Henrik Freischlader – A man with a Cap & a Plan

Never mind ‚Can a white boy sing the Blues?’ how about ‘Can a German white boy do it?

If anyone fits the bill right now it’s self confessed Autodidact Henrik Freischlader.  Germany’s Nr 1 Blues icon was in town on Sunday so Bonn’s Nr1 Blues fan (me!) had to check him out out the Harmonie and see if he deserves the attention.

Germany with a Blues Hero?  Sounds unlikely.  People like Herbert Grönemeyer have been more mainstream but still gone largely unnoticed away from the Fatherland.  I was surprised then to hear from a journalist  in England who was asking about info and pictures for an interview with Henrik Freischlader to be published in a British magazine.

A bit of research of my own revealed that Freischlader is big news lately, having shared stages and supported the likes of BB King, Johnny Winter and Gary Moore in recent months as well as coming up with a corker of an album produced by Martin Meinschäfer that sounds like it’s got all those celebrated guitarists in as session men but is actually just Freischlader himself – right down to the drum solos.

Not surprisingly then the Harmonie on Sunday was pretty well a sell out, as were both the opening shows in Wuppertal, and probably every show this Tour will be.  Showtime and HF steps onstage with the minimum of fuss and his mild mannered voice says Guten Abend.  As he smiles a Han Solo smile that suggests he (and we) are in for some fun.  The smile doesn’t lie as Henrik Freischlader lets his fingers do the talking.

There’s no doubting Fleischladers eloquence on six strings.  Or thirty strings more appropriately.  A guitar technician sits out the show in a dark stage corner.  Which guitar is for which song is taped to a printed list on the corner wall and the appropriate ‘axe’ is freed from the long guitar stand as appropriate.  A Peter Green number?  It’s the Les Paul.  Jimi’s ‘Foxy Lady’? got to be the 1963 Stratocaster.  I later asked Freischlader if he’s considered doing say Hendrix on Gibson as a groundbreaking idea.  Yes he did once, he recalls.  It didn’t sound too bad.  Onstage though ‘too bad’ clearly isn’t good enough so The guitars are switched around with Bonamassa-like speed (a new adverb?!)

I have a mere second to glimpse a handwritten greeting on the Les Paul’s rear – “With love from Gary Moore” as Peter Green’s ‘I loved another woman’ is announced.   Freischlader came to the Blues through Moore’s 1992 ‘After Hours’ platter which makes me, who saw Moore with Thin Lizzy in 1979, feel rather like a large, should be extinct, cold blooded reptile.  Playing support for BB King must have been like having a kick around with Cro-Magnon man to HF!

The sound quality on the new CD is wonderful but here at the Harmonie it’s rather less wonderful – which is odd since the Producer, Martin Meinschäfer, is also the Tour’s soundman.  At one point Freischlader announces there are ear plugs available on the merchandise stand.  I never found out if he was kidding but if they were available I saw none later. Maybe that’s not surprising given the shrill tone in the Hall they would have been instant best-sellers.

The set, like the new CD, kicks off with ‘I’ and the shrill, muddy sound fits it nicely.  Problem is that the sound doesn’t improve much afterwards.  ‘I Got It Made’ is in similar vein soundwise.  ‘So Damn Cool’ sounds a ringer for BB King on CD but here there’s no danger of thinking the big man is onstage as the sound system roughs up the smooth intentions.

The best moments are inevitably quieter ones when the sound is more under control.  ‘Cry Again’ lends more than a small nudge to Gary Moore’s ‘Still got the Blues’ with the added benefit that Freischlader is a better singer than Gazza.  He reminds many people of John Mayer vocally but to me there’s a lot of Elvis Costello at his ‘Almost Blue’ best in Freischladers voice.  Outside of referring to the plural of sheep as ‘sheeps’ in one of the texts he is undetectably German – a paradox really that his best chance of being Germany’s first Blues star lies in not sounding German.  Star?  Well consider this people – The Stetson Company, those fashionably ever in vogue people responsible for dressing the heads of George Custer and Wyatt Earp,  are planning a Henrik Fleischlader signature Cap for their headwear range.  Does it get bigger than that?

Well possibly it does.  And very possibly it will for Henrik Freischlader.  The concert sound was disappointing and the band never really seemed to catch fire but the CD is one of the best I’ve heard in a long, long time.  A white Boy CAN play the Blues – as long as he drops the German accent, you can bet your last sheeps on this man going places.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Sixties United – Stoned Again!

“Mit siebzehn hat man noch Träume” is the title of Bea Tradt’s memoirs of teenage life in Bonn – especially so it seems when you were seventeen in the 1960’s.

Tradt re-lived her dreams in the Harmonie on Saturday and the packed house was proof that she shared those dreams with many a resident of Bonn who came out in force to let the  sixties swing again for a night at least another night.

If the colour in the hair of many of those present was lacking then it was more than made up for by the colour onstage with it’s flower power petals or at the hippy market with it’s garish tie-die neck scarves and Tshirts. There was colour in the cheeks of both audience and performers too. Maybe the Summer of Love is long gone but the children who lived it still have a corner of their hearts where, like Bea, the memories are kept and cherished. Just watching the pictures of a bygone age flickering by on the giant screen behind the stage was worth admission alone. Young teenagers with daring to be different clothes and attitudes that all seem so endearingly un-threatening and un-different today.

Before the show could even begin came an announcement: “Can everyone stand a little closer together, like in the old days? It’s almost full here now and we have another hundred people outside wanting to come in!”

The stage too was packed full with people.  21 songs and 21 musicians from Bonn’s past. They’re the bald statistics of ‘Sixties United’, Except the evening wasn’t about statistics, but about memories and music. The former came from Bea Tradt who took us on a teenagers journey through sixties Bonn. It started at a seemingly innocent time when sex was something your parents did behind your back and finished in the decadent seventies when it was something you did behind their backs.  Bea had wanted to sound like Melanie, to look like Twiggy and amongst her earliest wishes just wanted to own a whole 45rpm record, instead she shared them with her brother – and was only allowed to play the B sides! Ah, but a Rolling Stones B-side was not a bad deal at all she recalled “As Tears Go By” on the flip of “19^th Nervous Breakdown” for example. On the subject of the Stones we had Mick Jagger himself to give the evening some weight and swagger. Well okay, not Jagger exactly but Günther Grothaus seemed to embody Mick in everything but the birth certificate. Certainly his Stones covers gave a lot of people ‘Satisfaction’ (pardon the pun).

The 21 songs chosen for the evening were a real ramble down memory lane. Some were the expected hits of the era, like the opening ‘Roll Over Beethoven’, ‘Mr Tambourine Man’ and ‘Wild Thing’. Others were surprising choices – like Peter Sarstedts ‘Where do you go to my lovely’ or, what to me was a highlight, Steamhammer’s 1969 hit ‘Juniors Wailing’. Not a single melody from a German band though – was Germany pre Lindenberg a rock wasteland?  Truth to tell, despite being more a child of the 70’s myself (I was a mere ten year old when Woodstock rolled into history) I was a bit disappointed to hear Quo’s ‘Rockin all over the world’ from 1975 and although I can understand the sentiments are perfect, somehow ‘Summer of 69′ from 1985 seemed a pity because there were so many great sixties songs that went unsung.

The good news is that packed audiences don’t go unnoticed and there is every chance that this show will become a regular at the Harmonie. If so I’m sure we will get to hear some other gems from a time when there was no ‘Bonner Loch’ and the height of decadence was sitting by the Kaiser Fountain in a tie die shirt on a Saturday afternoon. Someone suggested to me how lucky I was to be in the UK at the time. I had to admit Portsmouth wasn’t Carnaby Street and anyway I was still in short trousers. I have to say though that Bea and her compatriots by all accounts, did a pretty good job of putting the Beat in Bonn.

Footnote: I went along with a wide angle camera lens to capture the musicians playing together but finished up using a telephoto because in the end it was all about smiles on faces – and what I will most take away from the evening is those expressions of sheer pleasure at playing music. Young musicians take note!

Popularity: 3% [?]

Bonn’s Swinging Sixties

I’m a big fan of Bonn’s oldest surviving pop band Sunny Skies, so when founder of the ‘Skies’ Rope Schmitz told me there were other musicians from Bonn’s pop past performing again I was intrigued.  The evening has been organized by Bea Tradt who sung alongside Rope (Rolf-Peter) in the original Sunny Skies and will feature many of the musical heroes from Bonn’s past (someone calculated their ages would total almost a thousand years of Bonn Rock History, which I think is thinking a little bit TOO hard!)

There will be reminiscing about the past and a small sixties market too (although I guess my chances of buying one of those ‘Beatles Wig in a box’ that I saw as a youngster, but without sufficient pocket money, has gone forever).

Should be an interesting and fun evening so dust off your drainpipes, oil your hula hoop and head for Endenich!

SIXTIES UNITED LINK

And to get you in the mood for a swinging sixties evening here is a fascinating and fun homage to Bonn in the Mods and Rockers days:
THE BONN-BEAT WEBSITE LINK

Popularity: 1% [?]

Choral Evensong with the Bonn English Singers

Choral Evensong with the Bonn English Singers (conductor: Fraser Gartshore)

Preacher: Rev. Simon Hobbs

Music: C. V. Stanford – Magnificat &Nunc Dimittis

John Stainer – God so loved the world

Saturday, 27^th February 2010, 6 p.m.

Antoniter City Kirche, Schildergasse 57, 50667 Köln

Tram: 1, 3,4, 7,9 (Haltestelle Neumarkt)

The Anglican Chaplaincy: http://www.anglicanbonncologne.de

AntoniterCitykirche: http://www.antonitercitykirche.de

Bonn English Singers: http://www.bonnenglishsingers.de

Popularity: 1% [?]

Dr Feelgood – Still Lovin’ It

”I don’t know how any celebrity can hang around night clubs etc. It’s not for me, I’d rather go to a dog meeting.” Lee Brilleaux passed away in 1994 but his down to earth approach to life and to music lives on in the band fondly referred to  in the UK as “The best pub band in the world”. On Thursday ‘the pub’ was Bonns’ Harmonie so grab a beer and join me ‘down at the doctors’

This week saw the British release of Julian Temple’s ‘Oil City Confidential’ – a film recalling the early days of Dr Feelgood. The film is part of a trilogy on British music of the 70’s and the fact that the other films feature iconic figures The Sex Pistols and Joe Strummer is an indication of how influential (and powerful) a musical force the band were in their prime.

The Feelgoods had all the power of Punkrock before anyone knew what Punkrock even was and incredibly they still pack a hefty punch live. Now in his sixties, John ‘The Big Figure’ Martin sits at the drums like they were the Xmas present he always wanted even after all these years. I love watching his eyes – he’s always watching and listening and above all smiling. I asked him three years ago why he still played and he said ‘Because I love it’ and clearly he still does.   Phil Mitchell on bass has more the look of a man enjoying a quiet cigarette as he, like Martin, watches and plays. The two men are the bands engine and they (literally) keep guitarist Steve Walwyn and singer/Harp player Robert Cane on the move.

And do these guys move!   Cane leaves the stage a couple of times, presumably to collapse in an exhausted heap in the outside courtyard before bouncing back in to pogo around the stage like his shoes are on fire. At one point he swings a leg completely over a half crouching Walwyn before lifting the entire mike plus stand aloft and leaning it out into the audience who howl back down it with the beloved band refrain ‘Down at the Doctors’. The show is apparently being recorded live for the radio but the sound is so powerful all they really need do is open the door and the whole of Bonn will be shouting back.

I saw the Feelgood’s some 25 years ago in the Lee Brilleaux days and I saw ex Feelgood guitarist Wilko Johnson many times in the ‘70’s. The band were never subtle, surviving on their raw power and enthusiasm (not to mention Wilko’s catchy pop tunes) to make them special. Now 25 years and without Brilleaux or Johnson they still hit hard. It’s down to Cane’s  hyper manic stage presence and Walwyns sheer animal aggression on guitar (what a contrast to last weekend and the trancelike expressions from Ana Popovic during her solos). Walwyn looks like he’s a dentist pulling teeth rather than a guitarist picking strings.

There are a handful of songs you recognize after three chords and welcome them like long parted friends at a reunion. Lizzy’s ‘Jailbreak’ or Purples ‘Smoke on the Water’. Those thick notes that kick start ‘Milk & Alchohol’ are like that too. When it starts I only have to close my eyes and I can see Wilko leaning over  Lee Brilleaux’ shoulder and staring his maniac smile into a camera lens as Brilleaux spits the notes from his harp. The memory is a grainy black and white and fits them perfectly.
It also sums up Dr Feelgood – a band rough and ready around the edges even after all these years – and all the better for it.

Long may the Doctors Surgery stay open for business!

Popularity: 1% [?]

Ana Popovic Hot in Cold Cologne

While blizzards were sweeping across the cold streets outside a storm called Ana Popovic was swirling across the hot stage in Cologne’s Stadtgarten.

Only a few weeks into 2010 and already the year is looking busy for Ana Popovic. Amongst the highlights already planned are three days as a live music guest of Fender at the prestigious MUSIKmesse in Frankfurt in March, a new appearance in the UK on the Paul Jones BBC Blues programme, a UK Tour in April/May and a live DVD.

Right now though it’s the Stadtgarten in Cologne that Ana is rocking. There was a disco due to start in the hall at 11pm so Ana had been told to finish at 10.30. She’s just back from holiday though and keen to play music. “Back home in Belgrade we’re just warming up for an evening out at midnight, but I can tell I’m in Germany – Everyone here is so punctual. You all arrive exactly for 8pm and we have to finish at 10.30pm!”.
“What time is it anyway?” she calls out. Ronald Jonker on bass guitar has to tell her – “Um, it’s 10.35 already!” Ana, bless her, just heads into another number, and another… the lady’s not for stopping!

Good thing too. It’s only the second show of the year and although everyone looks a bit drained as they come onstage after fighting through the snowstorm, after half an hour it’s like the band has been plugged into ‘recharge’ via their instruments. Ronald is doing his best to jump and hit the ceiling and Ana is all smiles as the band take their solos. Mike is solid as always on Hammond Organ and Stephane is a powerhouse on drums. At one point I see a stick go flying out of his hand and onto the stage. Ana is too deep into her solo to notice and by evening end we have another super concert by Ana and her very capable band. Ronald inevitably picked up roars of approval and a raucous sing-along as his bass solo segued into Queens ‘Another One Bites The Dust’. Great stuff!

A casualty of Ana’s ’shortened’ set (even ignoring the 10.30 curfew she couldn’t quite make her usual three hours) was sadly ‘Navajo Moon’. So I missed out on one of my favourites but others were there to savour. ‘Steal Me Away’ with it’s down and dirty slide rythm and ‘Nothing Personal’ were two crowd pleasers. An acoustic ‘Blind For Love’ which maybe would be better without the drum (sorry Stephane but this song needs a light touch or no touch at all!)

Despite the awful weather the hall was pretty well full and no-one seemed in a hurry to go home as Ana chatted and signed autographs afterwards. CD’s were being quickly snapped up by new Ana fans so the choice of Cologne on the tour map had paid off handsomely and I’m sure that if Ana comes back here the whole audience will do so to!

Needless to say – the APB are set to kick up a storm in 2010, catch them in Bonn on October 8th.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Blues Caravan 2010

Coco Montoya has the pedigree of being, like Eric Clapton, a former ‚Bluesbreaker’ with John Mayall.  Meena and Shakura S’Aida are less well known but all share two things in common:  They are all acts on the 2010 RUF Blues Caravan Tour and they all know how to present the Blues at it’s foot stomping best.

Blues Caravan tours are always an early highlight in my year.  The law of averages says someday they will produce a dull show – but it hasn’t happened yet!  After last years super ‘New Blues’ with Oli Brown, Joanne Shaw Taylor and Erja Lyytinen this years bands hit the road under the slogan ‘Blues Without Borders’ but could have been headed ‘Ageless Blues’ given the varied birthdates of the headlining acts.

By the time young Austrian Blues singer Meena steps onstage there is the usual scrum of cameras around the front microphones.  These shows are a magnet for photographers and Thomas Ruf is a smart marketing man who knows the valuable free publicity a Flikr gallery offers.

At times like these I thank my parents that I’m over five feet tall to see over a few heads, particularly when the musicians are like the diminutive Meena.  Not that she goes unnoticed.  “A great set of pipes” was how Thomas Ruf described her to me before the show, and he wasn’t kidding.  Comparisons with Janis Joplin are inevitable both vocally and in appearance.  Truth to tell I prefer the rather more restrained sound of Meena’s brilliant ‘Try Me’ CD to the live article right now.  The stage just seemed too big at times.   Put the girl in a smokey barroom with a cigar chomping  pianist and it would be a different story I’m sure.

Shakura (not to be confused with Shakira!) was the total opposite.  Her sheer charismatic presence seemed to make the Harmonie stage shrink to dolls house proportions.  Franz from ‘Bluesroad’ Radio had already spelled the virtues of Shakura and her guitarist Donna Grantis to me beforehand but they still took my breath away.  An object lesson in how to present timeless classic jazz/blues vocals,  Shakura had the audience in her hands before singing a single syllable.  Heck, here I have to introduce a whole new adverb: ‘to walk smoulderingly’ which is how the Lady slunk sexily onstage to the equally sexy bass driven backbeat of “Gonna Tell My Baby”.

I’d had to lean round people to take pictures but I was glad not to be front row when the man ahead of me got asked by Shakura  to stroke Donna’s guitar during a solo.  He took it like a man: stammering something about not knowing how to play a guitar before Shakura stunned him into silence with one sexy stare from her saucer sized eyes.  To cut a long story short – If you see a billboard with the name Shakura S’Aida on it go to the show even if you have to postpone your wedding to do it.  You’ll regret it if you don’t (and if the wife doesn’t understand then she’s not the one for you!)

It must be even more difficult  to follow after Shakura’s set than it is to be followed by her so I didn’t envy Coco Montoya.  Maybe though because he isn’t a female vocalist with legs long as a giraffes neck he didn’t feel in competition. Instead he looked unphased, even nonchalant, as he picked up his left handed Fender and got stuck in to ‘Hey Senorita’.  He did have the odd Ace up his sleeve of course:  not everyone can say “Here’s one I did with John Mayall” as he introduced ‘Have You Heard’.  Montoya has come a long way since getting a gig with Albert Collins as a drummer in the 1970’s.

On the subject of drummers – resident Caravan drummer Denis Palatin is in fact now on his third Caravan Tour and still has the cheeky smile of a schoolboy who’s sneaked onstage to try out the drums during the break.  It’s a trick he keeps getting away with – probably because he’s one of the best drummers around.  I’d  heard too that Birmingham born bassist Roger Inniss was good and he was every bit as classy as last years Mike Griot.
As we’re the English-Network I should also give a mention to the keyboard player from London who worked for some time with the great Elkie Brooks – Johnny Dyke. Thanks for the chat about the english music scene Johnny. I will check out ‘The Hoax’ sometime!

If there was a fourth star on show this evening it would have to be Canadian guitarist Donna Grantis who had a gloriously raw rock touch to her sound but still keeping it blues.  She’s pretty talented all round – co-writing most of Shakura’s new CD and presenting her own fashion jewellery collection which is a clever concoction of bracelets and pendents fashioned out of guitar picks and used strings (I never saw that on Blue Peter!)

Many thanks to Thomas Ruf for another First Class evening.  The new Blues Caravan has only just started rolling, I recommend getting onboard as often as you can.

Popularity: 6% [?]

Concert Tip

A regular in Bonn, now music fans in Cologne can give their ears and eyes a treat. Ana Popovic is bringing her superb band to Cologne next week with a visit to Stadtgarten (Venloerstrasse) on 30 January.

Forget the ‘Female Jimi Hendrix’ tag, As Ana’s latest ‘Blind For Love’ CD shows, there’s only one Ana Popovic!

Doors Open 8.30pm
More details: STADTGARTEN

Popularity: 1% [?]

White Man Blues with Snowy White

He doesn’t have Rock Star attitude, he doesn’t have a great voice, and he barely scrapes in as a pop star courtesy of one 80’s chart hit.  His latest band, The Blues Project, shows however that there’s a lot to like about Snowy White – especially if you also like the Blues.

The only similarity between last weeks Harmonie show with Julian Sas and this week with Snowy White is that both had a bass player wearing a hat.  Where Julian was striking rock gestures and grimacing with every sweat drenched note, Snowy White stands motionless except for his nimble fingers that occasionally break from picking notes and hop over to flick the treble switch of his antique gold Gibson Les Paul.  Very occasionally he might, during a particularly emotive moment, squint his eyes closed.  When he solos he is most definitely THE MAN, but for the most part,  he is more the Circus Master handing over to his hand picked Project Band.

And a super band it is too with an excellent bass player and lead vocalist in Ruud Weber Jr, an excellent guitarist/vocalist in Matt Taylor and flamboyant (and also excellent!) drummer from White Flames Juan Van Emmerloot who today sports a furry Russian Hussar hat.  All Snowy has to do is sit back and play blues guitar – which is just how he (and we) like it most.

The material is, not surprisingly, mainly songs from the new ‘In Our Time of Living CD’.

A couple of older SW standards are also included in the form of ‘Old Grey Mare’ and Snowy’s own ‘Land of Plenty’ and there is also the new ‘Red Wine Blues’ all opportunities for Snowy himself to shine which he does, particularly with his delicate finger-picked soloing on the latter.

For the most part though it’s the band who take the spotlight and they would be worth seeing alone.  I particularly liked Ruud Weber’s vocal style.  Maybe it was the wide hat on his head, but he sounded Texan to me.  Cool, laid back and smiling.  Matt Taylor has brought some excellent songs to the band and provides a twin guitar attack (we’re talking blues here, you won’t find the likes of Lizzy’s ‘Emerald’ in a Snowy White repertoire!).

A highlight was the bands rendition of Skip James’ ‘I’m So Glad’ that saw the all too rare use of a cajon onstage by Juan Van Emmerloot who admittedly headed back to his drum kit for added oomph to close the number.  Everyone onstage was smiling, everyone I could see offstage too.  Should blues be music to smile to?  When it’s this good – yes it should!

Julian Sas’ bass player Tenny Tahamata had told me last Saturday how he’d enjoyed a recent show with Snowy.  Ana Popovic had referred to a recent ‘Symphony In Blues’ concert with “great musicians like Snowy White”.  There’s no doubt about the respect he has amongst musicians, and  great as the band were,  Snowy still blows everyone away with just a carefully phrased note in just the right place at just the right time.

By set end the band troop offstage.  Snowy gets halfway but comes back.  “At my age, going all the way outside just to come back.  I’m too old for that s**t!”. He smiles, picks up his gold Les Paul and picks out an exquisite solo.  It all looks so very easy, but don’t be fooled.  Phil Lynott, Peter Green and Pink Floyd all recognized a master craftsman at work  when they heard Snowy White – and so will you!

Popularity: 2% [?]

Julian Sas – Blues with a Feeling

Julian Sas was booked for next year before he even played a note on Saturday. The same went for last year and probably the previous year too. What makes hordes of Dutchmen (and no few Germans) head up the Autobahn to Bonn every year ? It’s not as if he has any hit singles to play or a glorious laser light show to wow the audience. Julian Sas just saunters onstage, plugs in his Gibson, and mesmerises.

“Playing live is the real deal. Living with the moment”. That’s how the gentle giant of a Dutchman describes that moment to an interviewer. “We’re a hard working band, trying to improve every night. That’s what people like about us”.

Sas’ words are something of an understatement. Calls of ‘Julian!’ and shouted requests for various favourites break out between practically every number. He could play until midnight and still not please everybody.

Julian does his best though. With a watershed time of 10.30pm he kicks off with no support at 8pm on the dot. This will be the bands last show this year he tells us, so they want to party. Last show in mid November? A lot of musicians would be envious of the time off, but Julian still has a day job. He wants it that way. Bass man Tenny Tahamata reckons they have done around fifty to sixty shows this year in variously sized venues – a highlight being a Blues evening with Snowy White amongst other top players. It could well be that the managable number of shows is a reason for the quality of each show – no-one gets jaded playing night after night. Whatever the reason, this band clearly enjoy playing. The smiles on their faces suggest that it’s great that we’ve come along to watch them but heck, they would have had a great time even without an audience. But, since we are here, as the man said – lets party!

Sas and drummer Rob Heijne seem to change expression with every note and every beat respectively. Just turn off the sound and watch those guys and you could ‘feel’ the music in their faces. Tenny Tahamata on bass is the opposite. When the groove really hits him he raises a straight leg onto the drum stand, smiles ever so slightly, then the leg comes down and the smile blinks off until the next emotional highpoint. ‘Mr Cool’ might be his name. Don’t be fooled though, just as Heijne could often be seen moving his various drum stands a millimetre to left or right, so Tahamata was prodigiously tweaking guitar and amp knobs. Sas himself, like a certain Mr Bonamassa, tended to change guitar every song. Like the aforementioned JB, it was always worth the wait too, especially for the down and dirty bottlekneck slide on his Gibson Firebird.

An excited, slightly inebriated, Dutchman next to me is shouting in my ear ‘Almost as good as Rory’ after Sas has played his traditional homage to Mr Gallagher by way of a blistering ”Take What I Want’. I nod in agreement, but think – “Rory is Rory, Jimi is Jimi and Julian is Julian. Scientists will hopefully never clone musicians”. At the same time though I can’t help wondering if Julian Sas stood on a stage somewhere the day after Rory’s passing and felt a little different when he played. Maybe the G man found a way to carry on doing what he loved after all.

We were promised some new songs during the evening but how can you play all the old favourites from ten CD’s and find space? A 12pm cut-off time would have helped just a little. Last week saw Anne Haigis play a blistering show that did more than squeeze the pips out of the curfew time.

Julian Sas had another, rather ingenious, game plan. Play something so special that you couldn’t follow it – so amazing that people would be walking around with open mouths for an hour afterwards. What do guitarists play when they want to impress? You guessed it – Hendrix.
So Julian Sas played ‘Hey Joe’ and we all went home happy. Okay, it actually wasn’t that simple. Julian conjured up the sort of moods and sounds that a certain Jimi H dug from the bottom of his own soul so long ago now. He took the song up, brought it down, and took it back up to the moon again. Jimi would have been satisfied to have played like that this evening. The lights went out, the applause eventually (several minutes later) died down, and along with everyone else present I headed home to the amusement of fellow bus passengers who wondered at the tongue hanging out of my wide open mouth. Next time I’ll wear a badge saying ‘I’ve just seen Julian Sas live onstage’.

N.B. Special thanks to Bernie Gelhausen and the ‘Mr Music’ Team for organizing Julian’s concerts each year. I’m sure the posters will be up in his City Centre Shop next week for Julian Sas 2010. Don’t miss it!

picture gallery:

Popularity: 4% [?]

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