Jackson Browne wasn't being clever when his first song Tuesday night was “Before the Deluge,” and his third tune was “You Love the Thunder,” on a night when a string of serious thunderstorms pelted Boston just about the time his concert crowd was filing into the Blue Hills Bank Pavilion. Browne has been doing those […]

jaymiller

Jackson Browne wasn't being clever when his first song Tuesday night was “Before the Deluge,” and his third tune was “You Love the Thunder,” on a night when a string of serious thunderstorms pelted Boston just about the time his concert crowd was filing into the Blue Hills Bank Pavilion. Browne has been doing those songs early in his sets for most of the current tour, but they did elicit a few extra smiles last night.

But mainly it was the quality and enduring power of his songwriting that left a nearly sold out crowd of about 4800 fans cheering and singing along throughout the 27-song concert. Browne, fronting a six-piece band   as well as his longtime backup vocalists, Chavonne Morris and Alethea Mills, played two sets encompassing a total of two hours and forty-odd minutes of music, covering every period of his lengthy career.

The night also featured a charming two-song cameo from Browne's god-daughter, Ariel Zevon, who lives in Vermont and is the daughter of late Browne pal Warren Zevon.   Browne introduced her, walked offstage, and let Ariel deliver her two songs with his band, and her tart, feminist lyrics proved she's inherited her father's gift for provocative songwriting.

Browne, 69, was, of course, the epitome of the 1970s' singer-songwriter movement, and also one of the bellwethers of the way rock music incorporated more and more facets of country and folk music. But if most of those other singer-songwriters and their work has faded away, Browne's genius is that his most introspective lyrics were always relate-able to ordinary people, and it was interesting last night to see how some of his most personal, and even downbeat, songs resonated deeply with fans, even decades after they were released.

Browne has always been savvy enough to surround himself with the best musicians and this tour is no exception. With Val McCallum on lead guitar, Greg Leisz on guitar, lap guitar, and pedal, steel, Jeff Young on organ, Mauricio Lewak on drums, and Bob Glaub on bass, along with Browne on guitar or piano himself, Tuesday's band was a topnotch unit. That became crucial late in the set, when Browne momentarily lost track of his lyrics to “In the Shape of a Heart,” and had to have the band cycle around a couple measures so he could recover. What could have derailed some shows became just a funny, endearing incident last night.

What was striking last night was how much of Browne's material deals, in one way or another, with reality meeting youthful dreams and ideals, or romantic matters going astray in the crucible of day-to-day life, and how you try to hold it together nevertheless. Browne's writing is so literate and poignant, however, that all of that quest for meaning and self-affirmation connects with an audience. Certain songs may land harder with some people and not with others, but there is enough overall impact to create a lasting bond with music fans. More than half the crowd last night awarded Browne's first song a standing ovation, a phenomenon that repeated itself throughout the night in varying degrees, and something you really don't witness at most concerts.

Which isn't to say there aren't fun songs too, and relatively lightweight stuff like “Somebody's Baby” generated some of the night's loudest responses, with its buoyant rock 'n' roll momentum.

It was evident immediately Tuesday that Browne was in fine vocal form, his warm tones filling the tent on “Before the Deluge,' a wistful kind of laidback ballad that seems to be seeking meaning amid turmoil, and at one point offers “let the music keep our spirits high.” That simple phrase seemed to be a prescription for Tuesday's concert, and one Browne was happy to fill. The bright easy-rolling rock of “You Love the Thunder” was another early gem.

Browne noted he'd always loved coming to Boston, in part because he could connect with local activists, like his friend John Rosenthal, who's worked at aiding the homeless, common sense gun reforms, and drug abuse treatment, and he dedicated “The Long Way Around” to his pal's efforts. That song, from Browne's most recent album in 2014, encapsulates youthful idealism turning into the reality of slogging towards your goals, and was an apt dedication.

Browne's song “The Dreamer” deals with immigrants, and is based on woman he knew who came to the United States as a 12-year old, and he performed it as a Mexican folk song, with lyrics alternating in English and Spanish, along with the two backup singers. He also had a joke someone had passed along to illustrate where he stood on the contentious issue: “What do they call immigrants in Canada? New Canadians.”

Browne's political stances also colored “Lives in the Balance,” his 1986 tune decrying wars. He explained that, to his surprise, the South Central Los Angeles gospel choir he often worked with–which is how he met and brought Morris and Mills into his band–had done a gospel treatment of his song. Moreover they had added a final verse, portraying how people of faith might seek to deal with the issue, and when they did the acoustic version of the tune, Morris and Mills sang that last verse themselves, a moving plea for peace. As if to lighten the mood after that, a rousing run through “Doctor My Eyes,” his first single hit from way back in 1972, got the crowd singing along in delight.

Zevon's segment, which included tunes from the album “The Detangler,” she released last year, was a stunning moment. Ariel's voice was a bit tentative at first, but she gained power and confidence as she went on, and songs like the throbbing ballad “(I Buried the Key to) My Fickle Heart,” and the subtly rocking “Cold Hearted Empath,” with its witty declaration of independence “I'm nobody's no one..” were eye openers for sure. If Ariel Zevon, 41, wants to pursue a career in music, she's got a truly singular songwriting perspective.

The first set ended, after about 70 minutes, with a sharply poignant “For a Dancer,” with Browne on piano. The tune is about how to deal with loss, and “keep a fire burning,” and Browne was invited to play it at the funeral of Saturday Night Live's Phil Hartmann a few years back.

The second set would go past 90 minutes, with highlights like “Looking East” and its worry about national direction, “Your Bright Baby Blues” and its unabashed romanticism, and the fast-paced rowdy rock of “Redneck Friend.” But perhaps more notable was the way the audience reacted so powerfully to “For Everyman,” Browne's 1973 paean to the time's changes. A crunching rock treatment of Warren Zevon's “Lawyers, Guns and Money” was terrific fun, with the superb Leisz adding slide guitar.

Browne's famed ode to the workaday life and how to try and settle in, “The Pretender,” also generated a huge crowd response, with an arrangement that made it downright bouncy and included a graceful gospel-tinged coda. “Running on Empty” was the full-throttle charge to end the regular set. The first encore was “Take It Easy,” and Browne admitted he'd had to learn how to sing it based on the Eagles hit version, though it was his song, which then-neighbor Glenn Frey helped him finish. “Help me out with this one,” Browne asked, “and sing it loud enough for Glenn to hear.”

Most shows on this tour have ended with the gentle ballad “Our Lady of the Well,” following “Take It Easy” as it did on Browne's second album in '73. But last night the band went for a bit more, obviously warmed by the overwhelming crowd response. Browne and company finished with a heartfelt rendition of “The Loadout/Stay” from that “Running On Empty” album, a virtual anthem for touring rock bands and their fans.