Jon Spencer Blues Explosion @ ULU, London (4/09/99)
There's no getting away from the fact that the man looks good on
stage. DAMN good. No I said DAMN good. YEAH. (My apologies Ladies and
Gentlemen, I won't be doing that again. There should be a law,
however, stating that all rock stars should look like this---handsome
in a dangerous way, slightly greasy and completely insane.) For the
uninitiated (and after 5 or so albums, where have you been?), JSBX
play a somewhat shambolic mix of Rock and Roll and blues with a
nineties edge. It's the kind of shambling that takes years to craft
and hone yet these boys have managed it seemingly without difficulty.
They still sound like noone else, despite the fairly simple
ingredients that make up their sound. OK, they have essentially been
playing the same song all these years and, yes, Spencer does tend to
say 'bluuuuuuueeeeeees exploooooosion' far too often. But what the
fuck, it works. It comes as no surprise that tonight's 45 minute set
(a tad short, but there you go) is at the same time both highly
professional and ridiculously overblown. It's impossible to watch Jon
Spencer without both longing to be doing what he's doing and wanting
to dance and I certainly did both. As for the material, well, pretty
much the Reading set by all accounts. It even includes a ferocious
and dramatically elongated version of "Bellbottoms," which culminated
in the drummer being left to pound out the drums for a minute or two
on his own, Jon Spencer dropping his guitar and kneeling, accompanied
by an almost completely different riff from the guitarist. Long
sentence? You never heard the song! From "2 kindsa love" to "I wanna
make it alright," the whole set is blistering. If you want songs
about your meaningless existence and a sound for a hangover go
elsewhere. BUT If you want entertainment, if you want a party
atmosphere, if you want to be blown away by a hurricane of a band and
if you want a crowd who couldn't be more into something if they had to
smoke it, watch a show like this one. And let's face it---who else do
you know who could get away with wearing silver pants? Eh? (EH/Radiant
Kovacs)
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