If Hayes Carll wants more in life than to play music for good people and write clever one-liners, he showed no signs of it last night at the Double Wide. Maybe it's an act, but he does a good job of faking it. Here are some of the most Hayes Carll-ish things that happened at his show last night.
6. Sharing some wisdom about irony Carll introduced one song with a quote from singer Ray Wylie Hubbard, a friend of his. "He said, 'The problem with irony is not everybody gets it.'"
5. Claiming that he would have played even if no one was there. Not humble enough to simply thank fans for being there, Carll also said that he would have played the show whether, "Y'all show up or not."
4. Skipping the fake early-ending encore concert thing At the time of the night when most bands leave abruptly to force fans to chant for an encore, Carll explained that he wasn't going to be doing that. Instead, he stayed on stage and calmly asked everyone want they wanted to hear next. What followed next was lots of yelling. "All right, I got it," he said, before playing a few more songs.
3. The mixture of tattooed punk-looking folks and cowboy hats in the crowd. Not so much something he did last night, admittedly, but it speaks to what he does in general. Is Hayes Carll's music country, is it folk, or is it rock? Scanning the crowd's wardrobe, you'd be left with few answers. You just know his music isn't for snobby hipsters because everyone showed up dressed comfortably, in whatever they felt like wearing. The only thing uniting the audience's look was that everyone was pretty young. So let's just invent a new genre called Modern Country Rock and that should cover everything.
2. The Touchy-Feely Couples Again, more of a reference to what he inspires. In the mosh-pit area, there was no mosh pit, only a cowboy-hat-wearer slow dancing with his lady. Closer to me, there was a dude in a baseball cap who seemed physically unable to pry his hands off of his girlfriend's waist, unless she was leaving to get him a beer. They made out passionately during the slow songs and did kind of a upbeat, freaky, gyration-type thing during the fast songs, while looking longingly at each other. Also, they knew all of the words to his songs and sang along all night. I can't confirm this, but I'm fairly certain that their night ended with some above-average drunk sex while Hayes Carll played on vinyl.
1. His performance of "Another Like You." Best song of this night and most any other.
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