CODY CHESNUTT at Wrongbar, Sunday, February 10. Rating: NNNN
Cody Chesnutt’s 2002 debut album, The Headphone Masterpiece, was a defiantly quirky, lo-fi R&B triumph, while his long-time-coming 2012 follow-up, Landing On A Hundred, went in a more conventional neo-soul direction. However, he’s damn good at the latter and, as it turns out, even better live.
Chesnutt and his band nearly didn’t make it through customs, arriving at Wrongbar in the nick of time. If the experience ruffled him, he didn’t show it. He projected confidence and was full of charisma, shaking hands with the front row and engaging with the crowd in a way that didn’t seem staged in the least.
He and his band might not be rewriting the R&B rule book, but they’ve got strong enough skills that it’s easy to ignore how familiar some of the music sounds.
Chesnutt’s been candid in interviews and at shows about having grown up a lot in the decade between albums. Artists who say that have usually also got boring, but Chesnutt makes maturity look like a viable career path.
