Giles Corey brings a rare tour to The Masquerade's Purgatory

Dan Barrett's long-quiet solo project plays Atlanta on Sunday, Nov 15, with Kathryn Mohr and Val Acton Loper.

For a certain kind of listener, the name Giles Corey arrives with a hush around it. Dan Barrett's solo project put out one self-titled album in 2011 and then mostly went quiet, which is part of why a run of live dates this fall feels like an event. On Sunday, Nov 15, that run reaches Atlanta.

Giles Corey plays The Masquerade (Purgatory) in Atlanta on Sunday, Nov 15, with Kathryn Mohr and Val Acton Loper in support. The show starts at 7pm, and tickets are through Ticketmaster. There's no earlier Atlanta show for Giles Corey in our records, which makes this a first chance for a lot of local fans who have only ever known these songs from headphones.

Giles Corey is the solo project of Dan Barrett, according to his Wikipedia entry, which counts the 2011 self-titled album as the project's only studio record, followed by one EP and one live album. The project's Bandcamp lists *Live in the Middle of Nowhere* as its latest release. Barrett is also half of Have a Nice Life, and Stereogum reviewed a night when the two projects shared a bill at New York's Bowery Ballroom. If you came to Giles Corey through that band, you already know the territory: quiet, heavy, intimate music that asks for your full attention.

Atlanta comes late in a tour that has been working its way through the Northeast and mid-Atlantic: Burlington on Nov 3, New Haven on Nov 4, Brooklyn tonight, then Philadelphia, Providence and Washington, D.C., on Nov 12. By the time Barrett gets to Purgatory, the set will have had nearly two weeks of nights behind it.

The room suits the music. The Masquerade has named its stages Heaven, Hell and Purgatory for years, and in 2024 added a fourth, Altar. The venue left its longtime home on North Avenue when that property was bought for redevelopment and moved to Underground Atlanta in 2016, settling into Kenny's Alley; it signed a lease in 2017 to stay at least ten years, as Rough Draft Atlanta reported. Purgatory is the right size for a show like this one: close enough that a whispered vocal carries, small enough that the crowd is part of the hush.

Quiet, heavy and intimate music, in a room small enough to hear every breath.

Kathryn Mohr and Val Acton Loper open, and on a bill this carefully put together, it's worth being there from the start. A 7pm Sunday show also means an easy night home before the work week.

A few practical notes: The Masquerade is downtown at Underground Atlanta, so plan your route and parking before you go, and check the Ticketmaster listing for entry details.

Some records find their people slowly, over years, one listener at a time. Giles Corey has been doing that for a decade and a half. On Sunday, some of those people will be in the same room for once.

Sources: Dan Barrett — Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org); Giles Corey — Bandcamp (gilescorey.bandcamp.com); Giles Corey and Have a Nice Life at Bowery Ballroom — Stereogum (stereogum.com); The Masquerade (Atlanta) — Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org); Masquerade inks deal to remain at Underground Atlanta — Rough Draft Atlanta (roughdraftatlanta.com); Masquerade moved to Underground Atlanta — Rough Draft Atlanta (roughdraftatlanta.com); About — The Masquerade (masqueradeatlanta.com); Giles Corey tickets — Ticketmaster (ticketmaster.evyy.net)