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Wednesday, February 27, 2008

DVD Review: Eric Clapton - Crossroads guitar festival 2007 (DVD)

Well I’ve managed to get hold of the new Crossroads DVD. A few years ago I bought the first one, and have got endless hours of enjoyment out of it both directly and indirectly. By indirectly I mean that there were some performers that I had never heard of before. Subsequently I have followed up on their studio recordings, with really good results. Examples of this are both John Mayer and Jonny Lang - what talented young axe-meisters they are, with voices to go with their axe wielding!

Crossroads, for the uninitiated, is a concert hosted by none other than Eric Clapton himself, in order to raise funds for his rehabilitation centre based in Antigua. According to Mr. Clapton he calls all his favourite guitarists and invites them to attend. Apparently most respond in the affirmative.

The first crossroads DVD based on a concert in Texas in 2004 was excellent. The quality of performances and the calibre of artists featured was extremely high. While some performances were ultimately a little too esoteric for my tastes, these numbered only about 3 tracks. The rest pure bliss! We had brilliant performances as already mentioned from both John Mayer and Jonny Lang. My favourite on this two disc set was without a doubt Robert Cray. Then there were special moments such as EC teaming up with JJ Cale himself. Not to mention an on form Joe Walsh wearing the loudest pair of shoes that I have ever seen (he probably needs them in the Rocky Mountains as an aid to being found should he get lost), as well as BB King, Robert Randolph and Steve Vai. In addition we have Santana, who were joined onstage by EC demonstrating how in touch with his funky side he can be. Country music also had representation from the brilliant Vince Gill as well as members of AKUS. The DVD set ends with ZZ Top masterfully ripping the crowd up with two of their classic songs (La Grange and Tush). If you don’t have it, there is a big gap in your life.

However, this is a review of the second crossroads DVD, recorded in 2007 from a similarly themed concert based in Chicago. I was surprised to find the DVD in a local shop so soon after being released, and naturally snapped it up. This time the line-up is fairly different. Regulars are John Mayer, Robert Randolph, Vince Gill, Jimmie Vaughan, the highly talented Robert Cray and Doyle Bramhall II, but for the rest - a new cast. Also, this concert had a compere (or MC) in the form of the great Bill Murray. In fact he starts the DVD sessions with his own unaccompanied rendition of ‘Gloria’. Considering the line-up for the rest of the day, you cannot underestimate how brave that was. Halfway through the song EC rushes onstage with his guitar to, I think, save Bill (or on second thoughts maybe the song).

The first disc is actually only OK. There are some revelations that I have noted for following up, namely the really cool sounding Derek Trucks, as well as his wife Susan Tedeschi, and an awesome Sonny Landreth. But Doyle Bramhall II, while onto a conceptually good thing of having two drummers onstage with him, fails to rock out as expected. Robert Cray is in my opinion too understated, seeming to prefer to take the backseat while he and his band support the likes of Jimmie Vaughan, Hubert Sumlin and BB King. Vince Gill puts in a strong performance and then we are onto Sheryl Crow and Willie Nelson with what I would call fairly shambled performances.

On a more poignant note is the presence of Johnny Winters. He has apparently been rescued from some Svengali type career arrangement, close to complete collapse, and he has slowly been trying to rebuild his career, life and health. That he is able to perform at all is therefore a blessing.

So a little worried about the wisdom of having spent all this money on the DVD, I slotted the second disc in. John Mayer kicks it off – and how! These are really good performances of a couple of tracks from Continuum and they really rock live. Next up we have Los Lobos. On the previous Crossroads DVD we had some of them performing, namely David Hidalgo and backing band which was basically a low-light for me. So seeing Los Lobos coming up did not have me that excited. Well suffice it to say, the whole is a whole lot better than its individual components. They delivered a fine set.

Up next is Jeff Beck. Wow, what a revelation! Not only in terms of Jeff with his utter mastery of the electric guitar, but also relating to band member Tal Wilkenfeld on bass guitar. This lady really can play. To see the respect and enjoyment in Jeff Beck’s eyes as she takes the bass solos during parts of the songs is to understand how amazingly talented she is. Beck is followed by EC himself with, like Bramhall, two drummers. His backing band included both Derek Trucks and Doyle Bramhall II on guitar, and the sound is fantastic. EC is then joined by Robbie Robertson for a couple of songs, and then, as the highlight of the entire DVD as far as I am concerned, he is joined by Steve Winwood. First they do ‘Presence of the Lord’ and ‘Can’t find my way home’ before EC leaves the stage with Winwood carrying on without him – this, to be honest, is compelling viewing and listening, if only for these five songs, it is worth getting hold of this DVD.

Steve Winwood is followed by Buddy Guy who closes the show by bringing the house down. His performance is funky and menacing (or maybe it’s just his band that looks menacing – watch the DVD you will see what I mean, his guitarist is so big he looks like he is playing an Ukelele and the drummer is even bigger…) as he closes off with ‘Sweet Home Chicago’.

Sunday, February 24, 2008

Recommended Radio Station in Johannesburg

Okay, You may or may not know, but traffic in Johannesburg (that's the biggest city in South Africa in case you don't know) has become something of a nightmare. Without much in the way of alternative safe public transport systems, this leaves you sitting in your car for fairly long periods of time. Not a problem if you have some decent rock music to listen to during the ordeal. But sometimes things go wrong i.e. your CD player is empty, you have listened to Radioheads 'In Rainbows' twice already during this trip or some type of malfunction takes place. This should not be a big problem, as there is always the radio. Having travelled to a lot of the big cities in the world, I have found that you can always tune into something rocking on the radio.

Not here in Johannesburg! Or at least not until recently......

It was not always like this. A decade ago 5FM played some good rock music. Even earlier than that they played some excellent rock music. We had the likes of Chris Prior, Rafe Lavine and Barney Simon laying down some brilliant sessions. Rafe did the Heavy Rock late at night. A classmate of mine reported that he had to do pushups all night to try and keep awake waiting for Rafes show to start (it did not show - he was the skinniest guy I knew). Well those days are gone. 5FM now is strictly Pop and Hip hop, I suppose their target market likes it... Then we have 94.7 or Highveld radio, they seem to specialise in Wimp-rock. And that's about it for Rock music.

There are of course some good stations, but just not delivering the rock I need. Classic FM delivers a quality classical music format. Kaya FM delivers solidly in the Soul and RnB categories (http://www.kayafm.co.za/frontpage.php) . But that is generally not what I want.

Well ...... now we have UJFM. This is the local 'College radio' station. The DJs are kids from the University and the music is mainly Rock. Their accents tend to be great, the punchline for the station is 'Your Noise of Choice' but when they say it it comes out ' Your Norz of Chorz'. Even better, there are not many advertisements. In an hour you could hear anything from Slipknot, to Snow Patrol. In fact it was the first place that I heard the excellent Wolfmother single 'Woman'. On top of this they have a solid representation of local music too.

All is not rosy, as their signal is not that strong, and I tend to lose it for the part of my trip to and from work that passes through a dip, but such is the lack of quality rock on any other station, I sometimes prefer to listen to something like the Queens of the Stone Age's 'Little Sister' through an exreme static hiss rather than change that dial. Check out more about the station at this website: http://www.ujfm.co.za/

Friday, February 22, 2008

DVD Review: David Gilmour -Remember That Night Live at the Royal Albert Hall (DVD)

Well at face value this DVD looks like it has lot of potential. First of all David Gilmour takes on his new Album 'On an Island' and decides to play it live in it's entirety. Next he assembles most of the musicians who played on 'On an Island': Richard Wright, Phil Manzanera, Jon Carlin, Guy Pratt, Steve DiStanislao, and Dick Parry. Then he even rounds up special guests: David Crosby, Graham Nash, David Bowie and Robert Wyatt. This almost sounds too good to be true, even in danger of becoming overblown and stultified when considering the big names involved. Things can go horribly wrong with so many big egos involved in a project like this...... so do they?

Not at all - the individuals involved gather around Gilmour as true team members and seem to get on with the business of professional entertainment! The DVD pack that I purchased consists of two discs. The first is the concert DVD. This disc include an entire performance of the 'On an Island' Album which is excellent. The band look relaxed and as if they are enjoying themselves - and the sound is excellent. In fact the concert recording audio and visual are of the highest quality. What about the content? Well 'On an Island' is a pretty relaxed album that made it to 1 in the UK charts, so if you liked that, what's not to like. Then in addition Gilmour also performs some tracks by his usual band, maybe you have heard of them 'Pink Floyd'? Here a broad period is covered from early Syd Barret PF era recordings such as 'Arnold Layne' (done with Bowie on vocals) to later classics such as 'High Hopes'. Also included are some relative 'obscurities' such as 'Fat Old Sun' and 'Dark Globe' amongst others.

All in all one could not ask for more - this disc is excellent.

So still not sure whether to buy the DVD package or not? Check out disc 2 'Bonus Features'!

This disc includes several other (non Royal Albert Hall) live performances, and several Documentaries. The quality of these live recordings varies, but the must haves on this disc are the documentaries. You get to join the tour and travel around with the band through Europe and a little on the USA west coast. You get to see the environment in which Gilmour works with intriguing looks at his house-boat based recording studio nestled somewhere on the Thames, and you get a view of Gilmour and some of the band Jamming in a barn in the middle of nowhere (I think). In addition, a reasonable amount is revealed here relating to Gilmour as an individual. My interpretation: someone with a sense of humour, but also very firm on who is right or wrong in any situation. Another key factor: never compromise on quality! This comes through in the entire DVD package - content is strong on both discs, the packaging is great and in my view value for money too.

Overall recommendation: Buy it!

Thursday, February 21, 2008

Introduction

This blog is about music reviews.



I will provide my subjective view on new purchases that I make in the realm of popular music in both the CD and DVD formats. In addition, if I am lucky enough to attend any live concerts or festivals I will also be providing feedback on these.



What will also be fun will be to rank certain categories. For example, my top 5 greatest bands of all time, my top 5 favourite up and coming bands etc.