Possible’ Chronicles Ambitious Journey of One of the 80s’ Most Iconic Bands (FILM REVIEW)
1982’s ‘Around The World’ Covers The Police On Their First World Tour (DVD REVIEW)
‘U2 – Until The End of the World’ By Bradley Morgan (BOOK REVIEW)
‘Licorice Pizza’ Can’t Carry Weight Of Its Parts (FILM REVIEW)
‘Loki’ Gives Us Loki vs. Loki in Episode 3 (TV REVIEW)
All the Movie Trailers from Super Bowl LIV
2021 Holiday Movie Preview: ‘Ghostbusters: Afterlife,’ ‘The Power of The Dog,’ ‘House of Gucci’ & More
35 Years Ago Today- Ride Released Pivotal Shoegaze Album & Debut ‘Nowhere’
SONG PREMIERE: Talented New Orleans Sidemen Come Together as Captain Buckles for Soulful Blues-Rock Tune “Bus Station Blues”
Willy Tea Taylor and the Fellership Play ‘The Great Western Hangover’ in its Entirety, Record Live Set at Portland, OR’s Showdown (SHOW RECAP/PHOTOS)
Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Don Felder Shares Candid Eagles Stories & Why His Album ‘The Vault – Fifty Years Of Music’ Is A Must Listen (INTERVIEW)
30 Years Later: Pretenders’ Live Album ‘The Isle of View’ Remains Vital Unplugged Listening Experience
Tulsa’s Studio Records Helps Fill Many A Vinyl Fanatic’s Collection (VINYL LIVES)
The Surf Ballroom Remains Iowa’s Rock N’ Roll Historical Landmark- Readies ‘Not Fade Away’ Buddy Holly Experience (THESE WALLS)
Saxophonist John Helliwell (Formerly Of Supertramp) On A Life Of Jazz After Prog-Pop (HEY YOU/INTERVIEW)
ON THE MAP: Antone’s in Austin Celebrates 50 Years
The Replacements’ ‘Tim’ Let It Bleed Edition Proves Worth As Discerning & Durable Retrospective
Time Out Take Five Summer Edition: Noah Haidu, Dave Bass, Satoko Fujii, Jon Irabagon
SONG PREMIERE: Talented New Orleans Sidemen Come Together as Captain Buckles for Soulful Blues-Rock Tune “Bus Station Blues”
SONG PREMIERE: The Krickets Find Pure Euphoria Through Soulful and Harmonic Americana on “If You Only Knew”
VIDEO PREMIERE: Bird Streets Reflects on Dark Times with Shimmering Guitar-pop Sounds on “Everyonewelovewillgoaway”
Jerid O’Connell of Rousers on The Energy of The Punk Scene Surrounding Their Unreleased ‘1979 Sire Sessions’ (INTERVIEW/ALBUM PREMIERE)
It feels reasonable to say that millions of people know Mike Viola’s music and could recite a lot of his lyrics but have no idea that he wrote it or who he even is. (I’ll unpack that in a moment.) But on October 15th, at the legendary John & Peter’s in New Hope, Pennsylvania, songwriter Mike Viola performed a solo acoustic set – him, a microphone, and an acoustic guitar run into a DI box – for an adoring crowd who could not have been happier that he didn’t play any of “the hits.”
Viola’s most widely known original work is from blockbuster films: in 1996, he sang lead on the title track for That Thing You Do, Tom Hanks’ charming story of a one-hit wonder in the 1960s. (Viola and his co-writer and frequent collaborator, the late Adam Schlesinger, were nominated for an Oscar for Best Original Song but, in a decision that has not aged well, lost out to Madonna’s “You Must Love Me.”) In 2007, Viola wrote songs for the film Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story, and went on to serve as musical director on a promotional tour. (John C. Reilly recently announced that he’ll reprise his role as Dewey Cox and tour with his band, the Hard Walkers, in 2027.) And in 2010, Viola wrote many of Aldous Snow’s original songs from Get Him to the Greek, including “African Child” and “Furry Wall,” made legendary by Russell Brand. Viola is also well known for his work with Panic! at the Disco – Viola co-wrote the massively popular “Victorious” with frontman Brandon Urie, who frequently performs on Viola’s solo recordings, as well as a variety of other singular artistic voices, including Andrew Bird, J.S. Ondara, Jenny Lewis, and Dawes. This is all well and good, but it’s not exactly why the crowd showed up to John and Peter’s.
There were plenty of local friends and fans at the show – the venue is a short drive from Viola’s record label, Grand Phony Music Company – as well as some who came in from out of town. (Longtime fans Don and Pat flew in, as they’ve done for countless other Viola shows over the years, while Kailee Butcher, bassist with ViperSnatch, surely traveled the farthest from her homebase in Queensland, Australia.) In a way, Viola’s fans came for the same reasons fellow artists seek him out as a collaborator – because he’s a uniquely talented and expressive singer, songwriter, lyricist, guitarist, and musician – and he lent these talents to offer the crowd an intimate and unforgettable night of music, along with an overarching feeling of being seen, of belonging.
Viola has released a wide variety of music over nearly three decades, whether under his own name or as part of his cult ‘90s power pop band, Candy Butchers. In this band, Viola found early success and also learned some hard lessons. He opened the night with the Candy Butchers’ “Unexpected Traffic,” offering an early glimpse into aspects of his inner life that would go on to inform many of his lyrics. He next played “Rock of Boston,” the title track from the 2024 album he recorded at his Los Angeles studio, Barebones, and wrote about returning to his suburban Boston home. Viola’s easy stage presence and warm, evocative tenor served to comfort the crowd as his lyrics touched on themes of middle age, memory, and forgiveness, implying rhetorical questions about whether we ever truly escape the gravity of our family of origin – or if we even should – a la John Darnielle of The Mountain Goats.
Viola’s stage presence is unassuming, yet confident, and as he began to sing and tell stories between songs, he really drew the audience in. He plucks his strings more like a musician than a guitarist, presenting a broad and distinctive set of rhythmic and harmonic possibilities to support his moving melodic ideas, delivered with a voice that calls to mind everyone from Buddy Holly to James Taylor, Paul Simon to Elliott Smith. The setlist moved through his catalog with purpose: Viola sang of pharmacy parking lot ennui and positivity mantras in “It Does a Number On My Brain,” as well as first wife Kim, who died young of cancer, in “Painkillers,” where the room held its breath as he sang of his wife Audrey’s reminders to remember the good and not just the suffering. (Viola and Audrey have been married for almost 25 years.) Viola talked about his mother Charlene – or “Chuck,” as he called her – and how she moved so fast through life that he nicknamed her “the pink blur.” That affection bled into “Bonanza,” which endeavors to sublimate her childhood trauma into something softer, through the lens of old TV Westerns flickering at the foot of her bed. After singing “What to Do with Michael,” Viola himself said that one reached his heart. (As the father of girls, “Night Birds” tugged on my heartstrings the hardest.)
A lot of Viola’s music is also fun and funny. He performed more than a few songs from Paul McCarthy, his trippy 2023 concept album that imagined Paul “Baz” McCarthy, rather than Macca, had manned the Höfner bass for the Beatles. (Somehow, this calls to mind the Dirty Projectors’ The Getty Address, their 2005 “glitch opera” about Don Henley.) He muses on how to tell his story in “Bill Viola,” the first track on Paul McCarthy, where his lyrics hint at the philosophy of relativism: first, he refers to himself as Mike, then as Bill (a famous video artist) and then as Frank (the late Red Sox pitcher), each name shift representing another version of ambition and self-construction, all while a teenage Mike watched himself on VHS and doesn’t recognize the face looking back. (Heady stuff, man.) Local artist and diehard fan, Colin McCullough, noted that the show happened to fall on the three-year release anniversary of the title track, originally released in October 2022. Butcher, the Aussie bassist, offered to play flute to the song, and Viola was into it. (McCullough joined the pair on stage to hold the sheet music.)
Between songs, Viola shared that he’s written a book about growing up in Boston in the early 80s and will soon publish it, along with recordings of two songs he wrote during those years at 14. He expects to return to the studio in the fall and soon after will hit the road with the full band. He’s also been working on the music for an upcoming comedy that he says is great. (Given his track record of contributing music to movies that become classics, it should be a good watch.
Viola and his music engender a really cool crowd, and such a small, intimate show highlighted much of what holds it together. It will be great to see him and his band when they tour early next year, as well as when he leads Dewey Cox’s Hard Walkers – but you really have to see Mike Viola in this context to really appreciate his songs at their simplest and most direct.
photo by John Young, Grand Phony Records.
Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *
A Heavyhitting Music Veteran Flies Below Radar: Songwriter Mike Viola Captivates a Reverent Crowd at John & Peter’s (SHOW REVIEW)
Violent Femmes’ “American Music” Enchants Burlington’s Flynn Center (SHOW REVIEW)
The Beta Band Bring First Tour in Over 20 Years to Portland, OR with a Sonically Rich and Dazzling Performance at the Crystal Ballroom (SHOW REVIEW)
30 Years Later: Pretenders’ Live Album ‘The Isle of View’ Remains Vital Unplugged Listening Experience
Luther Dickinson’s ‘Dead Blues’ Featuring Datrian Johnson Proves Illuminating & Fierce (ALBUM REVIEW)
Katie Schecter’s Twangy Soul & World Weary Sound Make ‘Empress’ A Winner (ALBUM REVIEW)
A Heavyhitting Music Veteran Flies Below Radar: Songwriter Mike Viola Captivates a Reverent Crowd at John & Peter’s (SHOW REVIEW) – Glide Magazine
