I saw Jeff Beck last year after a long long gap and was impressed enought to want to take in his current tour. I was more familiar with his current output this time having bought his latest album.
The support was "Trombone Shorty" a funky jazz quintet from New Orleans who stomped around a lot and had a good time whilst blowing some nice brass with "Shorty" on trombone and cornet/trumpet and a good tenor sax player.
Beck's band was different this time round but still a four-piece and they were all excellent musicians. There was a similar feel to the gig in that it was pretty much all instrumental with Jeff's guitar centre stage.
He did some tracks from the album, some covers including a lively version of " I want to take you higher" from Sly and the Family Stone, "Rollin' and Tumblin", "People Get Ready" (Curtis Mayfield)and "A Day in the Life" which he also did last time. For the encore he even did "Nessun Dorma" which was no big surprise as it is on the latest album. I wouldn't have expected to enjoy that so much as it seems to stray into James Last territory to cover such a well known anthem but it works brilliantly with Beck's ethereal guitar sounds fitting nicely with the soaring melody of the song.
There were a couple of stand out tracks for me where the guitar and the melody seemed to gel and with the band on board as well. One was an Irish song that I think is "Mna na Eirean"and the other I don't know the name of. That is Beck at his best, his mastery of the guitar chanelled to deliver some real emotion. At other times I felt my connection to the music was not always deeply felt. I would like sometime to hear him deliver some straight R&B again. It's a shame I was not able to go to Clapton and Beck when they played together earlier this year.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment