Incomparable Sunny War @ Lulu's Downstairs With Dave & Jim 27Apr23

Wow. Welcome to the new Colorado Springs.

Nina de Freitas was the opener for the show tonight at lulu's Downstairs in Manitou Spgs and she was excellent. Her voice was beautiful despite just recently recovering from throat issues. We were very lucky to have seen this relative local tonight. Here she is along with her song "Bound To You"... yeah, a bit about someone close dying. She's a Brazilian-born to musicians now residing in Denver. Sweet voice with heart rendering songwriting ~ excellent.

The incomparable Sunny War (Sydney Lyndella Ward) took the stage with accompaniment from Buffalo Nichols this night. If you've not listened to Sunny War, you should ~ she's generally lauded with a recently dropped new LP, Anarchist Gospel. She's a unique guitarist with a self-effacing and funny-as-heck stage presence, combined with strong songwriting with tough political messages along the way. She thumps out baselines with her right thumb while plucking leads and melodies with left fingerboard hand ~ amazing sound. She's Nashville now but has been homeless so knows a lot. The show was mesmerizing the whole way. Only 50 people were there and we were way luckier than the 500K folks from Colo Spgs who didn't attend tonight that's for sure. i was able to pretty easily grab the set list for the show in Ward's own hand.

This was my first time at Lulu's Downstairs, which has decent sound; I will come again. I surely would've gone to the 5/27 show with Sarah Shook & The Disarmers, but I have a conflict. COS is getting better for stuff like this. We enjoyed great food at Adam's Mtn Cafe prior to the show and spent a fine evening together hearing some breakthrough roots music. Thanks Dave.