You could search for something wrong with The Steel Wheels’ performance on Friday night, but you’d come up empty handed. 

The Steel Wheels kicked of the show themselves, without the help of an opening band. Combined with their personal, storytelling approach to music, this transformed the Maintenance Shop from a venue on a large campus to what felt like a staple hang-out in a small town. 

The intimacy of the performance allowed the audience to really invest in the music. Every moment and every note was heard and appreciated. 

That kind of transparency was refreshing, as it’s something that is so rare in music. Live music is often accompanied by tracks that play along with the band on stage. This was not the case with Steel Wheels.

Each note of each song was authentic. The beginning of the show saw a couple of small technical difficulties with one of the microphones. However, even without amplification, vocalist Trent Wagler’s voice carried through the venue. The mishap didn’t phase the rest of the band either. The song carried on perfectly.

Throughout the whole show, vocals were only one small part of a much bigger picture. The instrumental aspects were even more intriguing that the words the four voices sang. 

While those words told so many beautiful stories, so much detail was put into the instrumental writing that the it almost told stories of its own. So much talent was packed on to the small M-Shop stage it is impossible to decide who stood out amongst the four of them.

Eric Brubaker held nothing back on his violin. Brian Dickel on the bass and Jay Lapp on guitar and mandolin made the incredible skill with which they played look effortless. Wagler managed to carry most of the lead vocals while never missing a beat on his guitar or banjo.  

The Steel Wheels played a set that presented itself like a well organized album. It had a perfect pattern of rises and falls. The first song was the hook, but the rest of the set pulled the audience along and never let go.

Each song and transition was engaging. Even when they took a break so Wagler could say a few words, it almost seemed like part of the performance, like they had truly thought out every moment of their stage time.

Nothing was overdone or underdone. There was a beautiful balance of everything. There wasn’t too much or too little talking, there wasn’t too much silence between songs, and there wasn’t too much of any particular kind of song. The whole show simply flowed. 

When The Steel Wheels first walked off stage at the end of their set, the audience rose in a standing ovation and cheered until the band came back on stage.

They played one more song, but they did it with no instruments and no amplification. The four of them simply stood to the front of the stage and allowed their voices and beautiful harmonies to ring out, real and unaltered. 

The band appreciated the audience as much as the audience did them. They played in the M-Shop in 2014 as well and Wagler said it’s, “A lovely place to keep coming back to.” The day of the show, the band made the long drive from Colorado, but Wagler said it was worth the drive. 

Wagler also pointed out the posters that hang on the walls of the M-Shop that show past performances in the venue.

“It’s something we don’t take lightly,” Walger said. ” To be part of the river of music that flows through America and may attach itself to you and it may continue on that river a little further and attach to someone else.”