{"id":258,"date":"2018-08-17T22:27:22","date_gmt":"2018-08-17T22:27:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/elephantintheroomband.com\/wp\/?p=258"},"modified":"2020-12-31T16:21:31","modified_gmt":"2020-12-31T22:21:31","slug":"review_2018-07-27","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/elephantintheroomband.com\/wp\/?p=258","title":{"rendered":"The Elephant In The Room Experience"},"content":{"rendered":"

(Twin Cities resident John Augustine wrote a review of our July 27, 2018 performance at the old Stillwater Eagles 94 club.\u00a0\u00a0This article is excerpted from that review.)<\/em><\/p>\n

This band is very capable and entertaining, with an extensive list of songs from the 1950s through the 1990s.\u00a0\u00a0They opened with an enthusiastic rendition of Warren Zevon\u2019s \u201cLawyers, Guns, and Money.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0I had heard them do this before, and Warren Zevon\u2019s songs fit vocalist\/lead guitarist Mitch Berg’s range and personality very well.\u00a0\u00a0EITR ventured into previously-unexplored territory for their next song, “Found Out About You” by the Gin Blossoms.\u00a0\u00a0Other songs EITR does particularly well are Golden Earring’s \u201cRadar Love,\u201d \u201cCloser to Free\u201d by the BoDeans, \u201cBye Bye Love\u201d by The Cars, and material by the Eagles, Tom Petty, Sister Hazel, Wilson Pickett, Ian Hunter, Bob Seger, Bob Marley, Tommy Tutone, Cheap Trick, Aerosmith, Stray Cats, Lynyrd Skynyrd, the Georgia Satellites, the Steve Miller Band, and the Greg Kihn Band.\u00a0\u00a0A very wide variety.<\/p>\n

Lead vocalist\u00a0Tommy Huynh<\/a>\u00a0makes it easier to have more post-1990 songs in their setlist.\u00a0\u00a0Because Tommy’s voice is in tune and powerful enough to be heard over hard-rock music, it frees Mitch to thrash harder on the guitar when he doesn’t have to carry the vocals.<\/p>\n

EITR band leader\u00a0Mitch Berg<\/a>\u00a0is a very capable singer, writer, and musician.\u00a0\u00a0You can hear that on his solo album,\u00a0See Red<\/em>\u00a0(by “The Supreme Soviet of Love”).\u00a0\u00a0He can play blues, punk, rockabilly, country, and even some reggae.<\/p>\n

Jon Heyer<\/a>\u00a0plays rhythm guitar (electric and acoustic) and occasionally, bass guitar on some songs.\u00a0\u00a0He also sings some of the slower, bluesier, pre-1980 songs.<\/p>\n

Drummer\u00a0Paul Yackel<\/a>\u00a0can really play and can sing lead on some songs as well.<\/p>\n

Torleif Sorenson<\/a>\u00a0often stays in the background during performances, but provides whatever texture is needed (bass, keyboards, backing vocals) for a song.\u00a0\u00a0He plays a six-string bass, which is *not* something you see in your average local band.\u00a0\u00a0Since adding keyboards to his live rig, the range of songs Elephant In The Room plays has increased.<\/p>\n

Even though they don\u2019t play live for a living, they come off as skilled professionals, not a goof-off novelty.\u00a0\u00a0Elephant In The Room is a good, fun, five-man band, and if you haven\u2019t experienced an EITR show, you should.\u00a0\u00a0Perhaps the best thing that can be said about this kind of band is that the members seem to have a good,\u00a0whole-is-better-than-the-sum-of-the-parts<\/strong>\u00a0chemistry.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Twin Cities resident John Augustine wrote a review of our July 27, 2018 performance at the old Stillwater Eagles 94 club.\u00a0\u00a0This article is excerpted from that review.) This band is very capable and entertaining, with an extensive list of songs from the 1950s through the 1990s.\u00a0\u00a0They opened with an enthusiastic rendition of Warren Zevon\u2019s \u201cLawyers, … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “The Elephant In The Room Experience”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-258","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-review"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/elephantintheroomband.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/elephantintheroomband.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/elephantintheroomband.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elephantintheroomband.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elephantintheroomband.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=258"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/elephantintheroomband.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":967,"href":"http:\/\/elephantintheroomband.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258\/revisions\/967"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/elephantintheroomband.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=258"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elephantintheroomband.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=258"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elephantintheroomband.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=258"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}