T-Bone Kelly is a talented American in town who has got the work life balance just right, during the day he creates an atmosphere of inspiration for his students in his lectures as professor of psychology at the University and at night as leader of the classy, emotionally driven, powerful T-Bone Kelly Band. The songs are a good mix of new material and classic covers from the Rolling Stones, Muddy Waters, ZZ Top and Rory Gallagher.
T- Bone Kelly has accumulated a wealth of musical experiences in his travels and this Irish project of his is clearly a labour of love with some very talented local
musicians, John Nugent (Drums), Martin O Keeffe (Bass) and Phil Baker (Co-Lead
Guitarist) making a welcome return to the live scene on guitar in absolutely fine
form after a ten year absence.
They launched into the high energy set with some modern Texas blues in ZZ Tops Tush the appropriate mating call of the young man on the town on a Saturday night with T-Bone and Phil trading sizzling guitar runs between them.
“I been bad, I been good
Dublin,Texas,Hollywood
I ain’t asking for much
I said Lord, take me downtown
I’m just looking for some tush.”
The wonderful blend of raunchy humour and sexual innuendo had the upbeat Bleu Note audience captured immediately followed by another key influence in the tough, melodic T- Bone Kelly sound Honky Tonk Woman by The Rolling Stones showcasing T-Bone on blues harp.
Part of the appeal for me in the relaxing ambiance of the Bleu Note is their collection of imported beers on offer and there is nothing tastier to complement a bottle of Tyskie Polish 5.7% beer with its 17th century light relatively strong recipe, than a bouncy and invigorating version of Screaming Jay Hawkins’s I Put A Spell On You, indelibly inoculated into my consciousness the first time I put the needle down on Creedence Clearwater Revival’s version in the jukebox in Fat Freddie’s Chipper back in ‘69.
The T-Bone Kelly Band’s frisky unpretentious approach to the arrangements has a vibrant likable energy and bounce and works well especially on uncluttered covers live No Expectations from Beggars Banquet the Brian Jones and Bill Wyman era Rolling Stones 1968 LP.
“Take me to the station
And put me on a train
I’ve got no expectations
To pass through here again”
Phil Baker found the magic in the moment with his tribute to Rory Gallagher doing an impeccable version of the Irish Tour ’74 Muddy Water’s tune I Wonder Who playing bottleneck with a full sized beer bottle.
“I wonder who?
Goin to be your sweet man when I’m gone”
T- Bone cruised up to the end of the first half nailing the groove with Green Onion style riffing and classic Chicago and Texas blues matching his guitar skill with some rack held blues harp and raw rollicking boogie somewhere in a vibe reminiscent of The Allman Brothers, Smoking Joe Kubeck & Bnois King or Buddy Guy.
“You got to help me, baby
I can’t do it all by myself
You got to help me, baby
I can’t do it all by myself
If you don’t help me baby
Gonna find somebody else “
After a short break there were ample portions of more classic covers like Unchain My Heart, Are You Ready,Bring It On Home To Me and originals like Indigenous Tuna showing a band with authority never letting the pace or fretwork slip below the funky hot n taste on the radar screen.
The energy and excitement on the stage pretty soon became the pulse of the party, my favourite type of cross pollination filling the front of the stage in the Bleu Note with sensuality and patterns of interactive unabashed celebration and in the moment Saturday night fever.
There is a humorist theme in the air at a T-Bone Kelly performance which makes a nice desert for the southern fried boogie cultivating bridges of empathy in the rapier like wit of tunes like Down Drinking At The Bar by Louden Wainwright 111 where the obscene is poetically combined with the pristine.
T-Bone Kelly has put together a local band of crack musicians with a road house heart and plenty of musical muscle, capturing the essence of a song like ZZ Top’s Jesus Left Chicago demonstrating the concise punchy delivery and ZZ’s wacky sense of humour.
“Took a jump through Mississippi
Well muddy waters turned to wine
Then out to California
Through the forests and the pines
Ah take me with you Jesus”
The classic chemistry of T-Bone’s Gibson guitar and Phil Baker’s customised Squire Fender Strat copy was as near to perfection especially when they combined legs and arms to play with each others fret boards.
Just as a matter of interest for one to have the true tonal attributes of the classic Gibson and Fender combined in one instrument you would have to take the hard wood from a neglected garden on Mount Diablo not to far from Alamo, California, cut and steep it in a vat of bikers urine for five long years in a workshop behind the best little Bordello in Paris Texas and finally polish the atomic free radical sun dried overblown massive blues tone molecules with a blarney stone in the Arizona desert close to where they made the TV western Have Gun Will Travel.
In the meantime you can capture the essential magic of it all at a T-Bone Kelly Band gig in the Bleu Note on the corner of Parnell & Capel Street where the music is consistently alive and kicking and keeping Saturday night live and exquisitely wonderful as captured in poetry by George William Russell one hundred years ago or so to the night.
“Ah, no the wizardry is over
The magic flame
That might have melted all in beauty fades as it came
The stars are far and faint and strange
The night draws down
Exiled from light, forlorn,
I walk inDublinTown”
