Isaac Hayes’ performance at a crowded Ravinia on Friday didn’t get off to a promising start. The veteran soul man, sporting his trademark shaved head and dark sunglasses, initially appeared uninterested in the proceedings.
It didn’t help that the singer’s 10-piece band was centered on a trio of keyboards, the tinny instruments proving a poor stand-in for the music’s brass and string flourishes. Fortunately Hayes’ rich-as-coffee voice, unaffected by a 2006 stroke, resonated as strongly as it did in the singer’s heyday.
Hayes finally perked up as the band locked into the swirling, psychedelic funk of “Walk On By” midway through the 75-minute set. The tune, with its fuzzed-out guitar and airy “bum, bum” backing vocals, stretched on for more than 10 minutes, even incorporating a lively jam session between dueling percussionists. “Soul Man,” followed, taking on deeper meaning for the still-recovering 65-year-old. “Got what I got the hard way,” he bellowed. “And I’ll make it better / Each and every day.”
The singer’s struggles were evident in his measured movements as he rose from his keyboard to conduct the band during a set-closing “Theme From ‘Shaft.'” But his frailty melted away once the musicians locked into the familiar high-hat groove, as if Hayes were determined to prove he was still one bad mother … (shut your mouth!).
Roberta Flack’s opening set occasionally veered too far into schmaltz (the saxophone solo on “Oasis” was particularly galling), but the singer was in fine voice throughout. She practically purred on a slow, sensual “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow” and delivered “Killing Me Softly” like a starry-eyed teenager lost in the throes of first love.
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— Andy Downing, Special to the Tribune
Phil Lesh & Friends with Levon Helm
Summer and the Grateful Dead is a union that endured for four decades — plus 13 years of solo projects and reunions after the group disbanded. Phil Lesh, a founding member and the band’s bassist, is leading this season’s installment on a tour that played the Charter One Pavilion on Northerly Island on Friday.
Unlike Ratdog, the blues-oriented combo fronted by Dead veteran Bob Weir, Lesh’s post-Dead outfit is tailored more like the ensemble that defined his former band. Throughout the three-hour set, Lesh, 68, contributed vocals but made his mark with beefy bass runs that gave the music volatility and strength.
With lamented Dead principal Jerry Garcia represented by a plush likeness set atop the organ, the lead vocals were given to Jackie Greene, a 27-year-old guitarist who, despite his baby face, is the most refreshing player of recent memory to be handed the Dead songbook. Greene sang with an authority matched by his guitar that he frequently used to confront and trade steely solos with multi-instrumentalist Larry Campbell, a longtime Bob Dylan sideman. While Lesh’s previous collectives suffered from atonal vamps and too many notes, on reprisals like “Viola Street Blues,” Greene and Campbell forced the song to matter more than the clatter.
Opening with a 70-minute set was Levon Helm, the drummer-singer of The Band who is enjoying a revival of sorts after years battling throat cancer and financial straits. A Grammy win this year for best traditional folk album returned him to the road where, at 68, he is in the same role he’s always played: bandleader, timekeeper and Southern gentleman.
A bit wearier but still infused with deep country soul, his remains one of the most affecting voices in rock history. The group ended with “The Weight,” a song, that like everything that night, had years on it but sounded feisty and glad to be there.
— Mark Guarino, Special to the Tribune
Swervedriver
It was hard to tell that roughly 10 years have passed since Swervedriver last graced Metro’s stage. Sure, the band looked more mature — gone are singer/guitarist Adam Franklin’s trademark dreadlocks — and so did the audience, mainly composed of Gen Xers, but Swervedriver sounded as fresh as it did back in the day. And with the recent new crop of shoegazer bands influenced by the group, not to mention fellow former labelmates My Bloody Valentine’s recent reunion, Swervedriver’s re-formation seems as well timed as it is relevant.
The British group spanned material from its decade-long studio output. Leading with the thunderous “Sci-Flyer” and the psychedelic meltdown of “Sandblasted,” Swervedriver set the cacophonous tone. Franklin showed restraint during “Scrawl and Scream” before letting loose on his guitar, melding with guitarist Jimmy Hartridge’s countermelodies and the bottom-heavy dirge of bassist Steve George. Drummer Jez Hindmarsh led the charge for its slow-to-revved-up, ever-evolving syncopation.
Its classics “Duel” and the blistering “Rave Down” were crowd favorites, as was the epic “Duress.” Through its 17-song set, Swervedriver demonstrated it still has a lot of mileage left.
— Althea Legaspi, Special to the Tribune
Billy Bragg
Billy Bragg was in rare form at a sold-out Park West on Saturday night, but that’s not to say the British singer was any better than he usually is (which is very good). Rather, performers like Bragg are rare in the literal sense: So few are quite like him.
For 25 years, Bragg has pledged allegiance to the agenda of lefty folk rabble-rousers such as Woody Guthrie, but his sets owe just as much to punk acts such as the Clash. His songs are explicitly political but rarely strident, and though he rails against inequality and fascism, he’s also quite funny. With the power of his words and just his guitar as accompaniment, the atypically optimistic Bragg delivers this whole package with such conviction and enthusiasm that afterward audiences often seem ready to take up placards themselves and hit the streets.
No doubt there’s an element of preaching to the converted that pervades any Bragg set, but the man shouldn’t be faulted for knowing his fans. Whether blatantly addressing current political ills with “O Freedom” and “Sing Their Souls Back Home” (both from his latest album, “Mr. Love and Justice”), or playing such tried and true classics as “A New England” and “Waiting for the Great Leap Forward,” Bragg gave the sympathetic crowd just what they wanted: protest and poetry, punctuated by several inspiring stump speeches.
If, as Bragg suggests, we’re all in the same boat, one could sense his excitement that, for the first time in ages, the tide might finally be turning his way.
— Joshua Klein, Special to the Tribune