I like music a lot.  A lot.  I like it so much that I made my parents drive me around when I was a kid to see bands and musicians spanning the greater Philadelphia area – which is pretty fucking bad ass when your normal boundary is walking to elementary school in a pair of sweet Airwalks from Boscov's that cost $19.99 (JESUS!  Twenty bucks is a shit ton of money when you are a kid.  MY MOM RULEZ!).  Luckily, my parents would sometimes go for whatever I was listening to, since, after all, I was born with superior musical taste.  When my mom liked whatever I was listening to, it made it a helluva lot easier to convince her to drive me down the Schuylkill from our podunk suburban town to shows.  When I was around 12, she took me to see Francis Dunnery – a tall, funny, part-time astrologer, bedroom eye gazing, haver of British accent, songwriter, aka hot.   

No seriously, hot, literally hot.  I have met him a couple times and he is always covered in buckets of sweat after shows.  The first time, actually, he smelled so incredibly ripe that I was completely disillusioned ("Musicians *aren't* superhuman?  Waa!")  and I wanted to cover him in Mitchum. 

Alas, I got over the B.O. and he got over my middle school perm, braces, and crusty acne. 

That being said, Francis Dunnery is awesome.  Sure, the man plays an acoustic guitar, but this is not coffee-house adult rock that Starbucks spoon feeds the drones as they drive around the Main Line.  Oh, what I meant was... you do not listen to him because he is a quirky little-known artist all your friends are into.  You listen to him because he is a real dude with music that makes sense.  Having rubbed musical shoulders with the likes of Lauryn Hill, Robert Plant and Santana, Dunnery brings forth powerful acoustic live sets.  Coming from a prog rock background, Dunnery is intense, to say the least, but not in a way that requires you to wear a sleeveless Pink Floyd shirt.  There is no pretension whatsoever with this songwriter– his songs are sweet enough to be played during romantic montages on "Scrub"s (seriously, I checked, "Good Life" was totally on in 2001).  His music is poppy enough for you to actually enjoy it, and indie enough for you to still be cool.  Dunnery is refreshing – good music that is not trying to be good.   For a sampling, check out his album "Hometown 2001," on which he plays a typical Dunnery live set in his native Cumbria, UK. 

The man is so down to Earth that not only will he play entertaining acoustic songs you would write if only you could, he will even take pictures with any super-nerdy middle school music geeks that you may or may not live with. 

Francis Dunnery will be at the Tin Angel on Saturday, June 26, playing two shows (one at 7, the other at 9:30) for only $23 a pop!  Go early and eat dinner downstairs at Serrano.

Saturday, June 26, 2010, 7:30 and 9:00 p.m.
Francis Dunnery welcomed by WXPN
Tin Angel, 20 S. 2nd St, Philadelphia PA, 19106
Get Tickets