Going into a Tedeschi Trucks Band show, you know you’re going to get a winning combo of Derek Trucks’ incredible guitar work and his wife Susan Tedeschi’s bluesy vocals, along with some stretched-out jams full of horns, percussion, even flute, that will get the crowd dancing for most of the show.
Even knowing that, though, doesn’t make the sound of Trucks leaning into his first solo, or the dead-sexy voice of Tedeschi any less thrilling when you hear them. Monday night, braving threatening skies that did nothing to damper the good vibes inside the venue, the Tedeschi Trucks Band delivered a stellar show highlighted by songs from their upcoming Made Up Mind album, as well as a touching tribute to the recently deceased Bobby “Blue” Bland.
Opening with a torrid version of “Don’t Let Me Slide,” the band settled into the groove easily, each of the many musicians on stage smiling and moving to the sound they collectively created. Tedeschi is no slouch on the guitar, either, and her exchanges with Trucks–simply one of the best players in the world–created aural sparks early and often.
“Midnight in Harlem” showcased how strong a slow-blues belter Tedeschi is, while “Bound for Glory” offered a soulful R&B vamp that was my favorite performance of the night.
Among the new songs, the title track to Made Up Mind was strong, and Trucks’ solo on the ballad “It’s So Heavy” offered ample proof, as if it was needed, that he is hard to beat as a player. I first fell for Trucks’ playing when I saw him play with Eric Clapton in the Duane Allman role during one Clapton tour when he was doing a set heavy on Derek & the Dominos material. Trucks wiped up the floor with Slowhand that night at the EnergySolutions Arena, and I’ve tried to see him live every time he’s come to town since.
Unfortunately, that also means putting up with the drum solos favored by the jam bands, something I can certainly live without. But if stomaching another seemingly endless round of percussion is the price for digging into Tedeschi and Trucks’ excellent live interaction, so be it.
The most touching point of the night came when Tedeschi acknowledged the death of the legendary Bobby “Blue” Bland the day before, leading the band into an excellent take on Bland’s “That Did It” that made excellent use of all aspects of the band, from the horns to the keyboards to Tedeschi’s voice and Trucks’ playing. With a light sprinkle falling from the slate-gray sky overhead, the song proved a perfect homage to the man. Great stuff,
SHE & HIM, RED BUTTE GARDEN, Tuesday, June 25, 7:30 p.m., $50
I know that Zooey Deschanel is a divisive figure among hipster tastemakers, and I fall solidly in the pro-Zooey camp whether we’re talking about her acting career or her music collaboration with M. Ward in She & Him. When it comes to the duo’s music, it helps a lot that I’ve been a fan for years of Ward’s intricate guitar-playing and ear for classic “Wall of Sound” production styles. Add in Deschanel’s taste for retro girl-group harmonies and surprisingly strong songwriting sense that evokes everything from Patsy Cline to The Supremes, and you have some timeless tunes coming your way. I loved She & Him’s first album, aptly titled Vol. 1, and they’ve followed it up with two more volumes just as good. Tilly and the Wall open the show.
Just as Jason Isbell’s latest release, Southeastern, is the sound of a fresh beginning for the newly sober, newly married singer/songwriter, the man’s headlining show Sunday at the Utah Arts Festival had the air of an introduction to new fans.
With only 75 minutes to play with–a brief interlude in terms of live shows for the former Drive-by Trucker–Isbell managed to deliver many of the new songs never heard during his past Salt Lake City visits, while touching on enough older songs from his 10 or so years in the public eye that longtime fans had no reason to complain.
Joined by his band the 400 Unit, featuring new guitarist Sadler Vaden, Isbell kicked off with one of Southeastern‘s killers, “Stockholm Syndrome.” He settled in with “Go It Alone” and followed with one of his Truckers songs–“Decoration Day,” featuring a stellar slide-guitar solo from Isbell and an ingratiating introduction: “I couldn’t have picked a better night to come play some rock and roll for you,” Isbell said as he launched into into the song, and he was right.
With a decent-sized crowd for a 9:45 p.m. Sunday night show in Salt Lake City, Isbell bounced between unveiling songs from the new album and appeasing Truckers’ fans with selections from his years in that band. Early on, the set was heavy on the solo songs, with new ones like “Traveling Alone” and “Live Oak” sprinkled among older favorites like “Tour of Duty” and “Codeine.”
About halfway in, Isbell and his band really caught fire. After performing Southeastern‘s opener, “Cover Me Up,” and making it one of the best songs of the night, Isbell thanked the crowd for letting him run through new, largely acoustic songs, before announcing it was time to turn up the electricity.
The driving “Super 8,” one of the lightest moments on Southeastern–thanks to lyrics like “I don’t want to die in a Super 8 motel, just because someone’s evening didn’t go so well”–led into an unexpected, and unexpectedly great, cover of the Rolling Stones’ “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking?”
After that treat, Isbell and band closed the show in a blaze of excellent performances, starting with what is the signature song–to date for the 34-year-old artist, “Outfit.” The narrative from father to son remains a stirring, soulful song even though Isbell’s been performing it for years, and the segue into one of Southeastern‘s best, “Flying Over Water,” served to show how consistently excellent Isbell’s songwriting has been through the years.
A closing salvo of “Dress Blues,” “Alabama Pines” and another Truckers’ tune, “Never Gonna Change,” sealed the deal on a memorable 15-song blast through Isbell’s catalog. The 400 Unit sounded great behind him, with special props aimed at guitarist Vaden for his fiery contribution, and Isbell showed that he’s just as blazing a live presence as a sober frontman as he was with a buzz on–his voice has never sounded better. Here’s hoping we get a full-length tour stop while Isbell continues to tour in support of Southeastern. I’d love to hear how those songs gain momentum as the band gets comfortable playing them, and as Isbell continues to win new fans along the way as I’m sure he did Sunday night.
(Atrocious photo by yours truly)
One thing you can say about watching Tony Bennett perform live–without a Scotch, a steak and a cigar at your disposal, you fill utterly unprepared.
The classic crooner delivered nearly 25 songs in a tight set that blended classic pop standards with some jazzy ring-a-ding-ding swing, with Bennett leading his small group with emphatic hand motions, subtle nods and some unexpected dance moves here and there.
Bennett was a remarkably friendly host, repeatedly asking the audience for permission to play another popular hit, punctuating his announcements of what he planned to play with “if I may?” Giving the members of his band plenty of chances to shine via solos or his introductions, Bennett proved a beneficent frontman throughout the show.
He opened with one of his weaker vocal performances on “Watch What Happens,” but it wasn’t long before Bennett was belting out choruses and climactic last lines with style and power on the following “They All Laughed” and “Maybe This Time.” Some early surprises, at least to me, included a winning cover of Hank Williams’ “Cold Cold Heart” and an energetic “I Got Rhythm,” as well as an excellent take of “Sing You Sinners.” Hearing the 86-year-old Bennett sing “You’re wicked and you’re depraved, and you’ve all misbehaved” was a once in a lifetime moment.
Later, his version of “The Way You Look Tonight” started as a low-key slow-burn of a tune, until Bennett opened up and had the band chimed in for one of the most obvious highlights of the night. “Just in Time” and “Boulevard of Broken Dreams” followed before Bennett dedicated “The Good Life” to Lady Gaga, adding an announcement that he’d be recording an album of duets with the provocative pop star on Monday.
“It’s such a beautiful place,” Bennett observed toward show’s end, looking around the stunning setting of Red Butte Garden’s stage. “Out here in nature like this, it’s just perfect.”
It sure seemed just that as he pushed toward the show’s finale with stellar takes on “That Old Black Magic” and his signature tune, “I Left My Heart in San Francisco.” By the time Bennett finished to a standing ovation and performance of Charlie Chaplin’s “Smile,” he had once again shown that some sounds never go out of style. Bennett’s friendly run through the American songbook proved a show definitely worth seeing, as long as the man keeps delivering like he did Thursday night.
In the span of roughly 20 hours in Salt Lake City on Wednesday, I saw two utterly divergent concerts. One was New York City’s Parquet Courts, an indie darling of 2013 touring in support of their first proper album, Light Up Gold. The other? The lite-rock singer/songwriter Jackson Browne, a legend from the California ’70s folk-rock scene with nearly five decades as a performer under his belt.
The only thing in common between the two? The fact that I had never seen either in my years exploring live music in Salt Lake City.
With rising indie-rock kids Parquet Courts taking the stage shortly after midnight on Wednesday morning, and Jackson Browne taking the stage for a sold-out show at Red Butte Garden later that night at 8:30 p.m., I had the chance to compare the two experiences.
Here’s the breakdown:
Parquet Courts
With just a cassette-only release and the critically hailed Light Up Gold album to their credit, Parquet Courts (pictured above in all their red-lit glory) didn’t have a ton of songs to choose from for their first-ever visit to Salt Lake City. Thankfully, that did nothing to detract from the energetic blast of jagged guitars cut with insistent bass hooks that make Parquet Courts’ music a worthy addition to the dance-rock scene of their New York City home base.
The songs on Light Up Gold veer between noisy thrash and beautiful pop, and all of that came through at their Urban Lounge performance–and all of it at a high volume. Blazing through about 15 songs in just more than a half-hour, the quartet didn’t let the light crowd–maybe 50 people, tops–affect their performance in the least.
With the band’s songwriters and guitarists Andrew Savage and Austin Brown trading vocals, or joining together to harmonize along with bass player Sean Yeaton, Parquet Courts blazed through like the loping “Yr No Stoner,” the stuttering “Master of My Craft” and the hit-in-a-just-world “Borrowed Time” in short order. And if it’s at all possible, the pace actually picked up for the latter half of the show, even as the band’s sonic diversity came into greater focus. “Careers in Combat” was a torrid indictment of a twentysomething’s career options in the 2013 economy, delivered via a fevered 90 seconds at most. “N. Dakota” and “No Ideas” showcased the band’s more measured, sensitive side, while “Stoned and Starving,” saved for the second to last song, proved a clear standout among a show full of great performances.
Jackson Browne
Roughly 20 hours later I found myself in the plush environs of Utah’s best summertime concert venue, Red Butte Gardens, for Jackson Browne’s first Utah stop in recent memory. If there is a perfect venue for Browne’s oeuvre of gentle and occasionally politically tinged folk-rock, it would be the mountainside stage surrounded by trees and flowers.
I was at a disadvantage from the get-go in reviewing a Jackson Browne show, as my memories of him are stuck in the early ’80s MTV hits like “Lawyers in Love” and the scene in Fast Times at Ridgemont High set to his “Somebody’s Baby.” I know the man has been an influence on young folk-rock bands I enjoy, and I had a high school teacher who used his “Lives in the Balance” as a teaching tool in civics class. I also know that Browne co-wrote The Eagles “Take It Easy”–and that is NOT a selling point for this guy.
The show at Red Butte Garden Wednesday night, one of the first to sell out for its summer concert season, was pretty much what I expected–utterly professional, classy and straightforward. Unfortunately, those adjectives often add up to “uninspired” in my book, especially on the heels of the genuinely thrilling and occasionally sloppy Parquet Courts set I’d seen earlier Wednesday.
I was clearly in the minority at the venue in finding the whole thing relatively flaccid, as people occasionally jumped on their feet to dance to poppy oldies delivered between more stately songs that Jackson performed either seated behind a piano or strumming his guitar at center stage. From opener “Black and White” through songs like “The Pretender” and “These Days,” people responded to each selection respectfully.
The thing is, compared to other artists I would lump in with Browne’s brand of rock who have performed at Red Butte in recent years–Sheryl Crow and Crosby, Stills & Nash come to mind–this show lacked the energy and excitement to make it feel like a must-see event. It was a pleasant evening out, which I’m sure is enough to satisfy most of his fans. But it wasn’t even close to making this observer into a new one.
TONY BENNETT, RED BUTTE GARDEN, Thursday, June 20, 8 p.m., $72
I can’t lie–my primary interest in seeing Tony Bennett in concert is to fill in that box on my classic-crooner music-nerd Bingo card. Bennett’s blend of American standards and jazz isn’t in my regular rotation of recreational listening, but I know a living legend when I see one, and Bennett certainly is that. Still going strong into his 80s, Bennett has 17 Grammys to his credit, stretching back to 1963’s awards for his classic “I Left My Heart in San Francisco,” to just last year when he won for Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album for his Duets II set. His style remains timeless, and you pair that remarkable voice of Bennett’s with a night at Red Butte Garden and you’re looking at what could be a magical evening.
Daniel Nailen 