I’m sure I’ve seen this before, but I can’t place where or when. At the Birchmere on Tuesday night, headliner Robert Earl Keen walked out on stage to introduce his opening act, Nashville-based singer-songwriter Henry Conlon. It was just the kind of gracious, self-deprecating act the post-retirement Keen is doing these days. Then, he left the stage, allowing Conlon to do his thing.
When Keen returned an hour later, mostly clean-shaven and wearing a ball cap in place of his trademark cowboy hat, the veteran alt-country legend delivered a shambling, comfortable, and thoroughly enjoyable 75 minutes of stories and songs documenting his life and career.
He fumbled with equipment, related his checkered educational history as a Texas A&M Aggie (getting in a nice dig at the Longhorns along the way), and told charming tales of the creation of many of his oldest tunes.
It was the first of three consecutive nights Keen was doing at the Birchmere, which he called his favorite venue. Now, he might say that to all the venues, but the Alexandria, Virginia, room does have a proven history with the artist. There are at least two old photos of him lining the walls of the club. In one undated image, he looks to be barely out of his teens. He is now 69, and he can still deliver.
Robert Earl Keen, enjoying life as a retired performer
Keen told the crowd he retired in 2022, intending to never touch a guitar again. It didn’t last. “It’s really the only thing I’m any good at.”
On Tuesday, he seemed to relish going deep into his repertoire. More than half of his set was taken from his first four albums, all released more than 30 years ago. He opened the night with “Dreadful Selfish Crime” from 1994’s Gringo Honeymoon, and played a couple of other tunes from that album, including the fan favorite sing-along “Merry Christmas From the Family.”
What was a little surprising was that he did not play the popular title track. In fact, of the four songs that adorned tee shirts over in the merch room (the Birchmere has an expansive merch room – not simply a table or two), Keen skipped three of them. The one he did play was fascinating.
In its original incarnation, 1998’s “Feelin’ Good Again” is one of the singer’s most unabashedly warm and upbeat numbers. On Tuesday, he slowed it down and added a touch of melancholy that reflects the perspective of an older man. If you know the song, you can think of it this way.
It was the first time I’ve heard it as though it were being delivered from the POV of one of its minor players -- “old man Perkins – sittin’ on his stool, watching Butch and Jimmy John talkin’ loud and playin’ pool.”
In a way, Keen used to be Butch. Now he is closer to the old man Perkins.
Lest that sound like he has lost his magic, don’t worry. Slimmer than he once was, he is no less witty and no less charming, and the man can still sing. Whether it is the ramshackle humor of “Mr. Wolf and Mamabear” and “A Border Tragedy” (“I feel it’s best to get all the really stupid songs out as soon as possible,” he said before singing that little duo early on) or something a little more poignant, Keen still delivers.
Nowhere was that clearer than on “Mariano,” a song from 1989’s West Textures album. A heartbreaker about a hard-working immigrant who disappears one day, Keen did not have to point out just how timely this 36-year-old song is today. It speaks for itself.
On a night when he skipped well-known numbers like “Corpus Christie Bay” and his most iconic song, “The Road Goes on Forever and the Party Never Ends,” Keen filled the gaps with plenty of fine tunes ranging from the outrageous early “Armadillo Jackal” to the relatively new jazzy “Let’s Valet.” That’s the beauty of having a vast repertoire from which to choose.
“Let’s Valet” sounds a lot like a Lyle Lovett song, and his fellow Houstonian was there in spirit in main set closer “The Front Porch Song,” as well as the first encore “Bears” penned by former Texas Poet Laureate Steven Fromholz, and recorded by Lovett on his 1998 tribute album to Texas songwriters, Step Inside This House.
Keen closed the night with “I Gotta Go,” from 2011’s Ready for Confetti. The upbeat tune about a con man’s rambling and ultimately tragic tale is so bouncy and witty that its rather downbeat message doesn’t really matter. That kind of makes it the perfect Robert Earl Keen tune.
As for Henry Conlon, the young Long Islander who now makes Nashville his home, he showed a lot of that same sensibility, mining sadness and heartbreak for humor and wisdom. His newest song – the just-released “Sometimes the Weather” – suggests this is a songwriter to pay attention to. He met Keen when the legend came into the guitar store where Conlon works, and they got to talking.
Keen listened to a couple of the young man’s songs – and now he’s introducing him to larger crowds. That’s just the kind of thing an elder statesman does, and Robert Earl Keen, despite a youthful twinkle that will seemingly never perish, is now just that.
You can catch Keen and Conlon for a couple more nights at the Birchmere. Then Keen goes home to Texas, where he will lead an all-star fundraiser for the Texas Hill Community.