Onstage is a man who is a walking encyclopedia of scrappy,
underdog American pop, a champion of the music of the urban outsiders. He’s also a singular guitarist and horn
arranger. He’s backed by an 11-piece
band, like he means business. And three
backing singers too.
Oh yeah, the backing singers. Now, I’m not talking about some autopilot
mannekins here. These are the sassiest
trio you’re ever likely to come across.
They're wearing violet silk thigh boots, and these ladies ain’t
shrinkin’ from nothin’. To paraphrase a
line from The Commitments, “Inspired management, Brother Steven”.
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| Steve Van Zandt rides the night away |
Yes friends, I am talking about Little Steven, aka Steve Van
Zandt, here with his Disciples of Soul.
And joking apart, he rightly tells us at one point that those singers
are “dancing their asses off”, setting the tone for a night of sweaty R’n’B and
soul and rock’n’roll that demands you shake your booty.
The set is based firstly around the material from new album Soulfire, before winding around to some
stuff from his Eighties albums, but before getting to any of that Stevie leads
them into the fray with a downright perfect rendition of Tom Petty’s ‘Even The
Losers’.
‘I’m Coming Back’, originally crafted for Southside Johnny
and the Asbury Jukes before re-surfacing on the new album, has a classic Jukes
style horn riff, a chorus so great that it seems simply inevitable, and a
scything solo from Van Zandt – and is just one example of thunderous drumming
from Rich Mercurio. Mercurio may work
with just a small kit, but he is a veritable beast.
Thereafter Stevie punctuates the set with a guided tour of
his inspirations. Highlights include the
likes of Etta James’ ‘Blues Is My Business’, featuring stabbing horns and a
wild organ solo from Andy Burton, and ‘Some Things Just Don’t Change’, on which
he channels “the King of Despair”, David Ruffin, nailing the soul mood and the
phrasing. There’s ‘The City Weeps
Tonight’, a eulogy to post-war harmony groups on which the sheer passion of Van
Zandt’s singing is apparent. Then in
complete contrast there’s the restless funk of ‘Down And Out In New York City’. Originally recorded by James Brown for the
movie Black Caesar, it features a
succession of flute and horn solos, and a crescendo into which Austin
Powers-garbed guitarist Marc Ribler casually slips a reference to the riff from
‘Hey Joe’.
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| The Unshrinking Violets |
Along the way there are other delights, like Van Zandt and
Ribler ripping into a guitar duel on ‘Angel Eyes’, the irresistible horns on ‘I
Saw The Light’ and Stevie uncorking an eyeballs out solo at one point to get everyone shakin' all over.
Down the stretch though, it’s an absolute melting pot of
soul and New York punk and even reggae.
At the outset he may have said with a twinkle in his eye that back in
the Eighties he felt the need to do music about politics, but now there was no
need so tonight would be “a sanctuary from politics”. Still, there’s no shaking
the relevance of songs like ‘Solidarity’, with its haunting mid-section, as
well as ‘I Am A Patriot’ and the Latin-inflected, floor-shaking rhythms of
‘Bitter Fruit’.
He throws in a couple of other Southside classics just for
fun, with the rifferama of ‘Ride The Night Away’ and the romance of ‘I Don’t
Want To Go Home’. But there’s no way the
night could end with anything other than ‘Out Of The Darkness’, with the crowd
pumping their fists and in full voice.
Some folk say that nostalgia’s not what it used to be. But when Steve Van Zandt revisits his roots
and his repertoire with a two hour show of anthemic soul like this, it doesn’t
half take me back to my youth.
I was there...it was magical!!!
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