Brian Slattery Photo
Oliveras.
Andrew Cohen, vocalist and guitarist of the band Oliveras, mopped a little perspiration from his brow. All the doors and windows in Neverending Books were open, but a heat wave was a heat wave.
“I guess we’ll just get started,” he said.
That drew a cheer from the audience right away.
“I haven’t even done anything yet!” he responded, to laughter.
But then he became genuine, mentioning that this was the first time he and drummer Ryan Tedesco had played out, the first time he’d played songs he’d written in front of people. “Thanks everyone. This is a dream come true.”
Oliveras was the start of a three-band evening that has continued to cement Neverending Books as one of the places new New Haven bands can go to cut their teeth.
Of course, “new” could mean a lot of things. In the case of Cohen and Tedesco, this wasn’t even close to the first time either of them had played — both have been playing their instruments for years. But their excitement at playing new music for people for the first time was palpable, as both of them smiled most of the way through their set.
“Sing along if you start to feel it,” Cohen said, on a note of encouragement. He proved a charming, engaging front man, a solid guitarist who could play a line or fill in the band’s sound as needed, and a vocalist adept at delivering the strong melodies and messages of his songs, half confessions, half aspirations, all with little guile. Tedesco, meanwhile, laid down rhythms within the rhythms he played, creating shifting textures and giving a sense of momentum even to the songs’ quieter moments. The two musicians fed off each other’s energy, trading looks and flashing grins.
“ ‘Burning Alive.’ Perfect song for today,” Cohen said halfway through the set in reference to the temperature. As the audience laughed, Tedesco supplied a classic ba-dum bump.
“And that’s why you always bring drums,” Cohen said. “Thanks for sweating it out with us.”
The second act, Craig Musa, laced his warmth and amiability with en edge of intensity, as he performed a set of almost all originals, both sung and instrumentals. He began with a sound experiment involving guitar, looper, and theremin, and proceeded from there to put his guitar through its paces through layers and effects that added considerable space to the music, leaving his plaintive voice alone and effective in the center of it. An instrumental dedicated to a grandparent tugged at the emotions in one direction; a kiss-off to his hometown tugged them in another. A set highlight was a song Musa said was inspired by a character in It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, who said that he wanted his body thrown in the trash after he died. In Musa’s hands, it became a meditation on not only whole good the body serves us after we’re gone, but what we do with the life we have.
Soft Screams — a.k.a. Connor Mack — finished off the night in a sense by finding the common ground between Oliveras and Musa. Mack has been recording a lot of material, since 2018, and remarked that they’re very different on his albums, but “it’s fun to play them just me and a guitar.” Cohen and Musa had both commented on the heat on the stage (“Again, it’s very hot up here,” Musa had said) and Mack followed form (“You weren’t lying that it’s very hot. But that’s rock ‘n’ roll, baby”). He then charged through a series of honest songs ranging from struggles with mental health and the medications meant to alleviate them, to expressions of gratitude for relationship stability.
In his banter he could be self-deprecating (“I appreciate you watching some scrappy power pop like the end credits to a movie”) but toward the end of his set, sincerity took over.
“These last two years were really terrible and we can all agree on that,” he said, “but sometimes, if you’re lucky, you find solace in the people you surround yourself with.” This was to introduce a song celebrating five years with his significant other. At the end of his set, he announced what felt like a statement of intent.
“I’m trying to build real connection with the music scene,” he said. Making music on his own had been satisfying, but “it’s great to really play music with really cool people — like you. Let’s definitely do this again.” The cheers from the audience suggested that many agreed.