(When told to make love to the mic, Jamie Lidell insisted on foreplay. And as we all know, there's nothing sexier than impersonating a trout. © 2008 Benjamin Luk.)
The turnout was surprisingly high at Richard's for a Sunday night, and opening DJ James Pants did a reasonable job of pulling people out onto the dance floor despite doing nothing more than throwing on miscellaneous golden oldies. It’s difficult to hate someone who appreciates decent music, but there’s still something to be said for originality. When he was finally done, and the house lights had gone up and then down again, the entire room was itching to dance. Knowing this, soul singer Jamie Lidell adroitly built up anticipation by allowing his four-piece band (guitar, drums, keyboard and sax) to casually saunter onstage before him. When he finally appeared, it was like a landmine going off.
The room erupted in cheers and right into “Another Day”, he had no problem opening up to us. Lidell swung and swayed like a Motown Elvis with Buddy Holly looks. Enlisting the crowd to sing falsetto backup for “Out of My System” and armed with what appeared to be a modified radar gun that worked like a shotgun mic, he recorded beats, chants from the crowd and saxophone arpeggios, and mutated them into ambient Powerbook techno-pop before us. An improvised scatting session slowly took shape, but it rapidly became a bore and went on for about five minutes longer than it should have. Coming back in on “The City” (from the days when Lidell was less funk and more fucked up on his 2005 album, Multiply) didn’t quite save the groove, but “Little Bit of Feel Good” did. Sounding as though Marvin Gaye were twenty years younger (and alive, for that matter), Lidell’s magnetic presence onstage and what seemed to be a palsy-influenced brand of twitch-and-clap dancing had every woman in the place ogling him with bedroom eyes. Continuing on the theme of Gaye Pride, “Green Light” may as well have been written by Marvin himself and the explosive finale of “Wait For Me” ended with Lidell thrashing around and losing his glasses in one last bout of foot-stomping mania.
This was Lidell’s first show on his North American tour. It can only multiply from here.
Jamie Lidell's Vancouver Set List:
This article will appear in the July 2008 issue of Discorder. Special thanks to Brock Thiessen and the other good people at Discorder who put up with my dumping these articles on ThatRockBlog.com so people can read about it while the world still cares.
To see more photos of Jamie Lidell rocking Richard's on Richards, hit up the archives here.
Coming soon: Pearce's review of Sam Roberts' new album Love at the End of the World!
The room erupted in cheers and right into “Another Day”, he had no problem opening up to us. Lidell swung and swayed like a Motown Elvis with Buddy Holly looks. Enlisting the crowd to sing falsetto backup for “Out of My System” and armed with what appeared to be a modified radar gun that worked like a shotgun mic, he recorded beats, chants from the crowd and saxophone arpeggios, and mutated them into ambient Powerbook techno-pop before us. An improvised scatting session slowly took shape, but it rapidly became a bore and went on for about five minutes longer than it should have. Coming back in on “The City” (from the days when Lidell was less funk and more fucked up on his 2005 album, Multiply) didn’t quite save the groove, but “Little Bit of Feel Good” did. Sounding as though Marvin Gaye were twenty years younger (and alive, for that matter), Lidell’s magnetic presence onstage and what seemed to be a palsy-influenced brand of twitch-and-clap dancing had every woman in the place ogling him with bedroom eyes. Continuing on the theme of Gaye Pride, “Green Light” may as well have been written by Marvin himself and the explosive finale of “Wait For Me” ended with Lidell thrashing around and losing his glasses in one last bout of foot-stomping mania.
This was Lidell’s first show on his North American tour. It can only multiply from here.
Jamie Lidell's Vancouver Set List:
- Another Day
- Figure Me Out
- Out of My System
- The City
- Little Bit of Feel Good
- Green Light
- Where'd You Go?
- Wait For Me
- Game For Fools*
- Multiply*
This article will appear in the July 2008 issue of Discorder. Special thanks to Brock Thiessen and the other good people at Discorder who put up with my dumping these articles on ThatRockBlog.com so people can read about it while the world still cares.
To see more photos of Jamie Lidell rocking Richard's on Richards, hit up the archives here.
Coming soon: Pearce's review of Sam Roberts' new album Love at the End of the World!
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