G. Love & Special Sauce Turn Up the Heat
April 25 -- BOSTON — It might have taken the MC two or three attempts at crowd-rousing introductions before G. Love & Special Sauce took the stage of the Avalon Ballroom last night — but once on board, it was like the Philly trio, which formed in Boston in the early '90s, had never left.
Despite that delay — and though this was the first show of G. Love & Special Sauce's world tour to promote their fifth album, The Electric Mile (also released yesterday) — no nerves or hiccups were apparent. Singer, guitarist, and harp blower G. Love (real name Garrett Dutton) led his bandmates and an offstage bongo-percussion player for a vibrant hour-and-a-half set of new and old material.
Less funky than those on 1999's Philadelphonic, new songs like the country shuffle "Sarah's Song," the edgier rock boogie of "Electric Mile," and the reggae splashed "Unified," displayed the band's still-skewed musical vision. But, gently slipped in among old favorites such as the sensual "Sweet Sugar Mama," which dates back to 1995's Coast to Coast Motel, new and old were blended with ease.
In its straightforward set, the band created wonderful music that was almost psychedelic, and certainly hypnotic in its graceful, organic, flowing ease. G. Love & Special Sauce are now less a novelty than in their early days, having perfected their idiosyncratic blend of blues, R&B, jazz, rock, and hip-hop — originally dubbed by G. Love as "ragmop" — into a gorgeous, sultry, swampy blend.
The trio grooved jam-band style, but the set came without any extraneous noodling or soloing — apart from sticks man Jeffrey Clemens' little drum-solo workout. And, unlike many jam bands, G. Love & Special Sauce didn't rely on funk for their base and jazz for their tricks. Playing a mighty looking, old upright bass, Jimmy "Jazz" Prescott occasionally gave glimpses of how he gained his nickname, but apart from one or two passages of feisty avant-jazz plucking and plinking, he stuck to adding resounding washes of deep, flowing notes.
Trending Reader Picks
ABC News Live