Toots and The Maytals, Chris Pierce, and the House of Blues

So last night my girlfriend and I went to go see Toots and The Maytals at the House of Blues here in Chicago. It was my first show at the main theatre at the HOB blues so I was looking forward to it. That, and when I was a Freshman in undergrad a co-worker saw Toots and raved about it. I've been meaning to see him ever since but never got around to it until yesterday. Toots put on a great show. He's got to be in his 60s and he's still the consummate entertainer. Seeing Toots also make me realize how unique Bob Marley was as an artist. While Toots' main focus seems to be entertaining, Marley had other motives. He was much more concerned with raising consciousness about injustice and inequality, but did so in a manner that remained entertaining. It goes to show that Marley really transcended the boundaries of performer, entertainer, evangelist, and activist.

One of the opening acts (yes, plural - more on that in a minute) was a guy named Chris Pierce. Being the music snob I am, I tend to be skeptical of opening acts but Chris and his band performed admirably. They had a nice balance of soul, gospel, blues, reggae, and rock. Really a pleasant listen. He reminded me a bit of Amos Lee. There were some sound issues with Chris' set, mainly the bass was too loud and completely washed out. However, the HOB let the band use their house Hammond B-3, which complemented their sound nicely. I had the pleasure of talking to the drummer after their set. A very nice guy (who played a really stripped down kit and made it work very well, I might add) who seconded my thoughts on the sound issue (The sound did improve for Toots' set).

Had the aforementioned acts contained the entirety of the show, it would have been a rousing success. However, in between these two highlights was one of the worst bands I've ever seen. First of all, this show was on a Tuesday night and didn't start until 9pm. Why on earth there needed to be more than one opening band is beyond me. This meant that Toots didn't go on until about 11:30pm, probably about the time he would have been finishing up had the second band not played. I would be much happier today if that had happened, my ears would feel better, I wouldn't be so tired, and Katie would have stayed for the whole show (having a REAL job gets in the way of late night concerts). The terrible sound (engineering-wise) continued with the Fear Nuttin' Band, and their music was so putrid that it just exacerbated the situation to the extreme. Chris Pierce offered a pleasant segue to Toots, I can see why they shared a bill. But this other band created a jarring fissure between the other two performances. They played what they called "Yardcore," a mixture of Jamaican music (hence the "Yard") and hardcore. The end result of this equation was basically a Linkin Park type of sound (one song sounded kind of like 311) but without any semblance of melody or songcraftsmanship. If the goal is to be loud and atonal they were certainly good at that. The singers were two Jamaicans who spat fast paced Jamaican patois at the audience and struggled mightily when a measure of (attempted) melody crept into their songs. The audience had to suffer through this wall of noise for a good 45 minutes. I feel sorry for audiences of Toots' upcoming shows on the East Coast as apparently these guys are opening for the next couple weeks. A shock to the system indeed. Needless to say, I'll do a bit more research before I go see another show at the House of Blues, especially in terms of concert start times and opening acts. Although I'd love to see Chris Pierce come back to Chicago and put on a full set.