I missed another presentation of TJ Waltho’s A Charlie Brown Christmas at the Owl Acoustic Lounge, Saturday, Dec. 18, but was glad to catch Rob Ursel. He was supposed to play again with Waltho’s “A Charlie brown Christmas,” Dec. 23 at the Slice but he had to cancel because of illness.
I haven’t seen Ursel since 2013, but was glad to finally catch him again with a band including TJ Waltho on Keyboards and the Owl’s piano, bassist Paul Holden and drummer Brad Brouwer, who were just warmed up after performing the soundtrack to “A Charlie Brown Christmas” plus two back up singers dubbed “the Little Somethings.”
Ursel strummed acoustic guitar to start off his set as he played a set of humourous, upbeat, original country/ blues music with a touch of jazz with Waltho, Brouwer and Holden on board.
“Every Angel, Every Devil” was reminiscent of blues classic “St. James Infirmary.”
He dusted off an old song, quipping it was about “a Canadian hero” David Suzuki, which I remembered from his last show here in 2013.
He followed it up with “Everything is Gold.”
“Big Bamboo was a crowd favourite. He switched to electric guitar for the last couple of songs including a little bit of surf music. TJ Waltho played a hot keyboard solo.
He was called back for an encore of David bowie’s “Modern love,” before calling it a night.
—By Richard Amery, L.A. Beat Editor
