As If You Were There

An ambition for every live album that's ever been released, from The Last Waltz to At Folsom Prison, is for it to be captured warts and all. Artists want to give their listeners a snapshot of the gig as they listen to it in their bedrooms, and Band of Horses' Ben Bridwell is no different. They worked with the revered Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, and the result is Acoustic At The Ryman.

“That room is designed to hear someone singing from the stage and the room's dynamics just lend themselves to good sound anyway,” Bridwell explains with his slight Southern drawl. “We had some room mics set up around the venue to pick up the natural reverb bouncing off the walls and to really get a good sense of that room. You can hear the crowd in this thing.”

Band of Horses performed two shows on the dusty wooden floorboards of the Ryman in April last year, their sets split into two – acoustic followed by electric. It was the same set-up as the shows they brought to Australia for their 2013 BDO sideshows, and gave them about 80 minutes of music to choose from for Acoustic At The Ryman.

“Over those two nights we probably doubled up on a couple of songs, like No One's Gonna Love You, and there were some songs that we failed miserably at that could not be included, so it became pretty obvious which ones should be on there. Y'know, there are some good ones that are bonus tracks for vinyl release, like Evening Kitchen and a Gram Parsons cover [the heart-wrenching A Song For You], but honestly there wasn't a whole lot of material to choose from.”

With hits like The Funeral, Marry Song, Wicked Gil and Factory included though, the ten tracks across the album span the band's career. One aspect of the shows that was edited out was Bridwell's between-song banter, although according to him, it was for the best.

“It's funny – I'm really not that comfortable on stage, especially in the acoustic environment where I barely know what I'm doing. Between every song, all I would've said was, 'Thanks y'all', and it was just so annoying that we had to start cutting that shit out because it sounded like I was on autopilot – it was so embarrassing.”

The band is celebrating Acoustic… with a run of North American acoustic dates, although it will depend on Australian audiences as to whether they bring the show Down Under. “If people really dig [this album] and wanna bring us out for this kind of set-up, then it wouldn't be hard for us to do. There's less gear to rent and we're getting more comfortable with it so we'd be jazzed to bring it out as long as people weren't bummed that we came all that way and just played acoustic stuff.”

Bridwell also confirms that a new album is in the works. “It's difficult to tell what it's gonna sound like but I can definitely say there's a much more serious vibe going on than on the last record.”