As a writer, certain song lyrics light a spark in me that I have a hard time letting go of — there were a few lines at Friday’s Santa Barbara Bowl season opener with The Avett Brothers that are still running through my brain:
“There’s a darkness upon me that’s flooded in light / In the fine print they tell me what’s wrong and what’s right / And it comes in black and it comes in white / And I’m frightened by those that don’t see it / When nothing is owed or deserved or expected / And your life doesn’t change by the man that’s elected.”
They’re actually from a 2009 song, “Head Full of Doubt/Road Full of Promise,” but couldn’t be more relevant in 2025.
I first saw this band on this very same stage more than a decade ago, and I’m happy to report that despite their impressive growth in commercial success during those years, they’ve still got a down-to-Earth dose of sweet sincerity and genuine gratitude along with their beautiful harmonies and impressive musicianship.
“California has been so good to us,” said Scott Avett, one of the two brother bandmates who hail from Concord, North Carolina. “The years are starting to add up and at a certain point, it stops being a surprise and starts being a gift,” he told the happy, cheering crowd.
Those gifts were on nice display on that lovely warm night under the stars. I suppose the Avett Brothers’ music could be described as indie folk rock, but their playlist is pretty broad. Friday’s show was a fun mix of this kind of jittery punk bluegrass, Americana, roots rock, acoustic ballads with those aforementioned harmonies, some honky tonk stuff, and a few jiggers of ragtime that could have come right out of Disneyland’s old Country Bear Jamboree.
Brothers Scott (banjo, guitar, piano, kick-drum) and Seth (guitar, piano, hi-hat) Avett switch off on lead vocals and harmonize beautifully with longtime band members Bob Crawford (stand-up bass), and Joe Kwon (cello, saw, piano, kazoo), as well as some additional touring musicians and singers.
The eclectic setlist drew from much of their long discography, including the short-lived Broadway stage musical Swept Away, based on their music and a not very commercial plot involving a shipwreck and cannibalism. Those included the title song, “Swept Away,” originally from the 2004 album Mignonette, and “No Hard Feelings” from the 2016 album True Sadness.
The Avett Brothers opened the Santa Barbara Bowl season on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
The Avett Brothers opened the Santa Barbara Bowl season on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
The Avett Brothers opened the Santa Barbara Bowl season on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
The Avett Brothers opened the Santa Barbara Bowl season on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
The Avett Brothers opened the Santa Barbara Bowl season on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
The Avett Brothers opened the Santa Barbara Bowl season on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
The Avett Brothers opened the Santa Barbara Bowl season on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
The Avett Brothers opened the Santa Barbara Bowl season on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
The Avett Brothers opened the Santa Barbara Bowl season on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
Guitars galore when The Avett Brothers opened the Santa Barbara Bowl season on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
The Avett Brothers opened the Santa Barbara Bowl season on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom
“Forever Now,” from their new self-titled 2024 album, was a stellar showcase for Scott’s signature baritone and Seth and Scott’s harmonies, while the amusing 2006 anthem “Distraction #74” sounded almost like a sea shanty, and the 2007 tune “Go to Sleep” highlighted some plucky banjo and fiddle. Their setlist also included songs like “A Father’s First Spring,” “Ain’t No Man,” “I Wish I Was,” “Black Mountain Rag,” “The Traveling Song,” and “Victims of Life,” among others, sampling almost their entire discography from 2002 to the present.
Their music was so varied, the songs all hit me in different ways, but the other lyrics that probably resonated the strongest were from “Murder in the City,” a 2008 song that has the words, “I wonder which brother is better / Which one our parents love the most,” and then a few verses down is the moving reflection on family: “Always remember there was nothing worth sharing / Like the love that let us share our name.”
It’s not often a night of music under a full moon leads to reflections on family, politics, cannibalism, and the Country Bear Jamboree — all from the same band! You can’t ask more from a concert than that.
West Virginian singer-songwriter Charles Wesley Godwin opened the show with some crowd-pleasing country folk tunes.
Charles Wesley Godwin kicked off the night opening for The Avett Brothers at the Santa Barbara Bowl on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
Charles Wesley Godwin kicked off the night opening for The Avett Brothers at the Santa Barbara Bowl on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
Charles Wesley Godwin kicked off the night opening for The Avett Brothers at the Santa Barbara Bowl on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
Charles Wesley Godwin kicked off the night opening for The Avett Brothers at the Santa Barbara Bowl on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
Charles Wesley Godwin kicked off the night opening for The Avett Brothers at the Santa Barbara Bowl on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
Charles Wesley Godwin kicked off the night opening for The Avett Brothers at the Santa Barbara Bowl on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
Charles Wesley Godwin kicked off the night opening for The Avett Brothers at the Santa Barbara Bowl on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
Charles Wesley Godwin kicked off the night opening for The Avett Brothers at the Santa Barbara Bowl on April 11, 2025. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom
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