The Devil Made Us Do It

By Lizz Kannenberg in Arts & Entertainment on Jul 8, 2007 9:20PM

As music writers, we get the opportunity to hear a lot of stuff that flies under the radar for the average fan. There’s a little sense of pride in having a friend stop cold in the middle of a sentence, point to our car stereo, and ask “Who is this? This is really cool!” Never have we had that happen more often than when playing Jim Bianco’s 2004 release, Handsome Devil. Recorded with a 19-piece big band, including members of the LA Philharmonic Orchestra, it’s a brainy, wildly creepy concept album about the disturbing power of the male libido. Weird, right? But it works, and if Elvis Costello and Serge Gainsbourg had a “what-happens-in-Vegas-stays-in-Vegas” kind of weekend with Tom Waits, Handsome Devil would undoubtedly be the soundtrack. It’s full of boozy, New Orleans-jazz tinged ballads and rollicking ragtime pop numbers, each one dripping with a come-hither sarcasm that makes you feel like Bianco’s got a few riverboat gambler’s tricks up his sleeve.

Chicagoist has seen Bianco play in dives and halls from Chicago to Austin and New York to LA, with a band and without, on sizable collaborative tours and on lonesome one-sedan jaunts across the country, and we’re yet to be disappointed. Besides a knack for high-level eclectic songwriting, this is a guy who knows how to work a room. We dragged a couple of skeptical pals out to the first edition of Bianco’s solo tour with veteran LA songwriter Gary Jules last fall, and they couldn’t stop talking about how he had the entire music room at Schubas chanting “The devil made me do it…” in one collective seductive whisper as he prowled through the rows of chairs, telling song-stories in his trademark ashtray growl. Here’s hoping for a reprise of that refreshing kind of concert experience tonight.

Jim Bianco plays Schubas tonight, Gary Jules headlines | 9pm | $12