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Jeff Beck's expressive guitar bends musical lines CONCERT REVIEW Wednesday, March 24, 1999 By John Young
Some musicians are such geniuses that they practically invent their own musical language. Cecil Taylor and Eugene Chadbourne are such singular composers and performers - and both have been doomed to relative obscurity.
Almost as inventive, guitarist Jeff Beck boldly perverts the rules of rock and jazz with instrumental shows that play to packed concert halls.
If Beck hasn't created a new form of music, he has at least developed a distinctive instrumental voice based on jaw-dropping fingerwork and odd recombinations of disparate musical styles.
Somehow, in the process, Beck has maintained a major label affiliation and a loyal, supportive following.
Dressed in black and slinging his signature cream-colored Stratocasters, Beck didn't put on much of a visual show at the A.J. Palumbo Center last night.
A screen behind his band simply featured a road and splashes of colored lights. Beck rarely grimaced or spun his ax dramatically around his neck, preferring to walk slowly about while gazing down at his own fleet hands.
Beck didn't say much, either. He'd reeled off 10 songs before offering a perfunctory, "How ya doin'?" Ten seconds of cheering later, he leaped wordlessly into the next tune.
What kept concertgoers enthralled was Beck's shocking virtuosity on guitar. On "Brush With the Blues," Beck soloed with nearly rude exuberance, his Strat sounding, in turn, like belches, backfiring cars, a sci-fi movie computer and hoarse shouts.
Most amazingly, all that racket made sense. Rather than coming off as the histrionics of a show-off, the solo shone with a queer, purposeful beauty.
Covering the Beatles' "A Day in the Life," Beck proved he could play melodically and inventively. You could almost sing along to Beck's lead lines, even as he turned McCartney's jaunty middle eight into a fuzzed-out stomp. Instead of ending on a resounding piano chord, Beck faded the song into warm, sustained feedback.
Playing far less complicated blues-based acoustic tunes, Paul Thorn opened the show solo. Song titles like "I'm Gonna Go to Viagra Before It Falls" and "Joanie, the Jehovah's Witness Stripper" tell the tale of the affable, entertaining and decidedly lightweight Thorn.
While he occasionally planted his tongue in his cheek, Beck wasn't playing for laughs.
From the techno-fusion racket of "What Mama Said" to the wild harmonies of "Psycho-Sam" to art funk to complicated balladry and back again, Beck set out to prove he could play any style of music and make it sound new.
Some fans would still dearly love it if Beck returned to his days making flat-out rock records with the Yardbirds or Rod Stewart. Judging by the ecstatic, serious reactions of listeners last night, though, Beck has plenty of support for continuing down his thorny, unconventional musical path.
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