Iron and Wine to play Winspear in September
Iron & Wine was alt-folk before alt-folk was cool – so it’s no surprise that the band, which is actually just one talented guy named Sam Beam, marks its return to Edmonton with a bigger room: The Winspear Centre on Sunday, Sept. 22.
Tickets go on sale Friday.
Emerging on the Sub Pop label in the early 2000s and working in the Austin, Texas music scene, Beam quickly established a cult following with gentle, quirky, gorgeous music that has been compared to Cat Stevens and Elton John’s mellower side. Critics raved, he toured small venues and built what you might call an “organic” following, whole grain, sturdy, good for you. Often his albums are large, lush productions involving a number of his favourite musicians. The latest, “Ghost on Ghost,” seems to be no exception – coming on the heels of his 2011 record “Kiss Each Other Clean,” which debuted at No. 2 on the top o’ the pops in North America, so yeah, right in the vanguard of the folk-pop movement of the moment. And as if his music wasn’t cool enough, Beam is also a visual artist who designs all his own album covers.
