On occasion, every performer is confronted with an empty room. Some bands delay as long as possible then spend the remainder of their set complaining about the turnout. Some bands play a handful of low-energy songs and then repack the van. Some bands make fools of themselves, putting on a stadium-sized show for the unimpressed bartender. And then there are some bands who deliver an intimate set that rewards the room with something special. Thankfully, Kansas City got the last one on Saturday night.

Christopher Luxem stepped onto the low Minibar stage a bit after 8:00 and picked up his electric guitar. He thanked the audience for showing up, making no mention that the audience was only five people, or that these five included the venue staff and the headlining act. Instead, he launched into an ample forty-minute set of folk songs. Luxem performs as CS Luxem, and he's been doing it for decades. He has a keen ear for production, a strong voice, and a wandering eye that has kept the project eternally fresh. For most of the night, Luxem built compositions from looping pedals – primarily applied to his voice, but occasionally his guitar as well. While some looping musicians start small, adding in background bits, and slowly building up a song so it can blossom, Luxem did it differently. He began big, ensuring that the melody was there from the start, and allowing additional iterations to add color and complexity around it. Instead of questioning where a morsel might lead, the payoff was instant. Some pieces showcased his tumbling fingerpicked arpeggios, some his plaintive strums. Tempos remained calm, but time signatures shifted (often within a song), adding interest. The waltzes were particularly enveloping. Throughout the set Luxem showed off his vocal prowess, but it was never so obvious as during his cover of The Temptations' "Just My Imagination." Here Luxem matched the original singers' ranges, including a shockingly deep harmony line. When not singing, he proved himself an excellent whistler. Luxem didn't speak much during his set – just a few polite thank-yous along with considerate plugs for the headliner – explaining that he didn't really want to talk, but rather just to play some music for the growing audience. And he did. Special songs that resonated deeply and intimate songs that invited the room in. That's important, as looping pedals can be gimmicky, but CS Luxem's use of technology never distracted from his tunes, or the real connections he created.

It doesn't take much to swap the stage from one solo artist to the next, so it wasn't long after 9:00 when Danny Pound got his turn. Today Pound performs as D. Pound, but you may know him from his work in seminal post-hardcore [*cough* emo] band Vitreous Humor or the more experimental indie rock The Regrets that followed. Or maybe you have kept up with his solo offerings for the last twenty-five years. Pound took the stage with a six-string acoustic and a few effects pedals that were used for modeling more than punctuation. When Pound wanted to add emphasis, he just played louder. It's a simple concept, but Pound proved himself a master of dynamics throughout his set. Other variations came from different tunings or strum patterns. Many songs were played with the aggressive downstrokes learned during his early punk days. A few featured flat-picked quick arpeggios. During a cover of Dylan's "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue," his strum patterns shifted once again, embracing folk elements (but not Dylan's preferred Travis style) unseen during the rest of the set. Despite this dalliance, Pound is not a folkie. His energy and inspiration came from somewhere else. Maybe the same place that spurred Bob Mould's powerful early solo work, or the intricate solo work of Geoff Farina, or even Ben Lee's first confessional tunes. Danny Pound is still a punk to my ears. His lyrics told stories with a wistful melancholy. A version of last year's "Candy Cigarettes" had a clarity that it doesn't have in the hazy arrangement created in the studio. Unlike that recording, his voice was not whispered but honeyed with aged resonance, and still clear despite years of smoking. During the set he coughed, noting that despite quitting fifteen years ago, he still tasted cigarettes. "It's still in there," he noted. Unlike his opener, Pound was conversational, sharing song origins and a general disdain for MAGA politics. After one breakup number he joked that the wounds were still fresh even though he hadn't broken up with anyone for a decade. After fifty minutes, Pound set his guitar down for the night. There was no roar of applause, but there was palpable appreciation in the crowd's response. I tried to clap extra loud.

There weren't many of us at Minibar that night, but the club got two proper sets from talented songwriters and performers. Neither offered a grand or extravagant performance in any way, instead they delivered genuine ones. Playing to a (mostly) empty room is fraught, but veteran performers Christopher Luxem and Danny Pound had it figured out.