Jeff Beck at Ronnie Scott’s - review

I recently got to see this release.  I’m used to seeing Jeff Beck from afar, in mid to large sized venues.  Apparently someone approached him about doing a few nights in this intimate little club in England and they decided to tape it.

Good thing, too.

The video is excellent, as is the audio.  The playing is pure Beck.  And when you look at the audience, they’re sitting at small tables.  It’s just weird.

With Jeff is Tal Wilkenson, the (very) young female bassist from the past few tours, as well as drum legend Vinnie Coliauta (played for Zappa too) and a very good keyboardist whose name escapes me.

And there were Guests.  Something called Imogene Heap came out and sang.  Now here’s where it gets a little weird for me… I am at a bit of a loss as to how to describe Imogene and what she did.  I can confidently say she was singing but I can’t give you much more than that.  I don’t want to pick on her simply because she was odd (read: very artsy)  but I’m left with little else.  Her singing.. well, it was pretty much on pitch.  Perhaps the song was so weird that it didn’t allow her to really show off her abilities.  Yeah, that’s it!  She seemed to be doing rather a lot of mugging with her singing, which probably threw me off.   People seemed to know who she was, which gave them the distinct advantage over me.

Another guest was Joss Stone.  You know exactly where you stand with Joss Stone.  I haven’t seen much of her before this.  My opinion is that I like her but she oversings.  She tries too hard to be the rather large African-American Queen of Soul in a rather small, skinny white body.  That’s stated mostly for amusement’s sake - the girl can definitely sing.  Unfortunately she kinda botched `People Get Ready’ towards the end.  Maybe it was because she was performing barefoot - I don’t know much about singing (other than it being best that I avoid it).

Some old punter guitar fart was pulled in off the street to jam.  I believe his name was Clapton or something like that.  Eric sang and they both played lead.  This was a very good interaction.  Clapton appeared to be having the time of his life (and why the hell not - he’s playing with Jeff Beck).

You have to figure that with El Becko in town, there will be a few celebrities in attendance.  At one point during an older blues tune, another Olde Pharte of the leonine variety was seen bobbing his head seriously to the music.  This would be Robert Plant.  Twenty minutes later I saw some silver-haired dude at a table with the biggest grin I have seen in a while.  It was almost a Yardbirds reunion - Jimmy Page was grinning like a fool while Jeff played.  I think that about said it all for the evening.

You’re probably wondering what he played.

Dammit, why do you always ask me the hard questions?

He did a wide variety of songs from the very old to newer.  And he did them well.  Jeff Beck seems to only get better with age.  This is a very frightening proposition, as he’s sixty-something now.  There were tunes from Guitar Shop, Yardbird references, the aforementioned People Get Ready, whatever it was that Imogene Heap sang, as well as what you’d normally expect to hear from Mr. Beck.

The equipment, as I was able to see it, was fairly standard: a mostly white Stratocaster and some Marshall amps.  Worth the price of admission were the close-ups of the hands.  To watch this man play the guitar is to see magic being made.  Even after you watch him do it, you still have no idea how to reproduce it.  The riff on the record that you took for granted turns out to involve a whammy bar dip, a pickup change, and a volume control manipulation.  And the SOB is on pitch every time!

If you’re a guitar fan, a Jeff Beck fan, or are just bored, pick this one up.  Prepare to be amazed.