Concert Review: Wilco, Billy Bragg, and Friends stroll ‘Mermaid Avenue’ at Solid Sound 6/26/26
Will Hermes is a regular contributor to NPR, The New York Times, Rolling Stone, and Pitchfork. He’s the author of ‘Love Goes to Buildings on Fire’ and ‘Lou Reed: The King of New York.’ His Substack of music writing is at newmusicoldmusic.substack.com.
____________________________________________________________
Sometimes you put differences aside and come together for the greater good. That was the big takeaway from Friday’s revival-meeting concert of ‘Mermaid Avenue,’ the fin de siècle collaboration between English punk-folk hero Billy Bragg and American roots rock heroes Wilco that celebrated, revived and renovated the legacy of Woody Guthrie. It’s a legacy that couldn’t be more timely.
The evening had been a long time coming. Bragg and Wilco had performed songs from ‘Mermaid Avenue’ and ‘Mermaid Avenue Vol II’ — albums that combined unused lyrics from Guthrie’s old notebooks with newly-composed music — only a handful of times live, most notably in 1998, when the artists were booked individually on the memorable Guinness Fleadh package tour and devoted segments of each of their sets to it. But due to a combination of things, including some reported leadership conflicts, there’d never been a full concert until now. As the late singer-songwriter’s daughter, Nora Guthrie, put it during the set’s emotional finale, she’d “been waiting 28 years” to stand onstage “with Billy on one arm, and Jeff on the other.” (Jeff, of course, being singer-songwriter Jeff Tweedy, Wilco’s leader and frontman.)
The occasion was opening night of Solid Sound, the benchmark artisanal music festival that Wilco has convened in the Berkshire mountains more-or-less biennially since 2010. This writer has been to nearly all of them, and it rivaled the most moving sets I’ve experienced at a festival that’s never been short on them. Set amidst the sprawling factory-turned-jumbo art gallery campus of MASS MoCA, the three-day festival’s known for creating a family-friendly Eden of well-curated music, food, and creativity of all kinds, along with a spirit of kindness, social conscience, and good humor.
All these qualities were on display Friday night. The set included everything one might want to hear from the project, including “California Stars,” a staple of Wilco sets over the years and “Ingrid Bergman,” a love-lust song to the actress full of spicy metaphors that Bragg delivers with just the right amount of cheekiness. Tweedy sang a stirring version of the equality anthem “She Came Along to Me,” gilded by Nels Cline’s lap steel. And Bragg was joined for a stirring “Way Over Yonder in the Minor Key” by Natalie Merchant, who sang on the original.
Other artists on the festival bill lent a hand as well. Jon Langford and Sally Timms of veteran UK punk-country-rockers The Mekons, along with members of likeminded UK vets Gang of Four, put their backs into a rousing “All You Fascists Bound To Lose.”
For the finale, the entire cast, including Nora and various Guthrie grandchildren and great-grand-children, came together for “This Land Is Your Land,” complete with verses you rarely hear and, for a song that’s been so diminished by overexposure, a similarly rare and deep poignancy. There were plenty of hugs shared, notably between Bragg and Tweedy. The latter also made a point to acknowledge the late Jay Bennett, an important part of early Wilco, including the Mermaid Avenue LPs and the touchstone Yankee Foxtrot Hotel. Bennett, who fell out with Tweedy and was ultimately dismissed from the band, “was a big champion of this project,” Tweedy noted. “I feel like, if he was still around, he’d be here. I wish that could have happened.”
Tweedy added: “Continue to think about him. Continue to remember him.”
The set was hardly the only emotional one, nor was it the only display of folk tradition over the long weekend. Bragg’s solo set early Friday, punctuated by bursts of summer rain, showcased some of his topical neo-folk tunes, including an updated version of his LGB anthem “Sexuality,” updated to address the civil rights struggle of trans folks. There was a brilliant set by English avant-folk eccentric Richard Dawson. And the Philadelphia pop-rock duo Sam and Louise Sullivan revealed their own folk roots, perhaps, when Sam asked the audience: “how many of you have ‘Rise Up Singing’?” When dozens raised their hands, he added: “I thought so — no offense!”
