The Derek Trucks Band & The John Scofield Band

April 6, 2000

The Mill Street Entry

Pontiac, MI

I was lucky enough to catch a great double bill last night in Pontiac, especially if you dig guitar. Derek Trucks opened up for John Scofield at the Mill Street Entry which is the small room in the basement of Clutch Cargo's. I left Ypsilanti in a hurry so I could get up to Pontiac in time for the show. If anybody has driven between these two cities then you know how annoying it is to get between them. By the time I got there the doors were still not open even though they were scheduled to have already been open for 30 minutes by the time I got there. After standing for awhile in the chilly Michigan wind they finally opened the doors and I headed to the bar for a warmng Jack and Coke. Then I staked out a prime spot in front of the stage to view the show. The Mill Street Entry is actually a very cool little place to see a show. It is in the basement of an old church and is decorated with all sorts of funky attire including stars and clouds painted on the ceiling.

Derek Trucks and his band took the stage pretty quickly and went right into high gear. Derek is sort of a guitar prodigy. He is the nephew of Allman Brothers drummer, Butch Trucks and last year he took over the second guitar slot for the Allman Brothers Band. That is not the only high profle gig that he landed last year. He also played with Phil Lesh on his Fall tour. I was familiar with his sound through a few albums that I have where he is a guest player but this was my first full exposure to his playing

Derek and the band quitely took the stage and the first thing I was struck by was how young Derek looked. I am not sure how old he is, but he can't be more than 20 or 21 and he actually looks younger than that. His band consisted of a very cool drummer, a bass player and two keyboardists. One of the keyboardists was Kofi Burbridge who is the brother of current Allman Brothers bassist and former Aquarium Rescue Unit bassist, Oteil Burbridge. I had seen Kofi play keyboards and flute with the post-Col. Bruce Hampton version of the ARU a few times and was excited to see him in the band. The band kicked right into a groovy instrumental tune where Derek was the focus. The bass player and other keyboardist were kind of low in the mix so it was hard to hear them. Derek got really out there in certain parts. During one sequence he kept playing the low E string and slowly loosened it until it was flopping around and making all sorts of weird noises.

Most of the tunes that the band played were instrumental and had strong groovy hooks interspersed with extended jamming. Kofi played the flute during a few tunes. One of the coolest passages was when Derek broke a string and Kofi stepped right up for a flute led jam while Derek restrung. The second keyboardist sang several songs and he was good but very reminicent of Gregg Allman. One of the songs he sang was "44 Blues", the old Howling Wolf tune which Derek completely deconstructed during the jam.

The band finished up and the crowd was very enthusiastic,but there was no encore. I was left impressed by Derek's performance and demeanor. He is obviously heavily influenced by the jazz rock stylings of Duane Allman, but he does have his own thing going on as well. I can't wait to see where he goes with his music as he matures more.

Next up was the John Scofield Band who attracted more of a jazz crowd than the Allman Bros/Grateful Dead crowd that were there predominently to see Derek Trucks. After a stage switch, Scofield and his band hit the stage and broke into a series of songs from his latest album, Bump. I have been listening to that album quite a bit lately, but I was impressed at how Scofield used those tunes as a loose structure, but basically they were vehicles for extended jamming that was entirely improvisational. His band had a solid drummer, a bass player who alternated between electric and acoustic and a second guitar player who played all sorts of crazy Shaft-like rhythm guitar on electric and acoustic all night.

Scofield is a bald middle aged guy and he probably resembles your high school physics teacher quite a bit. On the surface he is about as white looking as you can get, but as soon as he starts playing he is super funky. A lot of the songs they played would be right at home on an old Meters record. The band was obviously having a good time, Scofield most of all. They played fast and furious barely taking the time to catch their breath between tunes. The younger Deadhead college kids who may have showed up for Derek were obviouly impressed and the whole floor was dancing. It made me remember how fun live, improvised music can be. The band finally wound up and after one encore they were gone. Unfortunately, the much anticipated jam between Derek and John never materialized, but I think everybody still went home happy.