Photo by Bill Kelly

Iron & Wine
Beacon Theatre
New York, NY
May 14

“I have to tell you, here in front of all these people, how much I love this band.” Sam Beam turned and gestured proudly to the 13-piece group surrounding him, onstage for the fourth show of a 28-date world tour. “I had this great idea to play seated venues, but you may feel the urge to dance. This band really smokes.”

Iron & Wine has coaxed his music along a distinct evolution since the gentle folk of his 2002 debut, adding instrumentation and energy to his gorgeous songwriting with each successive release. The journey has culminated most recently in this year’s Ghost on Ghost, a triumphant rollick that bears little resemblance to his early work. The touring band – comprised of a keyboardist, drummer, bassist, and trios each of backup singers, strings, and horns – signaled a decisive preference for the exuberant new material.

Whether it really took a baker’s dozen to play the music of an artist who had once traded on intimacy was never quite resolved. Barely shy of lockstep (which the long tour will hone) the band sounded crowded, but thin. Ghost is primarily driven by electric piano on the record, an instrumentation that highlights Beam’s characteristically stunning chord progressions. Live, the keys were relegated to the rhythm section. Center stage belonged to the horn trio, a swap that would have worked had they played more assertive counterpoint to Beam’s vocals. Sticking to legato harmonies, the reeds and trumpet drowned out just enough nuance to be distracting. A few squeaky sax breaks during designated solo sections were the extent of the band’s interplay. The strings and backup singers did their work well, but the dense arrangement came off sounding more like Sufjan Stevens than the AM gold it was shooting for. Lost in the mix were the beautiful lyrics that distinguish Iron & Wine from his countless copycats.

Sam Beam as a frontman was voluble and familiar with the audience throughout the show. After eight songs, the band exited the stage and left him alone to ask us that rarest of questions: “So what do you want to hear?” Requests rained in from every direction. He honored a few on solo guitar, his easy charm wrapping the enormous Beacon in a closeness that lent urgency to the delicate music. An a cappella rendition of “Flightless Bird, American Mouth” was the evening’s fulcrum, a mid-set moment that achieved with no instrumental backing a propulsion that the full band could not. Feeling his obligation to the catalog fulfilled after “Sodom, South Georgia,” Beam brought the band back for Ghost’s rousing “Grace for Saints and Ramblers.” The leap from creaky acoustic lament to DIY-Motown celebration summarized, in two songs, a decade’s evolution.