If you are familiar with the harmonies of Gary Louris and Mark Olson, two of the founding members of that premier Americana band The Jayhawks, then your ears will perk up at the vocals of The Milk Carton Kids.
Kenneth Patengale and Joey Ryan formed their band two years ago and their sound is warm, inviting and classic all at once.
The Milk Carton Kids have already been compared to Simon & Garfunkel, The Everly Brothers among others.. This was evident throughout the night as their guitars brought back distant memories of long gone folk clubs.
Their first performance in Australia was on a chilly Tuesday night in Sydney and it was a wonder so many people had turned up.
Word had obviously gotten out that these two gentlemen possessed a large amount of talent. Although the crowd was somewhat muted in their feedback during the bands frequent anecdotes between songs, there was no holding back when it came to applause.
Dark-suited and looking hip with their vintage Gibson and Martin guitars, from the outset there was no doubt that these beautiful props could be picked and strummed and stroked to produce heavenly music.
The clarity of the harmonies on “One Goodbye” and “There By Your Side”, touched with the note-perfect playing, brought the room to revered silence. Both of these songs can almost bring one to tears and the room was so captivated and attentive that the duo’s fingers sliding on their guitars could be heard
There were also parallels to some of the great comedic duos throughout the set with Ryan playing the kooky foil to somewhat straight man Patengale. Ryan stumbling for words early on in the set was blamed on his jetlag but as the night wore on you could tell this was part of their charming shtick.
He articulated the meaning of ampersand amongst other hysterical rambles including the spruiking about the band merch ‘onesies’ they had for sale for infants was particularly side splitting.
Whether it was the delicate and dreamy “Hope Of A Lifetime”, from their latest The Ash & Clay, or the more up tempo “Honey, Honey”, these two men from Eagle Rock, California sure have this genre covered perfectly. With playing that is reminiscent of times gone past and similar to the stylings of David Rawlings, these Milk Carton Kids are really onto something
Two of the stand out songs on their Prologue record were played tonight with both named after places in America, “Michigan” and “New York”.
The former is as poignant as it is delicate and will be one song that will quite possibly be played by this duo forever. With Ryan and Patengale standing close, the guitar virtuosity is apparent as Patengale bops along to the beat and they both sing like angels about unrequited or broken love.
If you did miss this couple on their brief tour of Australia; don’ fret over it. You can easily grab a piece of The Milk Carton kids for free just by visiting their website. Their first two albums, Retrospect and Prologue, are there for the taking, no money down. They announced from the stage tonight that they had just had just reached their 200,000th download and were clearly impressed with themselves, and so was the crowd at The Factory Theatre.
