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Jakob Dylan looks ahead at Keswick

Jakob Dylan is used to standing in others' shadows, but now he's standing in his own as well. On Tuesday at the Keswick Theatre, he played to a room that was half-full at best, an excitement level that's a long drop from the multiple-platinum sales of the

    by Sam Adams, For The Inquirer
    Published 

Jakob Dylan is used to standing in others' shadows, but now he's standing in his own as well. On Tuesday at the Keswick Theatre, he played to a room that was half-full at best, an excitement level that's a long drop from the multiple-platinum sales of the Wallflowers' 1996 album

Bringing Down the Horse

. The fortunes of Dylan's former band were in decline well before he struck out under his own name, but even so, it was startling to see the erstwhile Rolling Stone cover boy playing to a sea of empty seats.

The sense of a drop in Dylan's stock was made more acute by a backing ensemble that featured Neko Case and her longtime cohort Kelly Hogan on harmony vocals; these women have headlined the same venue to far more robust crowds. With Case's touring band - including steel guitarist Jon Rauhouse, guitarist Paul Rigby, bassist Tom V. Hall, and drummer Barry Mirochnik - filling the rest of the slots, the only thing missing was Case at center stage, and, of course, a crowd.

Dylan, at least, wasn't looking back. His 90-minute set included only a single song from the Wallflowers' career (the hit "Three Marlenes"), and nearly all of his new solo album, Women + Country, which delves persistently, if not deeply, into the rich lode of traditional American music. Heavily influenced by the album's producer, T Bone Burnett, the new songs were long on atmosphere but short on underlying structure. The ambient swell of Rigby's heavily reverbed guitar often threatened to drown out Dylan's muted rasp.

The energy level upticked noticeably on "Smile When You Call Me That," wisely recast as a duet with Case, whose voice cut through the fog and made room for some of Dylan's sharpest lyrics: "I'm drunk, you're insane. I can't quit and you won't change."

If Dylan was thrown off by the sparse crowd, it didn't show, although he did take a break between songs to shut down a wag who'd been shouting requests from his father's catalog.

"Yell for old songs, yell for new songs, just yell for my songs," he said. "I've got ladies back here who will mess you up" - a sentiment Case and Hogan hastened to reinforce.

There may not have been many people in front of him, but he had all he needed behind.