Written by: Geoff Tischman

After a two month hiatus, seeing the Record Company at Irving Plaza was the perfect way to end my drought of seeing live music.

Trust me, the drought wasn’t by choice. The fact is, I had an uncharacteristically busy winter with photography work and the incredibly harsh winter combined with my desire to stay healthy had me avoiding concert venues for an unprecedented amount of time.

But now I’m back.

I first saw The Record Company back in early 2016 when they opened for Robert Randolph in Connecticut.  hadn’t heard of them yet, but the second they hit the stage I instantly knew they were going places. I love catching an opening band before they break and, as luck would have it, the band selected a photo from that night that I took to appear on the cover of Pollstar.

Commemorating the tenth anniversary of their stellar, Grammy-nominated debut Give It Back To You, The Record Company have been touring since the start of the year to mark the occasion, playing the album in its entirety.

Singer and Guitarist Chris Vos, bassist Alex Stiff, and drummer Marc Cazorla were tight as ever and numbers like “Off The Ground” and “Rita Mae Young” were positively smoldering.

Vos is a telegenic frontman, but the L.A. band is so electric, you really can’t take your eyes off any of them.

The show kicked off with “Baby I’m Broken” and the mid-show acoustic set, featuring “Stay Up High,” “Talk To Me” and “Last Lonely Winter” was just riveting.

The encore featured a blazing cover of the Beastie Boys’ “So What’cha Want” and I’m Getting Better (And I’m Feeling It Right Now)”.

A perfect night to get back to live music.