The Civil Wars

Ever heard of the band "The Civil Wars"?

I hadn't either until a few weeks back a friend tipped us off to an upcoming concert

at the State Room in Salt Lake City.http://www.thestateroomslc.com/

Turns out, we were in for one of those rare shows, where chills run down your spine

because you realize you're watching something really special take place.

One of those shows, where a few years from now, we'll be telling people how we saw

these guys in a tiny venue with maybe 200 people, before they made the big league.

I had a similar experience seeing Pearl Jam in Stockholm in the very beginning of the 90s,

on the lawn with 100 people in the audience outside the Modern Museum of Art.

Dragged two reluctant girlfriends there because I had heard this new Seattle band on the radio

and I my friends balked at the 10 dollar cover. Of course...the rest is history. We laugh about that now.

But anyway, back to the Civil Wars. The band is made up of Joy Williams and John Paul White,

a charming duo who apparently met at a songwriting camp in Nashville two years back.

There they were placed in the same room to work on a song and immediately hit it off.

Listening to their voices harmonize perfectly as well as their bashful and witty in-between song banter,

you immediately get a sense of a strong, almost symbiotic connection.

Their harmonies are playful, and they seem to know intuitively where they other one is going,

voices and music working together like one organism. It's absolutely mesmerizing to hear them.

Barton Hollow, their full-length debut album will be released on February 1, 2011. http://www.myspace.com/thecivilwars

They are in town this week for the Sundance film festival and if you're lucky enough to have a credential,

they will perform for free Jan 27 at 3:20 p.m. and Jan 28 at 3:20 p.m. at Sundance ASCAP

Music Cafe at Stanfield Fine Art, 751 Main St., Park City.