By: Joe Lang
For once in my life, allmusic.com steered me wrong. The lede on the The Yellowjackets’ biography starts, “Although sometimes grouped with Spyro Gyra….” The band’s styles, according to the site, are fusion, crossover-jazz and smooth-jazz. My reaction: smooth-jazz! Fuck that shit, I’m out. Sorry to any Kenny G. fans (actually I’m not, Kenny G. sucks), but when I hear the term smooth-jazz, I recoil in horror at the thought of homogenized inoffensive, uninspired elevator music for the masses. As Pat Metheny would describe it, “lame-ass, jive, pseudo bluesy, out-of-tune, noodling, wimped out, fucked up playing,” that (in the words of Scott Henderson) “has gotta’ be the most humiliating way to make a living. Why not chop your balls off?”
So it should be evident that I avoided the band. That is, until some time ago when a buddy of mine—who had turned me on to all sorts of great music—said, “The Yellowjackets? They’re badass. Bob Mintzer, man. Cat played with Jaco.” I did recognize Mintzer’s name from the Jaco Pastorius autobiography I read last summer. After looking into it a little closer, I realized Mintzer wasn’t just Jaco’s main man in his Word of Mouth band, but he’d played with Buddy Rich, Steve Winwood and Thad Jones, among others.
I got a copy of the Yellowjackets’ 2003 album Time Squared and was pleasantly surprised. I heard a laid-back, groove-oriented, fusion band, not some overproduced noodling—the cats could obviously play.
And it was that band who took the stage on Monday at the Dakota. And throughout the concert, it wasn’t just Mintzer who impressed. Bassist Jimmy Haslip (who played left handed and with his strings reversed) got some of the best sounds out of an SWR bass rig I’ve ever heard all up and down the neck. Marcus Baylor’s funky kept the pocket and still managed to burn. And it was Russel Ferrante’s unison keyboard/piano that textured the music.
Throughout the set, the band played songs from their 25-year career. During the set, the quartet displayed earthy melodies similar to the Flecktones—dark bluesy syncopated rhythms and tender ballads. Each song seemed to focus on one of the band member’s strengths. On the band’s new tune “Ah Ha,” Ferrante’s dark keyboard rhythms laid down a brooding groove to solo over. At one point, Mintzer picked up an electric sax and the band ripped through a breakneck bluegrass piece. On one of the band’s signature pieces, “Geraldine,” Mintzer played slow soulful runs over Ferrante’s piano. And on the “epic” (as Mintzer called it) “Sea Folk” off of the Time Squared album, Baylor, looking like an intense little kid with his jeans rolled up and forceful drum blows that crashed down from above his head, played an incredibly funky and searing solo. Thankfully, in between were peppered Haslip’s soulful, building solos.
So are the Yellowjackets smooth jazz? Well, they’re smooth in the sense that petroleum is. That is, smooth, but highly combustible.
Location Info:
Dakota Jazz Club
Artist Info: The Yellowjackets
Share this story:
Article comments powered by Disqus