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A picturesque late fall evening’s cool air greeted us we hustled through Atlanta’s Historic 5 Points to the Variety Playhouse. Inside the jam-packed venue, an eclectic and diverse crowd’s collective pulse raced in anticipation for their Hasidic hero to storm the stage. As the lights went down and the first strains of musical notes swirled from the large mounted box speakers, the crowd patiently awaited Matisyahu to emerge from behind the curtain.
Once he hit the stage an instantaneous electricity filled the room and sparked the delight of its patrons. Long and lean of stature, Matisyahu gyrates and grooves to his band and then steps to the mike. He sings/croons/toasts/preaches/raps/beat-boxes to the razor sharp music as his band courses seamlessly through his repertoire. He seems at equal ease singing from a praise hymnal or toasting with his Eek-A-Mouse-sounding vocal delivery or his other worldly beat-boxing. At points in the show it’s as if his voice is a gold coin, locked away in a velvet box, at other points it’s right there with you, front and center. He can be forceful with an urgent message or quiet and dreamy-and you believe him because it’s convincing and authoritative.
The first set was filled with music from Matis’ upcoming album, Light, as well as other favorites, such as the opener, See To Sea and was generally a more mellow showcase and a yin to the yang of the second set. The undeniably explosive second set opened with a Close My Eyes that propelled the band through the more upbeat and funky repertoire.
“You got no water-how you gonna survive?”
Matisyahu’s band is locked in and tight. They would be an amazing band without Matisyahu’s considerable talent. Guitarist Aaron Dugan’s quick, adept and prodigious fret work is prominently displayed throughout the show as well as Rob Marscher’s tasteful and dramatic synth and keyboard work.
READ ON for more from Matisyahu at Atlanta’s Variety Playhouse…
Sometime in the last two years—there’s no exact date, but the shows that birthed Live at Tonic
[All Photos by Jeremy Gordon]
In his Benevento trio shows, which have one and soon two-full length albums from which to draw a panorama of core material, Benevento’s main focus is piano. There is, of course, the requisite sampling of other keyboard effects and toys for good measure, but the emphasis isn’t on creating an effects-driven soundscape so much as it is song-based: wrapping piano improvisation around a core melody and milking that melody for endless possibilities.
If there was anything discouraging about Benevento’s headlining set at Drom on Saturday, it was brevity: the whole thing was over and done with in a swift, encore-less hour-and-twenty. It wasn’t the band’s fault (Marco’s publicist, Kevin Calabro of Hyena Records, advises Hidden Track the band was originally told it could play at least another half hour, til 11:30 p.m., then was swiftly denied an encore right at 11 as Drom turned into a dance club). But it left little time to savor what Benevento, Jon Fishman and Reid Mathis had cooked up so much as absorb it like a laser beam to the head: tight and sinewy jams passing in blurs, and dazzling virtuosity to spare.
READ ON for more of Chad’s thoughts and Jeremy’s photos…
