Recently at Jammin’ Java, an image of the face of the late Dallas Good looked out from behind the highly-esteemed Canadian country-rock The Sadies. Dallas, who along with his brother Travis, had been with the unit since its founding in 1994, passed away in 2022 at the age of 48, just after The Sadies released their latest album, Colder Streams. Travis told the audience they were dedicating this show — and all their shows — to Dallas’s memory.

Colder Streams, which won Canada’s Juno Award for best alternative album, may be the Sadies’ finest work, and that’s saying a lot. The band has a large, diverse, and eclectic body of work, including collaborations with Neko Case (she sang on their early albums, and they toured with her and serve as her band on the live album The Tigers Have Spoken), a set of classic country covers with John Doe of X, two albums with the late R&B giant Andre Williams, and a 2014 record with Canadian legend Gord Downie of The Tragically Hip. 

The Sadies have often been compared to the Meat Puppets, and that comparison holds up. Both groups mix alternative rock with a twang and play with punk ferocity. Travis Good’s exceptional guitar work at Jammin’ Java on April 7 was fast and aggressive, but it also showed the sophistication of certain contemporary jazz-rock fusion players, like Al Di Meola. It makes sense that that Travis comes from a family of musicians (his father and uncles were in the Canadian country band The Good Brothers); it takes a certain amount of natural musical talent to play like this. Perhaps odd for a band from Ontario, Canada, there’s a lot of the desert sound associated with the film composer Ennio Morricone’s scores for Sergio Leone’s spaghetti westerns here, along with tinges of psychedelia and surf rock. “Message to Belial,” one of the cuts from the new album, recalls the Meat Puppets’ best work, like “Lake of Fire.”

Watch the official music video for “Message to Belial” by The Sadies on YouTube:

Sunday’s set featured a number of songs from the new album, opening with “Stop & Start.” Other songs from the album included “More Alone,” “All The Good,” “Better Yet,” “No One’s Listening,” and “Cut Up High and Dry.”

The lone cover of the evening was a country song, Conway Twitty’s “Ain’t It Sad to Stand and Watch Love Die.” The Sadies also played a couple of instrumentals, including one that Travis noted writing in a place called Northumberland, near his home in Ontario. The set also included a number of favorites from their extensive catalog: “Through Strange Eyes,” “Oak Ridges,” “The Trial,” and “Strange Birds.” They finished the main set with “Another Season,” and, for their encore, they played “Little Sadie,” “Anna Leigh,” and “Another Year Again.”

The Sadies’ set was tight, with a focus on the music and minimal banter. This turned out great for me, as I was able to make it home in time to catch the main event of Wrestlemania (which was actually pretty disappointing). I joked to someone before the show, “Do you think Wrestlemania is going to cut into the turnout tonight?” Fortunately, people really showed up during and after the opening set by the Highballers. The Highballers were a good fit as the openers here, as they play a similar brand of high-octane country. 

I’m always amazed at the caliber of artists one can see in small venues like Jammin’ Java. There’s an amazing amount of talent in the musical world today, and a lot of it goes under the radar. This can be especially true of acts from Canada, who sometimes just don’t to seem to catch on as well south of the border. But make no mistake: The Sadies are one of the great rock bands in North America, and they proved it in this show.