5 Things We Learned From Loudon Wainwright III's Intimate NYC Show

by Joe Lynch

While many practitioners of the singer-songwriter genre in the '70s approached politics, love, and self-examination with the deadly seriousness of the singer as The Artist, showing the full range of human emotion was never a problem for Loudon Wainwright III.

Although hailed as a 'new Dylan' when he debuted, Wainwright was far more comfortable indulging in self-effacement and even a goofy side, unabashedly going for laughs with his wry lyrics and winking delivery. Of course there were serious autobiographical songs about sadness and failures, but he never bothered fostering that marmoreal cool so many did in the post Dylan scene, skewing closer to musical humorists like Tom Lehrer. That helped endear him to a cultish following as well as famous fans such as Johnny Cash (who covered "The Man Who Couldn't Cry" on American Recordings) and Judd Apatow (who is producing his upcoming Christopher Guest-directed Netflix special Surviving Twin based on his one-man show about his late father, a Life magazine columnist).

Wainwright's penchant for performance was on full display Monday (July 16) night at the intimate Caveat (a self-proclaimed "bar for intelligent nightlife") in Manhattan. In conversation with fellow artist Chuck Prophet, Wainwright spoke on his upcoming two-disc release Years In the Making, a collection of 42 unreleased and rare tracks spanning 45 years. His eclecticism is nodded to in the packaging of the set, which segments his songs into seven "chapters" such as folk, rock, kids, "love hurts" and more.

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