Tavern of Northfield - Restaurant, Lounge, Live Music

Neil Young once suggested that folk-rock dream team Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young was a well-oiled machine, while Crazy Horse, his legendary backing band, was a rusty truck you couldnʼt quite keep on the road.

Well, Iʼll do him one better: Minneapolis' Art Vandalay is a little bit of both. As in, their album “Dancinʼ with Your Demons” is well-oiled music to listen to in your rusty truck. But thatʼs not the only reason I bring “Mr. Soul” up: His fans, new and old, will find much to love here, as singer/songwriter Brandon Henry and his comrades in Art Vandalay create music that can only be described as timeless. Not to be outdone, they also bridge the gap between dusty roads and hipster pads — an enormous undertaking if I ever did hear one.

Take this mini-LPʼs opening track “I Been Down,” for example. The guitar work could easily be confused for some lost noodlings from Youngʼs Buffalo Springfield days, but, once Henryʼs pleasant lyrics and Calvin Plocherʼs refrained drumming saturate the scene, youʼre immediately pushed forward a quarter-century.

-myspace/artvandalay