And here's to you Mr Robinson!
2015 should have been a great year celebrating 25 years of The Black Crowes, sadly the rift between Chris Robinson and his brother Rich, now well documented thanks to social media, is probably as wide as it could get right now. So with no reunion on the cards any time soon, Rich Robinson returns to Europe for some shows, this time without any band at all, just Mr Robinson and an array of Gibson guitars.
The Jazz Cafe venue in London is one of only 4 shows in England on this tour and its tightly packed, full of longtime blues/crowes fans and with some guests upstairs having a bite to eat, one punter even throwing down a chip to Ben Ottewell of Gomez fame, who supported Robinson earlier in the evening.
The venue set up means that he has to walk from the upstairs eating area down to the stage in full view of everyone, so he was greeted with a good round of applause, fans grateful for the fact that he does return to these shores regularly, unlike his brother whose ‘Chris Robinson Brotherhood’ hasn’t ventured much further than their California hippy home.
He’s welcomed here with such a warmness and affection and wastes no time getting started with a rousing version of ‘I Remember’.
Whilst there is no band accompanying him, he has a technical friend on stage in the form of a loop pedal which he utilises occasionally if he fancies breaking out a solo or two whilst the pedal takes care of the rhythm guitars.
Rich has an range of complex tunings and frequently changes his guitar making his tech guy really work for his living, and during tonight we have a few minor errors and some annoying moments when you can hear tuning going on in the background whilst Robinson is playing. He doesn’t seem to mind though and halfway through the show decides to abandon the setlist and throw in crowd favourite ‘Oh! Sweet Nuthin’’ a Velvet Underground cover frequently covered by the Crowes themselves in their latter years.
Robinson is no stranger to playing covers, in fact its fair to say it would be an unusual show not to have at least 2 or 3 well chosen numbers to play. Tonight we also get Little Feat (Roll Um Easy), Bob Dylan (Girl from the North Country), Buffalo Springfield ( Kind Woman) and Bert Jansch (Blackwaterside). Its a clever mix of tunes that fit Robinson’s deep vocal range and they sit well alongside his own material which has matured greatly from the first album ‘Paper’ issued over 10 years ago.
Instead of making the traditional walk back to dressing room and then out again, he explained he would just stay on stage and continue to play the encore. The crowd decided to spontaneously applaud and shout for more, giving Robinson even more to smile about. He replied to that applause by pulling out a Black Crowes song ‘Oh Josephine’ and proceeded to show how really beautiful that track can be in a solo acoustic setting. I’ve followed the Black Crowes for over 20 years, and witnessed them live probably more than 80 times over that period (I’ve stopped counting), but this version of ‘Oh Josephine’ had the hairs on my neck standing on edge. It was the highlight of the set for me and followed by ‘What is Home’, another Crowes tune, brought a superb evening of great music to a close.
The first half of the show had concentrated on his solo material from ‘Paper’, ‘Through a Crooked Sun’ and ‘The Ceaseless Sight’ which Robinson described on stage as his last record, before correcting himself by saying “I mean my latest record”. After the show he did tell me that another return to the UK is on the cards for May 2016 with his band to promote his next solo album. So here's to you Mr Robinson, don’t stay away too long!
