Lettuce 11/16/14 Bear Creek Music Festival @ Buffalo’s Ampitheater
Part 1 of 5:Evil Wu, Unknown intro > Madison Square, By Any Shmeeans Necessary > Expensive Shit [Fela Kuti cover with bassline from Asiko by Tony Allen] > Shmeeans
Lettuce 11/16/14 Bear Creek Music Festival @ Buffalo’s Ampitheater
Part 2 of 5: The Dump (with Nicholas Payton), Last Suppit, Mr. Yancey
Lettuce 11/16/14 Bear Creek Music Festival @ Buffalo’s Ampitheater
Part 3 of 5: Do Your Thing [Isaac Hayes cover](with Alecia Chakour), The Sun (with Alecia Chakour), For My Friend [Bill Withers cover] (with Alecia Chakour & Nigel Hall), Bowler
Lettuce 11/16/14 Bear Creek Music Festival @ Buffalo’s Ampitheater
Part 4 of 5: A Message From The Meters [The Meters cover](with George Porter Jr & Khris Royal)
Lettuce 11/16/14 Bear Creek Music Festival @ Buffalo’s Ampitheater
Part 5 of 5: Encore: Move On Up [Curtis Mayfield cover] (with Nigel Hall, Brandon “Taz” Niederauer & Khris Royal)
Lettuce 11/15/14 Bear Creek Music Festival @ Purple Hat Stage
Part 1 of 2: Big Anthem, Salute, Yakatori, Fly
Lettuce 11/15/14 Bear Creek Music Festival @ Purple Hat Stage
Part 2 of 2: Lettsanity, Phyllis, Don’t Be Afraid To Try (with Alecia Chakour), He Made A Woman Out Of Me [Bobbie Gentry cover] (with Alecia Chakour), The Love You Left Behind [Syl Johnson cover] (with Alecia Chakour), Monorail 3000 > Blast Off
Medeski Martin & Wood brought their 20th Anniversary Tour to Chicago’s Park West last Friday, November 4th. To celebrate 20 years, the band has been playing a first set of fan requests, and calling the second set a “shack party” full of spontaneous improvisations.
SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEOS
For the first set, the band opened with the super rare tune Shack from Friday Afternoon In The Universe (a tune that hasn’t been played live since 2003!), which segued into a super charged Pappy Check (my request) that included an illyB drum solo before a funky bridge section that only MMW could pull off.
Next was an oldie that tends to get played pretty often, Dracula, which I thought brought the energy down. But, hey, I don’t question these players. Next up, John brought the energy level way up by tearing into his Wurlitzer electric piano on I Wanna Ride You, somehow making it look effortless to play like he does.
I was surprised to find that another one of my requests made the cut, Toy Dancing. Not played live since 2006, this version was somewhat exploratory and expansive. At this point, something happened that I’ve noticed frequently in MMW sets: John looks up about 3/4ths of the way into the set and realizes that he hasn’t touched the acoustic piano yet, so he sits down and goes to town for over 6 minutes. By the time Billy & Chris reel John back in, the tune ends up over 12 minutes long.
Lastly, they closed the first set with the perennial crowd favorite, Bubblehouse. Bubblehouse was played at every show on the first leg of their 20th Anniversary Tour back in March and so far has been played at every show on this leg of the tour. After years of fans screaming for the song and years of the band neglecting to play it, perhaps out of spite, MMW decided to give the crowd exactly what they asked for: BUBBLEHOUSE!
SET TWO: Improv, Moanin’, Improv
ENCORE: Night Marchers
You can watch set two right here, although I cut off the first 15 minutes of improvisation, as it wasn’t very inspired. This video includes the second 15 minutes of improv, the Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers / Bobby Timmons cover, Moanin’, the next 23 minute improv (including a dubby section with John on melodica, as well as another short illyB drum solo), and the encore, Night Marchers.
Parts of the video are shot with a second camera (actually my iPhone 4) from up front and the audio was recorded by taperjoe with Sennheiser E914 condenser mics (audio download available here). Stream this baby to your HD TV, pop some popcorn (or gather whatever other party favors you choose to partake in), sit back, and enjoy 52 minutes of MMW in awesome HD quality.
If you’re looking for more tasty Chris Wood bass playing, check out these videos of The Wood Brothers I shot this summer at Headliners in Louisville, KY on June 2, 2011.
Before I hit the road to my first Bear Creek Music Festival, I have to unleash my videos of Dr. Klaw on the Creole Queen Riverboat during New Orleans Jazz Fest 2011. The full video is on youtube in six parts, listed below. I recommend watching in HD in 1080p or 720p. Also, if you are so inclined, the DVD is available to download at The Trader’s Den.
I’ve posted about Dr. Klawbefore. For those that don’t know, Dr. Klaw is a supergroup featuring Nick Daniels III and Ian Neville (both of Dumpstaphunk), along with Adam Deitch, Eric Krasno & Nigel Hall (of Lettuce, Soulive, Chapter Two, etc.). Basically, Dr. Klaw is a special conglomeration that only plays shows at Jazz Fest and Bear Creek (and sometimes Jam Cruise). Word is that they’ve been in the studio and will be releasing their new album at Bear Creek next week.
This video documents their only performance this year (until Bear Creek next weekend), and features several original tunes, as well as two Parliament covers that feature The Shady Horns (Ryan Zoidis, Sam Kinninger, & Rashawn Ross). The video was shot from right up front (because there really was no other way to see the band considering that the stage was only a few inches tall) with a Canon Vixia HF21 video camera and a Sony ECM-MS908C stereo mic. The audio is raw, dominated by Deitch’s cymbals and rim shots, but is still very listenable compared to the quality of most of the stuff you find on youtube. Enjoy, spread the word, and I’ll see you after what is sure to be an incredible Bear Creek Music Festival weekend!
Dr. Klaw – Part 1 of 6 – Beef, I Believe It:
Dr. Klaw – Part 2 of 6 – I Believe It (cont.), God Made Me Funky:
Dr. Klaw – Part 3 of 6 – Dr. Funkenstein, Do That Stuff:
Dr. Klaw – Part 4 of 6 – Do That Stuff (cont.), Rat Race:
Dr. Klaw – Part 5 of 6 – Lost Rager:
Dr. Klaw – Part 6 of 6 – Leave Me Alone:
Kirk Joseph’s 504 Brass Band w/ Steven Bernstein – Treme Theme Song:
