Chris Smit is a professor here at Calvin College. For the pre-festival show, there was a newer line up of Chris Smit, Michael VanHouten, and the New Midwest. The full band of electric guitar, electric bass, keyboards, drums, and Smit’s harmonica filled that small space at Schuler’s. Bookended by two solo singer/songwriters, this may seemed like too much, but it rather served to give a glimpse of how to ornament songs coming out of that solo folk tradition. For indeed, Chris Smit’s and Michael VanHouten’s songs are their heart are folk songs telling stories.
With a voice like Jonathan Rundman, Chris Smit can be both poignant and “laid back country boy” at the same time. His songs call you in to hear a little twang in the Country-influenced Rock like Jason Walker, James McMurtry, or an upbeat Grand Drive, but they don’t just leave you with beer bottles on the barroom floor. They leave you searching hearts—yours, your loved ones, and the heart of Iowa.
Smit’s songs often come out of his years in Iowa, having come to Calvin just over two years ago. Working nicely back to back, “Brother, Will You Pray With Me?” and “Strange Train” bring you right on board. “Brother, Will You Pray” feature a train track trap from drummer Jason Hammond. VanHouten’s electric guitar work makes like the clicking of the tracks. Then on “Strange Train,” which takes its bass line from some classic 60’s pop song (the name escapes me), there’s the train rhythm of the cars swaying side to side in the dark night. VanHouten’s solo works like the strange Doppler effect of the train horn going by a crossing, the crossing bells from the far side distorted by the passing cars.
Staying in that dark night imagined setting for these songs, “Holiday” sounded like driving through the fields and deserted roads, the rolling black clouds threatening to obscure the full moon. Suddenly, though, the chorus hits like coming up on the Interstate, traffic, speed. It’s not so lonely or aimless anymore.
Chris Smit, Michael VanHouten, and the New Midwest closed with “Lord, I See You in the Sun,” a Country worship ballad. Hearing that a praise song can have that style reminds me that you can praise God even while sitting around a campfire with the coyotes howling in the distance or while the family’s gathered on a front porch in the Appalachians. Talking to God in song knows no stylistic boundaries.
