Terminal 5 upcoming shows
The Royal Family Ball featuring
Soulive
Lettuce ft. John Scofield / Questlove (DJ Set) / Nigel Hall and special guests Talib Kweli, Big Sam & Christian Scott
A limited number of VIP "Rager" passes are available and include a commemorative "Rager" tour laminate, a meet & greet with the band following soundcheck, access to a VIP viewing area, a signed poster and a download code containing tapes of the show.- Venue:
-
Terminal 5
- Date:
- Sat 10/02
- Notes:
- all ages
- Doors: 6:30 PM / Show: 7:30 PM
- $25 advance / $30 day of show, $75 VIP "Rager" Pass
- Soulive
- official website
- myspace
- Just like keyboardist Neal Evans’ two hands—simultaneously pumping out the low end and reaching for those oscillating high notes—organ trio Soulive has spent the last decade balancing a reverence for the past with a conviction to push music into its own funky future.
When brothers Neal and Alan Evans first invited guitarist Eric Krasno to get down at their Woodstock, NY studio (a session that led to the trio’s break-out record Get Down! in 1999), it was out of mutual love for the great soul-jazz organ trios of the ’60s and ’70s (Jimmy Smith, Groove Holmes, Brother Jack McDuff). Now, a decade into the band’s career, which has seen forays into hip-hop, reggae, R&B, blues, rock and soul, eras featuring horns and a vocalist, and collaborations with artists as diverse as Derek Trucks, Joshua Redman, Robert Randolph and Talib Kweli, it was another shared love that brought the trio to drummer Alan’s Playonbrother Studio to record their latest, Rubber Soulive.
“We’ve always been big Beatles fans,” says Krasno, who had been working on an arrangement of “Get Back” for his recent solo record Reminisce when all those remastered Beatles records came out last year. The stuff was on heavy rotation in the van when the band found itself with four days off mid-tour. For Halloween, they’d made a crazy show at the DC zoo even crazier by trying out an all-Beatles set and decided the material was so fun it had to be put to wax. “We thought about doing all of Rubber Soul,” Krasno says, “but that band has so many great tunes. We picked the ones that lent themselves well to our sound, and others where we could add the Soulive flavor.”
The first two cuts, “Drive My Car” and “Tax Man” sound like they were written for the group, deep-pocket grooves featuring dirty drum parts and Krasno’s buttery guitar leads. The process, Krasno says, was pretty spontaneous. The band would consult the song’s lyric sheet to get the feel right and then track the whole thing live for that up-in-your-grill energy. “Something” and “In My Life” are deft instrumental interpretations of the sentimental balladry Lennon, McCartney and Harrison were famous for penning.
“Eleanor Rigby” is the big surprise though, with Alan pushing charging syncopation into the backbeat and Neal covering a full string section with his two hands.
Handling most of the melodies on guitar, Krasno’s all over the record, but he tears the whole thing open on tracks like “I Want You (She’s So Heavy)” and, naturally, “While My Guitar Gently Weeps.” Covered in what Krasno calls the “great crunchy, dirty sound” of Alan’s digital/analog studio, Rubber Soulive takes its place in a lineage of funky Beatles tributes, including those by George Benson and Booker T. and the M.G.’s.
Following last year’s Up Here, Rubber Soulive finds the band pushing on with its original trio formula. After 2006’s No Place Like Soul, which saw the addition of vocalist Toussaint Yeshua, Soulive decided to scale it back again and focus on the trio. This doesn’t mean, though, (to paraphrase Ringo) that the three don’t still get high with a little help from their friends. Their new artist run label Royal Family Records is home to plenty of the band’s longtime coconspirators like the Shady Horns (Sam Kininger and Ryan Zoidis) and Nigel Hall, and all the Soulive side projects, including Lettuce, Fyre Dept, Chapter 2, and Adam Deitch’s Break Science.
Creating Royal Family Records was like coming home for the band, who has spent years jumping from one legendary label to the next. On the heels of 1999’s Turn It Out, Soulive was signed by Bruce Lundvall to esteemed jazz label Blue Note Records, where they took their place in a legacy that includes Miles Davis, John Coltrane and Wayne Shorter. Doin’ Something and Next followed, featuring collaborations with Fred Wesley, Dave Matthews and Black Thought. Jazz heavyweight, Concord Records nurtured the band’s love of R&B with 2005’s Break Out, a record that found the band backing soul legends Chaka Khan and Ivan Neville. And when celebrated Memphis soul label Stax Records (Isaac Hayes, Otis Redding, Sam and Dave) decided to get back in the game in 2007, Soulive was the first band they signed. Now, with Royal Family, Soulive has been as prolific as ever, releasing Live In San Francisco last fall and Live at the Blue Note Tokyo this spring.
One decade young, Soulive is not a band to look backward, but when they do they look way back. With a quiver full of Beatles tunes and the lineup that put them on the forefront of the soul jazz revival, Soulive is grooving harder than ever. And with a fall tour on the horizon, it looks like things are starting to, ahem, “Come Together” right now all over again.
- Lettuce
- official website
- myspace
- Lettuce, the seven-person all-star collective originally formed in 1992, returns to the funk jazz forefront with its third album, RAGE!, a hyper-charged outing of tunes that are equal parts artsy and party. The CD is a tantalizing tribute to funk music paying homage to all stripes of funksters, including James Brown, Sly Stone, Herbie Hancock, Tower of Power, the Meters, Earth Wind & Fire, Parliament Funkadelics, J Dill ”music that reflects our way of life" says bassist Erick .D. Coomes, who is joined in the groove onslaught by his co-ragers: keyboardist Neal Evans, saxophonists Sam Kininger and Ryan Zoidis, guitarists Eric Krasno and Adam Smirnoff, and drummer Adam Deitch.
- Questlove
- myspace
- Nigel Hall
- official website
- myspace
- March 2009 marks Soulive’s 10th Anniversary – ten years since Eric Krasno, Alan Evans and his brother Neal Evans got together for the first time at a home studio just outside of Woodstock, NY and recorded Get Down.
Over the past 10 years, Soulive has covered a lot of ground – musically and literally.
The band has traveled to nearly every corner of the world, touring Ghana, Russia, nearly all of Europe, Brazil, and Japan (nine times!). They’ve been across America on dozens of tours. New Orleans Jazz Fest has become a home away from home. And in their actual home, New York City, they are closing in on their 100th show.
Not many bands can say they’ve recorded with Chaka Khan, Dave Matthews, Talib Kweli and John Scofield. Nor can many bands open for The Rolling Stones on one tour and have Stevie Wonder sit in with them on the next tour. The musical relationships the band has developed, from the aforementioned artists to Derek Trucks, Susan Tedeschi, Robert Randolph, Joshua Redman, Kenny Garrett, Fred Wesley, The Roots, Ivan Neville and so many others, speak volumes about both how versatile these talented musicians are. Jazz, hip-hop, rock, soul, funk, R & B, Blues – musically, there is not much the band hasn’t done.
In developing their own history, Soulive has been in the company of legends both new and old. In 2000, Bruce Lundvall signed the band to Blue Note Records and Soulive became part of recorded music’s greatest jazz legacy. Soulive joined the ranks of Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Jimmy Smith, Wayne Shorter and Grant Green and was part of the niche label’s rise as Norah Jones captivated the nation. Six years later, Soulive would be the first band signed to the new incarnation of Stax Records, joining the incredible soul tradition built by the likes of Isaac Hayes, Sam and Dave, and Otis Redding.
Soulive has always been creatively restless, never content to ride a sound (or a look) for too long. The band has led their fans through many incarnations: both male & female singers, a horn section, and repeated returns to the trio format. The band and the fans have endured, grown and morphed. Consistent through all of the different line-ups, though, was the groove – Neal’s club-shaking left hand pounding out bass lines, Alan’s ride propelling the music forward, and Eric’s solos soaring on top. Every show has that moment where Neal leans on the organ up high and the whole band breaks free. Every Soulive fan knows that moment. That is something that has never changed.
While ten years is something to celebrate, Soulive is not a band to look backward. The band is more concentrated on the future than concerned with revisiting its past. Unencumbered by record contract and fully equipped with a state-of-the-art recording studio, Soulive is embracing the new music business model by launching their own record label, “Royal Family Records.” With a focus on digital distribution, the label will be an outlet for all Soulive recordings as well as numerous Soulive affiliated projects such as Lettuce, Eric’s project “Chapter 2”, Alan’s and Neal’s solo records and Break Science featuring Adam Detch. The label will also sign emerging talent and develop them on tour with Soulive. The first artist to join up is soul singer Nigel Hall, who will release an EP this spring and join the band on the road.
Soulive will launch their label with the release of their new studio effort Up Here. The LP was recorded in Alan’s new studio in South Deerfield, Mass in the fall of 2008. “This is the Soulive album I've always wanted to record – it’s what I've been hearing in my head for years,” says Alan, who also tracked and mixed the record. “It's like when people say ‘if I could go back in time knowing what I know now.’ Well, that's what we did with Up Here. The session had the vibe and energy of Get Down but with all of our experiences from the past 10 years put down on tape in a very meaningful way. “
The record’s opening track “Upright” immediately sets the tone with a completely infectious hook featuring Neal on an old upright piano. There are some nods to the “old-school” on the record. “For Granted” is a tip of the hat to Grant Green, and Eric plays licks reminiscent of his early solos on Get Down and Turn It Out. Guest vocalist Nigel Hall tears it up on “Too Much” while Eric’s guitar sings like D’Angelo on the laid-back grind of “Put on Yo Pajamas.” The entire record features tight horn arrangements from long-time Soulive collaborators and friends, Sam Kininger and Ryan Zoidis.
No matter how you listen to Up Here, it sounds like you’re listening to vintage vinyl. One of the most difficult things about making a record with a great live band is capturing all that live energy while still making the record that’s about songs. Up Here does as good a job as any record could in accomplishing this. “Straight up,” says Alan, “this is the first Soulive album that I can say every tune on it is my favorite on the album.”
Up Here isn’t the only thing Soulive has on tap for 2009. The band has a double-live LP recorded in Japan last summer that will be released as four separate EPs throughout the year. There is also a full length live DVD from the same sessions. Soulive also hopes to have another studio record ready for public consumption by the fall.
In his recent book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell says it takes ten years of experience before anyone can really hit their stride. If he is right, then Soulive fans better watch the hell out.
OTHER UPCOMING SHOWS FROM THE BOWERY PRESENTS
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