Fri 12/20 @ 8PM
Kent’s Jessica Lea Mayfield just turned 30 in August, but she’s already been playing music professionally for more than two decades. She started playing in her parents’ bluegrass band when she was 8 (along with her brother David who also has his own flourishing career), started to play as a solo act under the name Chittlin when she was in her mid teens, and released her first official album, With Blasphemy So Heartfelt, when she was barely 19, produced by Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach.
She’s been through a series of moods, musical styles and looks in her long career. In fall 2017, she released Sorry Is Gone, her fourth album. While Mayfield’s earlier music contained more evidence of her early rustic roots, she’s more and more drawn from various corners of indie/alternative music with its brooding, emotionally complicated feel.
Her producer on this album is John Agnello, who has worked with Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr. There’s often a bleak, almost stunned quality to her vocals, which fits her subject matter like a glove: she’s said that most of the material on the album refers to the domestic violence she endured at the hands of her husband and former bandmate, bassist Jesse Newport.
Mayfield performed at the Beachland Ballroom last year just before Christmas, doing a mostly seated show so fans could listen carefully and absorb her story. She’s doing it again and hopefully this time she’ll share some of her further journey to healing.
Opening is Akron’s Angie Haze Project, fronted by the colorful Angie Haze, a vocalist/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist has called herself and been called many things, often with the word “gypsy” involved. Her rhythm-heavy global folk rock is enhanced by her distinctive sense of style, and her songs are marked by a confessional, open-hearted passion, enhanced by the ensemble with a wide range of sonic texture.
Tickets are $20.
Cleveland, OH 44110