The fourth annual Levitate Music & Arts Festival went off without a hitch at the Fairgrounds in Marshfield Mass, a small seaside south of Boston, a few miles from where Susan Tedeschi grew up. Tedeschi Trucks Band topped a bill that included Los Lobos, North Mississippi Allstars, Lettuce and Twiddle and ensuring that the festival sold out its 10,000 ticket allotment before the gates had opened. The event has grown each year and as a result, the 2016 incarnation hosted multiple stages and took up a larger plot of land.
An early highlight was a performance by Nahko & Medicine For The People who showcased a fierce genre-blending sound that felt just as Michael Franti as it did Damien Marley, and accordingly, had a powerful sociopolitical message. The lead guitarist exclusively played on a 12-string and made the thing wale. Most folks playing an acoustic 12-string are going for a folky sound and you’ll also hear players like George Harrison and Tom Petty who’ve utilized 12-string electrics for a shimmering tone but NMFTP’s guitarist was handling his acoustic like you’d expect to see Pearl Jam’s Mike McCready wield a Fender. These guys clearly put a lot of hard work into effective on-stage communication, but without their natural chemistry, it would be for nothing. If any act on the lower half of the bill deserved to be near the top, Nahko & Medicine For The People were it.
The event drew a young crowd who turned out strong for Lettuce, the Boston-bred funk act featuring All-World drummer Adam Deitch and Soulive frontman Erik Krasno on guitar. Unfortunately, neither of the groups regular guitarists were on hand for the gig and that wasn’t even their biggest problem. The set was cursed with technical problems from the get go. With horn players talking to techs in the middle of songs, various members gesturing for louder or lower levels throughout the set and even sound checking between songs (“Levitate, Levitate, Levitate, Levitate, Levitate”). Keyboardist Nigel Hall looked visibly frustrated and for a technically fight funk outfit, the tech issues hampered their mojo. This is an enthusiastic band, but nobody on stage looked all that stoked with the way things were going. Their fans had a blast and danced their hearts out but if you were to ask anyone in the band, it’s doubtful they would tell you their Levitate debut was a career highlight.
Rebelution was the last band to take the stage before the headliners and they didn’t make things easy on the act to follow. The modern roots/reggae outfit had their crowd worked up before the end of the first song and kept the energy going for the remainder of the set. The performance was bare bones, they’re not an act that has a wardrobe or any kind of noteworthy production but like Sublime, an act whose influence cannot be credited enough, Rebelution let the rap/rock/reggae do speak for itself.
Susan Tedeschi has a voice that can do practically anything and her Berklee College of Music-bred guitar chops make her a uniquely multifaceted performer. But as far as guitar playing goes, her husband Derek is arguably one of the greatest living guitarists, known for a sound that’s just as Delta Blues as it is Classical Indian Raga. Trucks’ sound can be recognized within a single note being played and was easily the most talented artist who performed. According to his uncle, Butch Trucks, founding member of The Allman Brothers Band, Eric Clapton loves Derek like a son but following a European tour where the DT played sidekick to Slowhand, Clapton won’t perform with him anymore because he doesn’t like being upstaged.
For as skilled as the husband/wife duo are, what makes TTB such a spectacle is how they flesh out the rest of the ensemble. Two drummers, bass, keys, a three-person horn section and both male and female backup singers ensure that this act can nail any song in their own catalogue, or pretty much anyone’s for that matter.
After a long, unseasonably chilly day, the highlight of the event turned out to be the very last song of the night. Artists are known to bring the heat when their loved ones are in the house and it seemed like the entire Tedeschi Tribe was on hand. Backstage, there seemed to be a dozen different women who could be confused with Susan Tedeschi and a few moments before her set, she met with a whole group of kids who seemed to have been nieces, nephews and the children of cousins and friends. She told the crowd her mother, father and grandmother were on hand and made a point of dedicating George Jones’ “Color of the Blues” to her late grandfather. After a brief encore break, the band returned to the stage as keyboardist Kofi Burbridge kicked into a slow, droning organ drawl. It was hard to place what was coming but Derek Trucks broke the calm with a some hard bent notes that felt like a warplane violently breaking the calm in the sky as TTB began their own take on Joe Cocker’s rendition of “With A Little Help From My Friends.” It was the kind of moment that took things from zero to one hundred in a matter of seconds.
Levitate 2016 went off without a hitch and in light of their expansion that’s not always the case. Plenty of successful events sign their own death warrant by expanding either too fast or in the wrong direction. Every year Levitate seems to make the event bigger and better while staying true to their roots and they’ve yet to become victims of their own success. All the more reason to have Levitate 2017 on your festival radar.
