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Provogue [Release date 08.12.23]
‘Warren Haynes Present: The Benefit Concert Volume, 20′ comprises 31 live track of cross genre jams that are infused with a ‘can do spirit’ in keeping with jam band fraternity.
A penchant for jamming has long separated the wheat from the chaff in straight music circles.
You can go all the way back to the 40’s when the Be-Bop era cut up rough against the big band tradition to trace a lineage to the contemporary jam scene.
The late 60’s West coast scene, the Chicago blues scene (with Paul Butterfield), the cross genre extemporisation of Frank Zappa, and the much more formalized Dave Matthews-led 90’s jam band scene all represented the need to explore the textural possibilities of music.
The various jam scenes were also glued together by an essential communality of purpose in sharp contrast to the machinations of the music business. And perhaps that explains the charitable foundations of Warren Haynes long standing Christmas jams.
But being an American phenomenon, the jam band scene has always been something big, from the numbers of performers to the set length, which Govt Mule have long extended.
In that context, it’s perhaps no surprise that the 20th anniversary of Warren Haynes Christmas Jam clocks in at 8 minutes shy of 4 hours, spread over 3 cd’s (also available on vinyl).
It asks a lot of both the listener and the people at the show. Indeed, when deep into the night Jim James shout out: “How You Doing?”, it’s almost as if to check everyone is still along for the ride.
Happily there’s enough musical variety and spark here to keep everyone interested, from the rock-blues antecedents through fusion, electro, country, Americana, acoustic, funk, prog and hard rock.
The album impressively charts its course from keyboard experimentalist Marco Benevento’s ‘Green Point’ – an uplifting 80’s sounding instrumental and ‘Pepper’, an unlikely meeting of bass led funk and rap – through to Govt Mule’s closing 3-song Pink Floyd set, which acts as a cathartic release to an intense musical evening.
There’s very much a sense of inclusiveness here, exemplified by the expressive baritone vocal of Jamey Johnson who captures the crowd’s rapt attention with ‘In Color’.
Grace Potter And The Nocturnals add stomping electronics on ‘The Lion The Beast, The Beat’, but she overstays her welcome on the edgy ‘Good Times, Bad Times Paris (Ooh La La)’.
The latter opens as a gargantuan rocker, but becomes wearisome on an over extended workout between the otherwise excellent sax player Ron Holloway and an unknown drummer.
Phish’s Mike Gordon recalls The Grateful Dead on the funky fusion of ‘Sweet Emotion’, while Jim James from My Morning Jacket evokes Neil Young on ‘A New Life’. It’s a style he later revisits alongside the ubiquitous Warren Haynes in acoustic mode on ‘Captured’.
Homeboy Eric Church impresses on the southern rock influenced ‘Ain’t Wasting Time No More’, which features a lovely combination of electric piano and slide.
CD 2 finds Joe Bonamassa getting heavy on Beck’s ‘Spanish Boots’, and he revels in Zeppelin’s riff driven ‘Tea For One’ and the bluesy ‘I Can’t Quit You Baby’.
His guitar work is exemplary, full of squalls, volume swells, cool dynamics and shot through with real intensity, the perfect combination for a jam band.
However, it’s Dave Grohl who steals the show with ‘Play’, a 30 minute suite which explores rock, prog, space-rock, fusion, metal, ambient drones and staccato percussion with an extended finale.
His use of changing tempos, different textures and moods is everything you would want in a lengthy piece of instrumental improv.
And so to Gov’t Mule, they open the lyrically spiky ‘Revolution Come, Revolution Go’ with a funky bass intro and some spell binding interplay.
A sudden lumbering tempo change and a drum break then leads to the kind of jazzy rebuild typical of a jam band who love the challenge of overcoming self imposed musical obstacles.
They rock hard on a reflective song ‘Million Miles From Yesterday’ and then segue Neil Young’s ‘Rockin’ In The Free World’ into Hendrix’s vitriolic ‘Machine Gun’, which they fill it with coruscating solos.
Kevin Kinney’s two song contribution is notable for his nasal vocal timbre, which is well suited to the gloriously ragged ‘Honey Suckle Blossom’, complete with a guitar avalanche.
And just when the evening needs a fresh shot of adrenalin, it comes from Band of Horses singer songwriter Tyler Ramsey, who fills a meditative instrumental called ‘1000 Blackbirds’ with lovely jangling notes which resonate and fill the room with fresh oxygen.
Planet of The Apts rock hard with a heavy growled guitar sound on ‘I’m Telling You’, while Warren Haynes and Dave Grohl change the dynamic again on the very poignant ‘Times Like These’ and the Foo Fighters love song ‘Everlong’.
Govt Mule and Jim James skip the opening verse to Pink Floyd’s ‘Them & Us’ and go straight for the sax solo, which is repeated after a reedy vocal is rescued by the ensemble’s bv’s.
‘Any Colour You Like’ hits new heights with a gnawing guitar and synth interplay over a powerhouse rhythm section.
Vocalist T-Bone Anderson does his best to nail the closing ‘Comfortably Numb’, which drags a little until a sparkling harmony guitar break flanked by bv’s leading to a manic crescendo.
As on this song, so with the album as a whole, nothing is done by halves. ****
Review by Pete Feenstra
Featured Artist: JOSH TAERK
Since early 2020 Josh has been entertaining us with exclusive monthly live sessions, streamed via Facebook.
In 2023 he signed a recording deal with Sony in Canada and released a new single on 15 September.
Latest session: Sunday 14 April
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UK Blues Broadcaster of the Year (2020 and 2021 Finalist) Pete Feenstra presents his weekly Rock & Blues Show on Tuesday at 19:00 GMT as part of a five hour blues rock marathon “Tuesday is Bluesday at GRTR!”. The show is repeated on Wednesdays at 22:00, Fridays at 20:00). This show was first broadcast 2 April 2024.
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KATH & THE KICKS Neptune (indie)
THE BEE TELLERS River Poem (Black Sand Records)
LAUREN FREEBIRD Like A Bomb (indie)
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09:00-12:00 The Best of 2003-2023
12:00-13:00 The Best of 2003-2023
14:00-16:00 KATARINA PEJAK – Pearls On A String (Ruf Records)
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