|
|
_In A Minute, I'll Be Free_ by Mitch Goldman (mitchgo@microsoft.com), Seattle, WA Seeing the first and third shows on Phish's summer tour is like looking at two disconnected frames of an otherwise coherent film. You get some idea of setting, but the full picture is not obvious. As with other bands whose live shows are works in progress and whose live process is the real "product" (as opposed to studio releases), the disconnect doesn't impair one's ability to enjoy the music. In the most McLuhanistic terms, your mind fills in the blanks, and thus Phish become a true cool medium.
As usual my mind was filling in blanks right and left during the Vermont foursome's first US summer show. A hot Wednesday at Portland Meadows found Phish to be in fine, if somewhat jetlagged form, as the band had come back to the states only days before from a two-week stint in Europe.
The "Wolfman's Brother" opener was nice and funky and loosened the boys up for some jamming early in the show. "Water in the Sky" turned up in a drastically re-arranged version; no longer the sweet country tune of last year's shows, this version is more jazz-pop a la Steely Dan. The new funk tune "Moma Dance", formerly the instrumental "Black Eyed Katy", got the jamming juices flowing fully. The rest of the set was kind of a mixed bag; the orchestrated prog-rock of "Gyute" was executed flawlessly until drummer Jon Fishman forced the ending early, a cool spacey jam became the cream filling to a "Horn" into "Chalkdust Torture" sandwich, and the new fast tune "Birds of a Feather" rocked the racetrack crowd in bone- crunching style. But things bogged down with a few other new songs, notably the slow "Brian and Robert", which was totally marred by a bad mix and horrendous use of "constructive" feedback from guitarist Trey Anastasio; said noise pretty much ruined the otherwise-melodic chorus. Also off to a less-than-stellar US debut was "Roget", a nice song which went on interminably as Trey played a repetitive melody over and over again. He looked like he was having fun, but it just didn't translate.
Set 2 was much better, and it felt like a fully integrated improvisational performance. The opening "Limb by Limb" was also slightly rearranged from last year's versions, and an amazing and gorgeous tune it is too; the mythically resonant lyrics and tuneful chorus ensure that this tune never leaves your brain. "Tweezer", as usual, contained some tremendous jamming, and a stop in the middle to riff on the old 70's funk tune "California Love".
Trey kept the funk going over bassist Mike Gordon's thick bass lines, and while this does not compare to the experimental "Tweezer"s of 1994 and '95, it stands up as one of the better versions I have seen over the last two years. Trey made a near-perfect segue into "Free" (again muffed by Fishman!) but the chunky/funky jam that followed went down a musical rathole from which there was no return. Once again, the band's playing pleasure did not translate into listening pleasure. A fine "Harry Hood" ended the set, and a metallic, burning "Wilson" encore, followed of course by the "Tweezer" reprise, brought the show to a satisfying and exhausting conclusion. The heavy-metal jamming after the third "Wilson" verse was bizarre, unusual, and amazing.
The second night at eastern Washington's famous and overrated Gorge venue showed a more engaged and experimental side of the band. Set one had a few nice highlights; this was the second year in a row "Divided Sky" accompanied a gorgeous sunset over the Columbia River Gorge, and the jam after "Gumbo" was a musical stew worthy of the song's name. However, it was set two that found the band in jaw-dropping form. Only four tunes were played during the course of fifty minutes, but three of them were near-definitive versions. The "Also Sprach Zarathustra" (clocking in at TWENTY FIVE MINUTES!) was a gigantic jam, full of noisy feedback, several modular segments that drifted way away from the main theme, and amazing lighting. "Mike's Song" is usually a launch pad for great jamming, but this version was also modular and segmented, so that at several points it sounded like the band would veer into the beginning of another tune. Just when I was sure they would iterate the start of a new song... BAM! They swung back into the "Mike's" theme with authority.
The same pattern occurred during the "Weekapaug Groove" that followed. From funk to psychedelia to sheer noise, this Groove just didn't stop. It was a sonic journey all to itself. Fishman (again!) screwed up Trey's segue into the set-closing "Character Zero", but by then it just didn't matter. The previous forty-five minutes contained some of the most experimental and impressive Phish improv in recent memory, maybe in the history of the band. It was one of those sets you travel hundreds of miles to see, just on the off-chance you *might* be lucky enough to catch the band in this kind of mood. They came, they played, they conquered...big time. The "Punch You in the Eye" and "Rocky Top" encores were icing on the cake, but Phish could have walked off and never returned after ending the set, and I still would have had my fill.
The tour took some interesting turns after the Gorge, but this show may have been the highlight in terms of mind- blowing improv. The work in progress continues this fall.
Stay tuned.Setlists:
Portland Meadows, Portland, OR 7/15/98
Set 1: (6:52-8:26)
Wolfman's Brother
Water in the Sky
Moma Dance
Gyute
Horn->
Space Jam->
Chalkdust Torture
Brian and Robert
Beauty of My Dreams->
Cars Trucks Buses->
Roget
Birds of a Feather
Loving CupSet 2 (8:48-10:11):
Limb by Limb->
Simple->
Tweezer->
Free->
Jam
Meat
Harry HoodEncores:
Wilson-> Tweezer repriseGorge Amphitheater, George, WA 7/17/98
Set 1 (7:44-8:53):
Makisupa Policeman->
Ya Mar
Gumbo
Divided Sky
Waste
My Mind's Got a Mind of Its Own->
My SoulSet 2 (9:38-10:58):
Also Sprach Zarathustra->
Mike's Song->
Weekapaug Groove->
Character ZeroEncores:
Punch You in the Eye-> Rocky Top
_Expressing Yourself Comes Naturally_
by Martin Acaster (martinacaster@sprintmail.com), Portland, Oregon"Expressing yourself comes naturally" was the theme of an ACLU Foundation of Oregon party held in honor of Kristy Edmunds, who is the director of the Portland Institute for Contemporary Arts. This set the tone for two Labor Day weekend performances, which featured Portland bands bent on free expression.
The first band, 3 Leg Torso, is a neo-classical three-man string quartet that produces fiery modern folk chamber music. They were the featured musicians at the high-brow ACLU function, which provided a rare opportunity to hang out on the roof of a downtown market. With the brightly lit medium-rise towers of downtown Portland as a backdrop, 3 Leg Torso took the assembled contemporary artisans of Portland on a passionate musical ride across the Morrison Bridge, out of the city, into the wild back-country of the central High Cascades of Oregon. The music changed character as often as the landscape does when traveling from the city out into the country, especially somewhere like Portland, Oregon where there is such a radical change between the lowlands of the Willamette River valley and the rugged peaks of the High Cascades. The music is multi- dimensional, often flowing like a river, solid like a basalt cliff, trickling like a waterfall over the edge of the abyss, plummeting towards the jagged rocks below, soaring heavenward like a leaf on an afternoon gale blowing out of the Columbia River gorge.
Consisting of Bela Balogh on violin, Courtney Von Drehle on accordion, and Gabe Leavitt on cello, 3 Leg Torso describes itself as "an ensemble with one foot in modern chamber music, one foot in Eastern European music and one foot in the telepathic territory of free improvisation." Fans of jam-bands will be most interested in the direction that third foot leads the other legs attached to the torso. There is plenty of territory in the world of musical improvisation to explore; 3-Leg Torso is certainly an uncommon entity with which to do it.
I know what you are thinking... well, can I dance to it? Tina (of "Tony n Tina's Wedding", the off-Broadway musical) and her bridesmaids gave an emphatic "Yes" to that question as they got down and dirty during a portion of the set. 3 Leg Torso recently released their first eponymous self-titled CD and toured the east coast during the summer of 1997, including gigs at the Knitting Factory and CBGB's 313 Gallery.
Moving across Burnside into northwest Portland, the free expression party train's next stop was Jimmy Mak's, a venue consisting of a candle-lit jazz bar upstairs and a grungy neon-lit, pool shooting, liquor lounge in the basement. The Jive Talking Robots were the musical attraction for the evening. Playing upstairs to a packed house of shiny, happy, twenty-somethings, the b.s.-ing automatons put out a lively blend of jazz grooves and metallic funk.
Residing somewhere in the Medeski, Martin and Wood end of the improvisational spectrum, the Robots add an electric six-string and a saxophone to their cybernetic sound selections. Dancing space at Jimmy Mak's is limited, because, well, who normally dances to jazz? Yet when it is laced with some funk grooves reminiscent of Phish's most recent jams, all the funky people in the house were on their feet. The Robots just released their second CD entitled "Superheroes", and I plan to pick it up soon.
_The Founding Fathers_
by Sarah Bruner (syrup@hula.net)After almost a three-year hiatus since the death of Jerry Garcia, members of the Grateful Dead - Phil Lesh, Bob Weir, and Mickey Hart - shared the stage once more, along with pianist Bruce Hornsby, Dave Ellis on saxophone, John Molo on drums, Steve Kimock (of Zero) and Mark Karan (of The Rembrandts) on lead guitar. This band was not the Grateful Dead, but rather its next incarnation: The Other Ones. Although their summer tour ended almost two months ago, we would be remiss not to recognize The Other Ones in the premier edition of JamBands.
Three weeks before the first scheduled date of their summer Furthur Festival tour The Other Ones were still struggling to select a lead guitarist to replenish the space left empty by Jerry Garcia. Ultimately they decided on two guitarists which turned out to be a superb idea. These guitarists had a legend to live up to, and it probably displaced some of the pressure that may have been burdensome for just one person. Kimock and Karan became the Chosen Ones, and along with Ellis, Hornsby, and Molo (about to tour with Mickey this fall and Planet Drum), they did a remarkable job of carrying forward music that was weighted heavily with thirty years of history and memories.
With little time to rehearse beforehand, The Other Ones' first few shows of the tour were noted as being somewhat tentative. However, as the reports began to trickle in, one theme became clear: the music was alive and Deadheads were having fun again. Throughout the tour, the music grew and matured, and the musicians on stage seemed to recapture the magical dynamics of beloved Grateful Dead songs, while adding their own new twists. Hardly dead, the music was animated and evolving once more. After a month on the road, The Other Ones wrapped up their summer Furthur Festival tour with two astral performances (one including the surprise appearance of Grateful Dead drummer Bill Kreutzmann) at the hometown venue Shoreline Amphitheatre in Mountain View, CA. Not only were these shows a jubilant celebration of rebirth, but we were treated to stellar musicianship.
Perhaps at some point every Deadhead who attended Furthur Festival had her or his own wistful Jerry moment, craving his distinct guitar notes during a Bird Song or Dark Star or Sugaree. But as Deadheads, we already know the way home. So with a giant leap of faith, we plunged back into the Zone, and came out the other side satisfied.
In the last decade we have witnessed the re-emergence of the classic genre of improv-based rock and roll, but with a modern edge. These bands have sprung forth and taken the lead back into the Zone with their own unique music. As fans, we have named them "jam bands", and the Grateful Dead were the founding fathers who paved the way into this musical territory. While each of the bands or performers (and those to come in the future) whose names you will see and whose music you will read about in this publication all have their own distinct style and sound, in some way most of them have been inspired by the Grateful Dead's foundation of improvisational psychedelic rock and roll. These bands, including The Other Ones, are carrying the Dead's 30-year legacy forward into the future.
KVHW "Official Debut" shows
August 15 and 16, 1998
Great American Music Hall
San Francisco, California
Steve Kimock - guitars and steel guitars
Bobby Vega - bass guitars
Alan Hertz - drums
Ray White - rhythm guitar and vocals
with special guest Tim Hockenberry - vocals, trombone, and "light" keyboardsby Christian Crumlish - (xian@ezone.org)
Throughout his career, Steve Kimock's guitar playing has been compared to that of Jerry Garcia, and fans of Steve's band Zero are virtually indistinguishable from Deadheads. On August 15th and 16th, however, Steve and his new band unleashed a unique jazz-rock sound that touches more on late Miles Davis/early fusion and progressive, improvisational rock from Allmans to Zappa, than it does on the sound of the usual Bay Area suspects.
Just a few weeks before, on July 24th, a sellout crowd at the Shoreline Amphitheatre saw the Other Ones open their set with Dark Star, a song particularly in tune with the strengths of Steve Kimock, one of two guitarists brought in to supplement Weir's quirky rhythms and Dave Ellis's sax. Known to some in the crowd as a musician on the periphery of the Grateful Dead famil, and to others as the revered lead guitarist from Zero, Steve was nonetheless making something of a debut in the Bay Area, 23 years after he first arrived.
Two weeks later, during what some Deadheads refer to as Jerry Week, Steve was the featured Friend at two Phil Lesh dates at the Fillmore, one a benefit for Phil's Unbroken Chain philanthropic organization, the other a payday for the worthy musicians. Here Steve was permitted to really take the reins (in an ensemble format, to be sure) and demonstrate that he is indeed up to the challenging task of playing lead guitar on Dead material. In a nod of recognition, Steve also was permitted to lead these masters through a credible reading of his own material, as they opened the second night with "It's Up To You" -> "Dark Star."
A week later, in a smaller venue yet, Steve Kimock appeared once again in a performance explicitly billed as a debut, this time the "official debut" of his newest band, KVHW (or Kimock, Vega, Hertz & White).
I say official debut because the band had already performed at a series of more-or-less stealth shakedown gigs, some up at Steve's home base of Studio E (a rural ex-barn music studio where Steve lives and works), some at a tiny tavern on 4th street in San Rafael, and one particularly hot gig at the Powerhouse brewery in Sebastopol on 4/21/98, tapes of which spread quickly in the wake of Steve's selection for the Furthur tour. These shows were attended largely by folks plugged into the Zero Mail list, where last-minute show announcements could draw a sizeable crowd.
KVHW is Kimock's first serious solo band, an example of what Kimock calls "a bunch of guys on stage, going for it." The band's repertoire is geared toward improvisation, both on standards and on songs they've been making up as they've gone along. Everything - composition, arrangement, even lyrics - has been created on the fly, in an ensemble context. The band also gives Steve a lot of room to play his guitars, touching on a wide range of influences and moods.
Bassist Bobby Vega and Kimock form the core of the band. They've been playing together on and off for over ten years now, much of that time in Zero, but a lot of the time just woodshedding on various musical themes. Vega knew former Frank Zappa rhythm guitarist Ray White from session work in the past. Alan Hertz is a local who just dropped by Studio E with his drums, a real find.
While Steve was away on the Furthur tour, rumors flew that KVHW was rehearsing a multi-instrumentalist. This turned out to be special guest Hockenberry, who for now is still not an official full-fledged member of the band.
They opened the first show with "Spring Water," a song written just before the band's second gig. As the story goes, the title and inspiration for the lyrics came from a plastic bottle of spring water on hand. I caught myself wondering if the song's quasi-mystical lyrics would appeal to the new age hippies who support jam bands these days. Like some of the other tunes that have been evolving from one performance to the next, "Spring Water" already shows remarkable richness and depth when performed live.
The second song was new, mostly instrumental, but with a rhythm based on vocal scatting. Later we heard the title is "Papa Da." The song went into so many spaces that I listed it as two question marks in my notes with a segue inbetween. The third song of the night was a progressive-sounding take on Taj Mahal's tune "She Caught the Katy" (one that Kimock has occasionally performed with Zero and the Psychedelic Guitar Circus in a more conventional arrangement). This was in 5/4 time, with Tim phrasing the lyrics to fit.
Tim took the lead on the next tune, also a new cover in their repertoire, Johnny Nash's 1971 hit, "I Can See Clearly Now," delivered in a slow, melodramatic vein. Tim and Ray achieve a transcendent blend on the epiphany chorus "gonna be a bright, bright, sunshine-y day."
Next the band touched base in more familiar territory, delivering a polite rendition of "Tangled Hangers," one of the quintessential early-Zero instrumentals. This was followed by a set-stopping, confident take of Frank Zappa's "City of Tiny Lights," with Ray, naturally, on vocals. "Tiny is as tiny do."
During the break, mostly we exulted. This music felt open, not nearly ready to settle into any kind of pat formula.
The second set began with Steve playing one of his lap steel guitars, still mounted on legs for the Furthur tour, and Ray and Bobby on acoustic guitar and bass guitar respectively. Together they played old shufflin' blues, Ray eventually singing some of the lyrics from "Hi-Heel Sneakers."
They followed with a new instrumental with enough passages and "mutations" to leave me unsure if it was one song or several. I'm facetiously calling it "We Don't Know Yet," as that's what Vega replied when asked after the show what that new tune is called. Steve played his "Florida guitar" on the second half of this one.
After that they reprised a Wayne Shorter composition, "Nefertiti," from the Powerhouse show. Their performance was elegant, and out of deep space it wandered into a very fast calypso introduction to "It's Up to You," a song Steve has played with the Psychedelic Guitar Circus, Zero, his old Saturday-night-poker-game band, SK&F, and most recently, Phil & Friends. The band tackled the entire head of the song in this fast delicate mode. When they were done, they introduced another cover, Jimmy Cliff's "Many Rivers to Cross" (which Zero recorded on their first album as an instrumental), with vocals.
After Bobby and Ray mystified the audience with a "Super Chicken" routine, Ray reciting something from memory and Bobby providing the clucking, the full band returned for a crazed, psychedelic, jaw- dropping performance of one of their oldest songs, "It's Impossible," whose lyrics speak instead of what is not impossible ("It's not impossible to invert a six into a nine. It's not impossible 'cause computers bring us into real time...").
Finally, the band edged into the Allman Brothers' showstopper, "Whipping Post," with Ray on vocals (Zappa's band used to perform it, too).
The encore was Bobby Vega's instrumental "Poonk," which first appeared in a much faster arrangement on his ambitious solo album of last year (Down the Road). KVHW has been playing it since their first show and has stretched it out into robotic psychefunketaffy.
We left wondering what was in store the next day. It turned out to be a looser show, with a smaller crowd, and a number of repeated songs (understandable, after all).
They opened with "Bad Hair," a song performed at their first gig, and followed it with "Slumber," which has a dreamy, Pink Floydian feel to it at first, but its jam reaches a lacework complexity of excitement before the final reprise. The third song of the set, "Five Before Funk," has been in the mix since the band's second show, when it reportedly started as a vamp on a sample of James Brown saying "Hit me!"
After this 45-minute opening, the energy let down a little when they wheeled out the somewhat campy "I Can See Clearly Now" again, but up close I could see how much fun it is for Tim and Ray to sing it. Their smiles were beaming, bright and sunny.
Next they played the vocal-scat piece "Papa Da," another repeat from the previous night, but one that was re-cast substantially. It feels like a work in progress in the best sense.
They ended the set with "Seventh Heaven," a song that sounds great on the Powerhouse tape and showcases Alan Hertz's schizzy drumming. He was totally in command, especially of the finale.
The second set started the same way as the previous night, with an acousticky blues workout that touched on some familiar themes. Next they took another stab at "City of Tiny Lights," the whole band wailing away at the unstructured parts of the song. The next song may have been a re-take of the one that isn't really called "We Don't Know Yet," or another new one entirely. With this band, it's sometimes hard to tell. Threy followed another performance of "She Caught the Katy" with a delicate take of "Tangled Hangers."
The last treat was a dreamy version of "Ring Around the Moon," a ballad that made its first appearance at the Powerhouse show. This is another one whose lyrics Ray has reportedly improvised, and he delivers the vivid images with an emotional integrity that brings them to life.
After this Steve came to the mic and said something like, "We never know whether to play one more or one less," which started people yelling requests and so on. Someone yelled out "Third set!" and I think Steve's retort was "You wish." They finished up with another spirited run through "It's Impossible." A song that has never yet failed to please me, live or on tape.
It's hard to judge how this band will be received. The Great American Music Hall was packed with fans prepared to lap up whatever Steve's guitar poured out, but the music may prove too jazzy or cerebral for your typical Deadhead. Some Zero fans, for instance, complained later that the irregular time signatures were hard to dance to. However, for those who like to hear on-the-edge improvisation in the context of progressive rock 'n' roll with a heavy jazz influence, especially those who like to hear guitar playing that ranges from delicate and searching to wild and shredding, this band might just hit the spot.
SETLISTS (some tracks lack definitive names)
KVHW@GAMH 8/15/98
Set 1 (about 60 min.): Spring Water
Papa Da
She Caught the Katy
I Can See Clearly Now
Tangled Hangers
City of Tiny LightsSet 2 (about 135 min.): Blues medley, incl. Hi-Heel Sneakers
We Don't Know Yet
Nefertiti ->
It's Up To You
Many Rivers to Cross
"Super Chicken" interlude
It's Impossible
Whipping PostEncore: Poonk
KVHW@GAMH 8/16/98
Set 1 (about 75 min.)
Bad Hair
Slumber
Five Before Funk
I Can See Clearly Now
Papa Da
Seventh HeavenSet 2 (about 87 min.)
Blues medley, incl. Hi-Heel Sneakers
City of Tiny Lights
We Don't Know Yet, Part 2
She Caught The Katy
Tangled Hangers
Ring Around the Moon
It's Impossible_Ben Harper at The Joint_
by Bill Hazelton (willard97@earthlink.net), Los Angeles, CA
reporting on Las Vegas, NVThere have been two events in my life that made the hair on the back of my neck stand up. When I was fifteen years old, I had to run, with a cigarette in one hand a beer in the other, from about a dozen cops with drug-sniffing dogs, who had busted a keg party in my hometown. I knew that another run-in with the men in blue (the third in four days) would certainly mean a slow and unnatural death at the hands of my thoroughly fed-up parents. I can't recall anything quite like the adrenaline-fueled invigoration of running from the law to avoid reprisal from my parents or the possibility of not having the car on Friday night, or both. I wasn't caught, but nevertheless, the experience was hair-raising and unforgettable.
Most recently, I had the only other hair-raising experience that I can remember: seeing Ben Harper live at the Joint in Las Vegas.
I had seen Ben Harper several times before this performance, each one of them building on the anticipation of the last. However, this performance in particular goes down in my personal logbook as one of the greatest that I have ever seen from any artist. Currently I have seen 400+ live musical performances; many of them are now highly-regarded live performances, ranging from the Dead at Alpine Valley to Bruce Springsteen at Soldier Field and the Beastie Boys on their Licensed to Ill tour. Ben Harper's ground-shaking performance joins the ranks with an epic and awe-inspiring experience that I will remember as one of the greatest I have seen.
I admit that I have always been a huge fan of Harper's music since my first encounter with him at Laguna Seca in 1993. He struck me then as a captivating and original new breed of artist. Ben's music cannot be categorized into any particular genre of music, which is the first indication of a groundbreaking, original artist. Harper's music can simply be described as soulful and inspirational, but at the same time refreshing with a starkly-written, straight-ahead lyrical approach. What appeals to me now, as it did when I was a 14-year-old listening to Led Zeppelin, is the visceral reaction that I get from an artist who truly inspires me. It's nothing more than a feeling I get in my gut. Every time I see Ben I get the distinct feeling that there's something more going on than just a retro-looking dude with an afro strumming a guitar.
Harper has a charismatic and mystical stage presence with a spiritual undercurrent running through most of his live performances. While Harper does profess to be a god fearing man and several of his songs have religious overtones, I feel a strong but perhaps a more diffuse spiritual presence coming from him as opposed to someone who might claim to be religious. Seeing Harper live is very much like being in church, but without all of the heavy-handed religious doctrine.
Harper performed most of the show sitting at center stage, with an oriental tapestry draped over his chair, playing a Weissenborn lap slide guitar. Candles and a rack of assorted acoustic and other exotic-looking Weissenborns were strategically placed around him.
The show lasted well over two hours, but it seemed to fly by in a heartbeat as Harper celebrated the night with a collage of tunes from each one of his records. He opened with his rock-like anthem "Faded" and continued with some personal favorites of mine like the celebratory "Gold to Me", the righteous indignation of "Excuse Me Mr.", and the ceremonial shout of "Burn One Down". His band, The Innocent Criminals, provided more than just adequate backup. Bass player Juan Nelson has an unstoppable groove and monster chops that he demonstrated with an outrageous solo midway through the set. The drummer, Dean Butterworth, provided the other half of the Criminals' insatiable groove with crisp backbeats and tasty drum fills that complemented Nelson's bass lines without stepping on them.
The most compelling sequence of the night was the first encore. Harper returned to the stage by himself with just an acoustic guitar. He played several tunes including "Another Lonely Day" and the haunting "Widow of a Living Man". During the proud tribute to his heritage in "Rise" he desperately urged the crowd to quiet their fanatical reaction to his previous songs as his voice and guitar lowered to almost a whisper. The room was so quiet that you could literally hear your own heart beating. Then the band joined him for the finale, and Harper broke into "Voodoo Chile", a rock-n-roll staple. With the band swaying and the crowd pulsing, I could feel something magical wafting around the room.
It was the most compelling evening of live entertainment that I had seen in a very long time and it rejuvenated my faith in the live concert-going experience. Now, a few more shows like this and it might make the $30 T-shirts and the $7 beers at live shows seem like a bargain.
Quincy Jones was once asked where his musical inspiration came from. He replied that the music came through him from a higher power, but not from him. I get the distinct feeling that Harper's music comes through him from a higher place occupied by music legends Bob Marley, Jimi Hendrix, and Marvin Gaye.
Personally, I would desperately like to see more compelling live musical entertainment like Harper, who can capture the attention of my distracted eyeballs and eardrums and give me what I'm looking for from an artist: inspiration. After all, when was the last time a musical performance made the hair on the back of your neck stand up?
Sarah Bruner is a researcher and writer who has been getting away with living in Honolulu, Hawaii for five years now. When she's not working, she spends the rest of her time swimming, praying for bands to include Hawaii in their tour schedules, and eating an absurd amount of mangoes.
Home | Editors | Features | Columns | Regional | New Groove | Road Trip
Tour Journal | Venue | Levels | Ghosts | Homegrown | Inaudible | CDs