The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Chris Barron doctors a solo visit to Cafe Nine
NEW HAVEN » Chris Barron of the Spin Doctors will take the stage at Cafe Nine Thursday night — the latest guy from a band you generally would expect to see only on a much bigger stage to succumb to the intimate charms of the Musicians’ Living Room.
Best known as the lead singer of the Spin Doctors, one of the longtime stalwarts of the jam band world, Barron will headline a Fernando Pinto Presents show that also will feature Shellye Valauskas and Dean Falcone and Peter Lucibelli as openers.
Showtime is 9 p.m. Thursday, with doors open at 8 p.m. Admission is $17 in advance, available at www. cafenine.com, or $20 at the door.
While he’s generally associated with electric music, Barron as a solo act “plays nifty chords on an old Gibson to masterfully crafted songs that are poignant yet wistful and funny,” according to the blurb on the Cafe Nine website pitching the show.
Just as importantly, he’s known as a storyteller as well as a musical performer.
Born in Honolulu and raised in the Bronx and Rye, New York and Sydney, Australia, Barron — born Christopher Gross, was a close friend who went to high school in Princeton, New Jersey, with John Popper of Blues Traveler.
After attending Bennington College in Vermont for a year, Barron went back to Princeton, got a job in a restaurant and plunged into making music. One night in 1988, Blues Traveler came to town and after hanging out and hearing Barron’s songs, Popper invited him to move in with them in New York City.
So at age 20 — with $100 and an acoustic guitar — Barron did just that. He joined a band called Trucking Company with Popper and Canadian guitarist Eric Schenkman, although Popper later left the side project to focus on his main gig with Blues Traveler.
With a name change to Spin Doctors, as well as the addition of Aaron Comess and Mark White, the Spin Doctors’ classic lineup was in place by the spring of 1989.
The band went on hiatus after Barron lost his voice in May of 1999. His voice returned in early 2000 and Barron began performing solo, with his own band and the Give Daddy Five in March 2000. The Spin Doctors remained inactive until Sept. 2001, when they reunited to play at New York City’s The Wetlands during its final week open.