Tractor Tavern, Tuesday, July 2 — Six songs into Grand Hallway’s set at the Tractor, Tomo Nakayama shook the enraptured crowd out of their reverie with the eight words any enthused concert-goer dreads: “This is going to be our last song.” The disappointment was palpable. “It’s a weeknight, people. Don’t you guys have jobs?” Nakayama quipped. “I know I don’t.” It was a bittersweet ending only because you hate to see such an amazing show end, jobs be damned. Nakayama and the—count ‘em, seven—other members of Grand Hallway played a stirring set of their intricately beautiful orchestral pop.

With that many musicians on the stage, what sounds full and balanced in the studio can easily degrade into a blasting wash of sound, with all the nuance lost in the mix. This wasn’t the case with Grand Hallway, which shined with its ability to move the crowd just as powerfully in its quietest moments as in its loudest. The diverse array of musicians comprising Grand Hallway—from a classically-trained string section to a pedal-steel/mandolin/banjo-wielding Chris Zasche (the Maldives)—had countless other tricks up their sleeves than sheer volume. Several times during the set, hushed pianissimo sections provoked fleeting, delicate silences from the crowd. These quiet moments made it all the more cathartic and riveting when Nakayama unleashed his surprisingly powerful tenor vocals with the full force of the band swelling behind him.

In only seven songs, Grand Hallway managed to fit in tracks both old and new, opening opening with “Pearrygin” from their 2008 EP We Flew Ephemera. Stand-outs from their 2007 full-length Yes Is The Answer—”Seward Park,” “Darling, Wife,” and “Minimum Wage”—drew excited murmurs from the crowd. They even threw in a brand-new song, “Honey Bee,” an upbeat number for which Nakayama traded his keyboard for an electric guitar and proved his front-man chops by abandoning his chair (and its makeshift pillow-booster seat-he’s a short guy) and jumping around up front.

Read Michael Connelly’s review of Yes is the Answer on page 81 of the July issue of Sound. For more on Grand Hallway, go here.

Photo courtesy of Grand Hallway.