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If there was a watchword for Saturday night’s Michelle Shocked/Poi Dog Pondering concert at the Majestic Theater, it was “community.”

While the audience was small, maybe 400 enthusiastic souls, everyone seemed to know everyone else—and the performers worked as if they were at a house party.

Poi Dog Pondering, an eight-piece outfit that comes from Austin by way of the world, opened the proceedings with its Pacific Rim World Beat tribal municipal orchestra twang, rhythm, and personality.

While wags and critics have taken shots at Poi Dog Pondering by calling the band, “too cute” and “too precious,” the group’s Saturday set, which featured songs from the albums, “Poi Dog Pondering” and the new, Wishing Like A Mountain & Thinking Like The Sea, came across as uplifting, joyous, engaging, clever, and downright fun.

Poi Dog Pondering does seem like a gang of young hippies that just piled out of its VW van, but with instruments that run the gamut from violin to accordion to electric guitar to frying pan to mandolin, cranking out a mixture of Celtic, Hawaiian, World Beat, and rock ‘n’ roll, the group’s songs can’t be denied.

Shocked, like many Texas-bred musicians, masterfully defies categorization while serving up artistry straight from the heart.

Shocked took the Majestic stage backed by a powerhouse six-piece band that includes a brass section and the hot hands of guitarist Nina Gerber.