Last Saturday, Mer and I met Eric and his wife, Shanna, at their cute apartment in Kent. We also got to see the much-grown Atlas, the kitten Eric and Shanna got last spring. He is a big kitty now! He is all black, and very cute.

We were meeting Eric and Shanna to go see the band Over the Rhine at the Kent Stage. Mer has followed Over the Rhine for almost twenty years now, and they are an excellent band. Eric and Shanna were familiar with their music, but had never had a chance to see them. This would be our third time seeing Over the Rhine at the Kent Stage, and our sixth time overall.

Since Eric and Shanna live in Kent and the concert was in Kent, we decided to eat in Kent. Eric and Shanna recommended Ray’s, a bar that serves excellent burgers. We were quite happy with that, so we drove downtown since it was cold and snowing some (normally, we could have walked from Eric’s place). We were surprised to be stopped in traffic on the bridge into downtown Kent; Eric then remembered it was Kent’s Christmas celebration, which included Santa arriving on a train. We had a chance to park the car, so we did, and we walked the short walk to Ray’s. Kent was decked out with lights, and was quite pretty with the snow.

Ray’s was packed, but we found a seat. It took a little while to get our order in, which probably should have been an indication of how busy they were. I ran to the bathroom, and when I got back, Eric, Shanna, and Mer informed me they thought they had seen Over the Rhine being escorted to a private room upstairs. That was fun.

We talked and had a good time, and then noticed it was getting late. We finally got our food after a forty-minute wait, which seemed a bit excessive for bar food. I allow lots of time for these sorts of evenings so that we do not have to be rushed; that is a good thing, since it was almost an hour and a half from the time we sat down to the time we got up to leave. I even just left cash on the table for the bill because our waiter disappeared. It was great food, but I was not thrilled with the service. I may give them one more chance, taking into account the fact that it was a special evening in Kent, but there are plenty of other restaurants around as well.

I dropped Mer’s leftovers in the car, and then caught up with everyone at the Kent Stage. We went in, and Mer saw one of her former students – one whom we had run into at the prior year’s concert. Eric and Shanna also saw several people they knew. I guess we run in circles that like this kind of music.

There was an opening act of a woman singer-songwriter who played guitar. Her guitar playing was very fine, and her voice was great, but for whatever reason her music did not grab me. She played for about forty-five minutes, and then there was a fifteen-minute intermission.

After the intermission, Over the Rhine came on. The official band is now just two members – the husband and wife team of Karin and Linford. Karin sings and plays guitar, and Linford sings some harmony and plays guitar and piano. They also brought several excellent musicians along with them for the evening – an upright bass player, a drummer, a man who played several variations on guitar-style instruments, and a harmonica/dobro/slide guitar player. They had a really great, tight sound.

Over the Rhine had just finished recording a new album, and so the concert heavily featured the new songs. Mer and I had an advanced copy of the CD (we had contributed $20 to help get it recorded), so the songs were fairly familiar to us. They also did several songs from their two Christmas albums, which was seasonal and fun, and they did a number of other songs, mostly from albums in the last ten years or so (the albums from the first ten years were not really drawn from).

The concert lasted two full hours, and was very excellent. Eric and Shanna seemed very excited about the show, so I was pleased with that. Maybe Over the Rhine will continue the tradition of playing a December show in Kent; I hope so. The shows have started to become a holiday tradition with us.