Hpx Night Four: Eddie Orso and Dan Mangan

• Teddy bear Dan Mangan enthralls a packed Company House.

I never thought I would see the Company House turn away patrons, and yet at capacity, with people packed shoulder to shoulder, they did so last night. It was by far the most surprising show of this year’s pop explosion. By the time Eddie Orso took the stage the crowd was peaking and chatting away—-very different from the usual shut-up-someone’s-on-stage crowd. Orso rolled with it, until he had to play a quieter song and asked people to keep it low for a few minutes. Pretty bold, but he won back the crowd with a few hand clap songs and walking into the crowd. I chatted with him in his van afterward (note: that’s water he’s drinking from the wine bottle).

It may have been Vancouver dreamboat Dan Mangan first time in Halifax, but you wouldn’t know it from the crowd response. It was a nice surprise for Mangan who had went through hell getting here—-he spent 54 hours in a motel in PEI suffering from possibly swine flu, watching bad movies, and hoping people would show up in Halifax. But he didn’t disappoint with banjo, trumpet, keys and stand-up bass accompanying him. Erin Aurich (of Hey Rosetta fame) had been playing violin during the tour, but was playing with Hey Rosetta at Dal and so when needed Mangan simply hummed her solos. Bashfully coughing during songs and delightfully more gruff than usual, Mangan joked and endeared the crowd in between songs about The Country French throwing scones at their van on the way to Halifax; how he balled “like a little school girl” watching 65 Red Roses (a movie featuring his song “Unnatural Progression”); and after playing two songs about dying joked he was going to bring out a big jug of Kool-aid so the show could be remembered as “the Company House massacre”. And Mangan definitely killed. After he finished his final song he had to come back on stage to play an unplanned encore of “Fair Verona” while the crowd unprompted continued to sing the chorus to his last song. Unbelievable.

This article appears in Oct 22-28, 2009.