Everybody's News, Cincinnati OH
March 1994

by Sam A Marshall

OVER THE RHINE
MARCH 24, 1994
EMERY

"It's been a dream for us to play here in the Emery Theatre, in Over-the-Rhine," said Karin Bergquist, Over the Rhine's vocalist, midway through their show before an expressive audience of 1,200.

As it happened, the show at the Emery gave Cincinnati's eminent alternative band a chance to showcase its past and future at length. Eager to return to the studio to record its second album for IRS Records, OtR clearly had new music on its mind. Still, the band handily squeezed in favorites from its first two recordings, 'Til We Have Faces and Patience.

In fine form was OtR's most remarkable quality: a superb command of dynamics. That, along with its fluency with harmony, rhythm and percussion, enabled it to suggest various emotions and points of view. This performance showed the band's increasing confidence in and mastery of these areas.

A churning bass and drum undercurrent, angular guitar and urgent vocals opened the show in a new song, "Murder." Also early in the set was another new but less edgy guitar-oriented song about self-acceptance, "Happy With Myself." An acoustic interlude introduced "Last Night," a whimsical song with a noticeable country attitude.

Revisiting some older, unrecorded favorites for the local audience, OtR worked out on "My Love Is a Fever" and "Within, Without." In particular, the potboiler blues of "Fever," full of tension and release and capped with a scalding lead by Ric Hordinski, took the audience over the top. For a three-song encore the group served up several favorites from Faces, finally checking out with the funky "Fly dance."

In terms of dynamics, the truly shining moments came near the end of the main set. First, in a solo rendition of the tender love ballad "Rhapsodie," from Patience, Bergquist sang with such delicacy and conviction that the only sound in the theatre was her crystal-clear voice and acoustic guitar. Then, in stunning contrast, the group returned to more ethereal realms with the haunting art-rock tone poem "Jacksie" and the expansive guitar and keyboard lines of "If I'm Drowning." In the space of just a few songs, OtR effectively took the audience from a whisper to the stratosphere.