With a 50-year musical career under his belt, Taj Mahal and his band – Kester Smith on drums and Bill Rich on bass – took to the stage at the Brooklyn Bowl in late September with an arsenal of nearly perfected country blues tunes. Taj Mahal began performing in 1961 and has since developed and donated to the revival of traditional acoustic blues. The simple, innocent and beautiful songwriting took center stage at the Bowl, and the always-wonderful atmosphere at the bowling alley-music venue certainly added to the intimacy of the show.
Mahal started off the set on electric guitar, singing both original and traditional country blues songs about the simplicity of living in the country, going fishing with your girl and a good dose of jealousy, like Checkin’ Up On My Baby and Gone Fishin’. While Mahal draws inspiration from across the globe – like the reggae, Caribbean and West African influences drawn from his father’s Jamaican heritage – the twangy harmonica, bright and steely guitar and gruff vocals are an unpolluted preservation of the sounds of Robert Johnson or John Estes. His bluesy guitar solos brought to mind his contemporary southern rockers/bluesmen – the Allman Brothers.
While his song introductions were almost entirely indecipherable and mumbled, Mahal’s vocals have only grown stronger over the years; but in this case time has only enhanced the roughness of his country blues. Mahal played the keyboard for a few songs and then switched to the acoustic guitar for the rest of the set, playing Corinna full of slow and sweet guitar picking. Mahal brought his daughter Deva Mahal, a member of the opening band Fredericks Brown, out for the crowd favorite Lovin’ In My Baby’s Eyes. The song was changed from a romantic husband-wife lullaby to a lullaby about paternal love, with Deva singing in a deep, husky voice not unlike her father’s, “lovin’ in my daddy’s eyes.”
With so many of their friends and side bands on the bill, it must’ve been hard for the Allman Brothers Band to figure out who would sit in with them at the Wanee Festival. Luckily one of the musicians they invited to the stage was Taj Mahal who led the band through Leavin’ Trunk and Statesboro Blues on Saturday night. Here’s a killer clip of Leavin’ Trunk…
Born Henry Saint Clair Fredericks, Taj Mahal has been putting out albums full of his brand of blues music for over 40 years. Here’s Taj with a scorching version of Ain’t That A Lot Of Love from his appearance in the Rolling Stone’s 1968 concert flick Rock and Roll Circus…
This Thursday and Friday former Velvet Underground front man Lou Reed will take up residence at the soon to be rechristened Gramercy Theater for two nights of fully improvised music inspired by his 1975 album Metal Machine Music which is being billed as A Night Of Deep Noise. Joining Reed for these special shows to form the the Metal Machine Trio will be Ulrich Kreiger on tenor sax and live-electronics as well as Sarth Calhoun on live processing and Fingerboard Continuum. Tickets for both nights are currently on-sale.
If you’re not into a night of Lou playing some dissonant noise rock, than maybe you’ll want to hit one of these recently announced tours…
Finally, with Bonnaroo less then two months away, the event’s producers have announced that David Byrne will become the first artist to curate a stage at the fest. The former Talking Heads front man, who will be performing the Songs Of David Byrne & Brian Eno at the ‘Roo on June 12, will host a Friday evening bill where he has invited the following acts to play – Santigold, The Dirty Projectors, Ani DiFranco, St. Vincent and Katzenjammer. In other Byrne news, the New York City resident will also play a relatively free show (there is a $3 suggested donation at the door) for the opening night of Celebrate Brooklyn on June 8 at the Prospect Park Bandshell.
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