The North Mississippi All Stars and Galactic
April 20, 2000
The Magic Bag
Ferndale, MI
I caught the Galactic/North Mississippi All Stars show at the Magic Bag the other night and had a great time. Still recovering from a particularly taxing Easter Egg coloring contest the night before I drove through the rain to Ferndale. The Magic Bag is a really nice venue to see a show. I took my usual spot at the counter to the right of stage where you can get a good view and not be too crowded. The place filled up pretty fast and soon the North Mississippi All Stars took the stage.
I was really excited to see these guys because they have gotten really good reviews plus I love their playing on Squirrel Nut Zipper front man, Jimbo Mathus' solo album. The band consists of Luther and Cody Dickinson on guitar and drums respectively, Chris Chew on bass and Garry Burnside on second guitar. The Dickinson's are the sons of famed producer, Jim Dickinson while Garry Burnside is the grandson of blues legend, R.L. Burnside. Set up in front of Galactic's equipment the band started out with a blistering version of "Muddy Water" with Luther taking a lot of solos on guitar and sharing the vocals with Chris Chew. Chew is an enormous man who is so large he makes his bass look like a toy. This night he was wearing a t-shirt that said something like, "My Friends call me Slim". He wears his bass so high that it is almost touching his chin when he plays, but he is an inventive player as well as a solid backup vocalist. The band ripped through their set mixing straight up blues with more improvised passages that recalled the Allman Brothers, Cream or Jimi Hendrix. It is obvious that Luther has listened to a lot of early Eric Clapton and Jerry Garcia, but he never sounded derivitive. Their music is rooted heavily in Delta blues, but its updated and fresh. They don't ignore their more contemporary influences and they let their Mississippi roots filter through everything they play. They played a lot of covers but none of them were straight renditions. Some of the familiar tunes they played were "Sittin' on Top of the World", "Goin' Down South" and "My Babe".
Garry Burnside took few solos but turned out to be an original rhythm player who foiled Luther's leads very well. The crowd were definitley into the performance. I found it hard not to like these guys too. I think its cool that they are an inter-racial band bringing blues to a new audience. Somewhere in the middle of the set Stanton Moore, the incredible drummer from Galactic sat down at his own drum kit which was set up right behind Cody Dickinson's and played with the band for several songs. Cody and Stanton seemed to have a great time playing together and their double drum sound brought to mind the familiar rolling thunder of the old two drum line-up of the Grateful Dead. In fact this band would be right at home either playing a blues festival or on the bill with any so called jamband. They finished off their too brief set with a rollicking version of "All Night Long" which included a lengthy jam based on the chord changes to Bobby "Blue" Bland's "Turn on Your Lovelight", but they definitley had the Dead's version in mind rather than the original. During this medley, Garry switched to drums while Cody played second guitar. They finally segued back into "All Night Long" and finished up but it was obvious that the neither they or the audience wanted the set to be over.After about a 45 minute break, Galactic took the stage and began jamming immediatley. They started out with several instrumental tunes, one of which featured saxophonist Ben Ellman switching over to heavily amplified harmonica. I saw Galactic in Ann Arbor about a year ago for the first time and was really blown away by their show. I was hoping this second outing would live up to the first and from the beginning it was obvious it would. This band is really tight but yet able to improvise heavily. The afformentioned Stanton Moore on drums is one of my newest musical heroes and he keep the whole thing together along with bass player Robert Mercurio. Last time I saw the band Skerik of Critters Buggin' and Tuatara was filling in for Ben Ellman on sax so this was my first exposure to his playing in a live setting and I was impressed by his soloing which was at once funky and avant garde. Keyboard player, Richard Vogel lays down all sorts of phat solos and chords on the B-3, moog and other assorted keyboards. Last time I saw the band I thought that guitar player Jeff Raines stayed in the background a little bit, but this time it was not the case. He really stepped up and soloed quite a bit in between laying down tight rhythm structures.
After a few numbers they introduced Theryl de'Clouet AKA: The Houseman who sang several songs. Houseman is a veteran of the New Orleans music scene and quite a bit older than the rest of the band, but he adds another dimension to Galactic. Booker T. and the MGs were a great instrumental band, but they were also a great back up band and the same is true of Galactic. Houseman is soulful vocalist with a great stage prescence. He came out wearing a gold silk suit and also displayed some hilarious dance moves. The show continued on with extended instrumental numbers interspersed with Houseman vocal tunes. Near the end of the show Galactic invited Luther Dickinson to the stage for several songs. For the first, Galactic layed down a bluesy set of chords while Jeff Raines and Luther traded solos and eventually the music reached a cresendo where the entire band was playing full tilt. Dickinson also stayed out to play on a great version of "Black Eyed Pea". Soon after, Luther's brother Cody came out and played an extended solo on electric washboard which ended with him and Stanton both playing on the washboard. As the 1:00 A.M. curfew neared, Houseman came out for one more song accompanied by only Stanton Moore and Richard Vogel and then the band played one more short instrumental number to close the show. The crowd was exhausted from dancing, but obviously happy. It is hard to imagine a better night of music. Two great bands in a small venue obviously enjoying themselves as much as the crowd was enjoying their music. Galactic is quickly becoming one of my favorite bands and I am really looking forward to the North Mississippi All Stars debut album which comes out in a few weeks and seeing them again for a longer set.