It was a heavy weather Wednesday night in Auckland, as the Tuning Fork hosted New Orleans’ favourite adopted son, piano great Jon Cleary. Along with his A-list band The Absolute Monster Gentlemen (AJ Hall and Cornell Williams) the trio were about to provide music fans with some shelter from the storm.
Go Go Juice, Cleary’s Grammy award-winning set of rootsy originals from 2015, put him on the map as a modern rival to those great piano players before him from New Orleans.
Originally from the UK, Cleary ventured to the Big Easy as a youth, and ended up making it his home of choice for life. With countless collaborations with his big-name mentors, Cleary has found himself at the forefront of Orleans music, his name synonymous with simply great music and musicians.
Stripped down as a trio for this eves gig, the final one of their Down Under tour in fact, the TF’s intimate setting lent a prompt for Cleary and his crew to loosen up their set and have some mischievous fun.
Stacks of local musicians were in the house, but noticeably attendance was down in numbers, weather played a part as rain warnings were issued earlier in the day. That didn’t stop those in the know however, from witnessing the first-class musical virtuosity of Cleary and his stellar rhythm section, who dished out two storming sets of joyous New Orleans funk/rhythm & blues.
Lee Dorsey’s upbeat Lottie Mo opened the night, signalling Cleary’s brand, steeped in tradition, and honouring many of the great Orleans piano players. Jelly Roll Morton, Professor Longhair, Allen Toussaint, and Dr John all come to mind, Cleary waxed lyrical about some of those and other influences throughout the evening.
Cheatin’ On You, a tune Cleary penned for Taj Mahal, rendered immediate syncopation from dynamic drummer AJ Hall. Musos couldn’t help but bop, clap and shout out, such was the mood of the groove.
And with another Cleary original, Sometimes I Wonder, the lads were just beginning to stoke the fire. Cleary got in one of his very slick organ solos, underpinning it with piano with his right hand.
New number Pickle For A Tickle put the band through tempo and feel changes, and began the polyrhythmic shenanigans. Remarks started airing regarding the prowess of Hall’s stupendous drumming skills, who extracted superb dynamics and textures from his kit and cymbals.
Smile In a While spaced the beat out much like Bennie & the Jets, with Cleary dropping in references to Donny Hathaway’s version of Jealous Guy (John Lennon). A historian and scholar of music, who has featured in documentaries (Make It Funky 2005), Cleary seemingly can extract that knowledge whenever he desires on his keyboards.
Let’s Get Low Down, a Dr John collaboration, ran the gamut on breaking down time and tempo shifts. Hall pulled off flammed fills that sometimes sounded like falling down the stairs. Resembling a funeral march in segments, Tom Waits would have tipped his hat in agreement.
Bassist Cornell Williams, who favours the flavour of sports gear attire on stage, produced a note-perfect performance on the night. He also featured on backing vocals on one of Cleary’s favourite Allen Toussaint ballads, What Do You Want the Girl to Do.
Cleary noted that Williams featured several times in the excellent post Hurricane Katrina New Orleans TV drama Treme.
Unnecessarily Mercenary adopted a straight-ahead groove, while set closer, Cleary’s take on Professor Longhair’s classic Tipitina, meant that if you weren’t boogieing, you were dancing in your head. Cleary fact-checked this song being the one most sung by those upon release from Louisiana’s Angola penitentiary. Hallelujah!
Set two commenced with an appropriate homage to funk master’s The Meters Mardi Gras Mambo.
So Damn Good was executed frenetically in 2/4 tempo, taking us straight to church Southern style.
Dual cowbells were in order for Dynamite, as Cleary got in on the act with Hall, who whipped up timbale, a trashy sounding cymbal, and plenty of inside-out drumming. His open-handed playing enhanced the rhythmic interplay that was a constant and integral motif for the band.
Johnny Taylor’s Last Two Dollars drew out a late-night funky groove, then newbie Zulu Coconuts took a nod at Mardi Gras and parodied its gender bendiness.
Bin A Lil Minit swung like mad, another new composition that will feature on the group’s next record.
Frenchmen Street Blues, a Cleary ballad originally featured on the soundtrack of Treme, was delivered with an exquisite use of space, and the smoothest of snare brushwork from Hall.
Then we got his most recognisable song and hit, When You Get Back.
Cleary is an expert at gathering the music that has influenced him and fusing it into his own gumbo of style and goodness. It seems instantly accessible and available as close as his fingertips.
One of those are the mighty Meters, and Cleary nodded to them for the show’s finale with Just Kissed My Baby. Hints of Herbie Hancock, and of course Meters founder Art Neville were in there.
The guys parodied stops and starts by forming frozen statues. And as for syncopation, well this was a cluster f$#@ deep dive.
Lights up meant goodnight, folks. It was all too easy for us to get lost in the music and want it to carry on for a heck of a lot longer.
Absolute Monster Gentlemen, these cats all deserve the title. Jon Cleary and his dynamic duo provided a case study in syncopation and note displacement, all the while providing the most danceable club date gig for many a night down this way.
Mike Beck
Photography by Nick Paulsen
Set 1
Lottie Mo
Cheatin’ On You
Sometimes I Wonder
Pickle For a Tickle
Smile In a While
Let’s Get Low Down
What Do You Want the Girl to Do
Unnecessarily Mercenary
Tipitina
Set 2
Mardi Gras Mambo
So Damn Good
Dynamite
Last Two Dollars
Zulu Coconuts
Bin A Lil Minit
Frenchmen Street Blues
When
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