I'm supposed to be heading out for birthday dinner, but instead I'm surfing Facebook, and what do I find but this clip--John Nemeth in a very recent show. I was hauled in by the groove, which is a half-step slower than I kept thinking it was. And if that makes no sense--well, it's been a long day and I needed some music like this. 10 views so far, but this is some very tasty performing here. The groove drives it, not the harp, but the harp player is wise enough to let that happen--and for me, that's where the magic is. The (superb) singing is icing on the cake.
Last Edited by kudzurunner on Apr 03, 2016 4:36 PM
I see what you mean now adam. It does seem to have a funny timing or something. Like it's waiting to break thru something. Or like you changed the BPM on the song artificially. It's pretty tight. ---------- Pay No Attention To The Man Behind The Curtain.
The drummer is playing the hi-hat pattern without the proper swing, a mistake actually referred to in the history of drumming thread posted elsewhere. Awkward.....
Personally I think the groove is pretty cool! I would have had the back beat even later to even increase that laidback feel.... The music's fine, solid harp and great vocals - but the stage outfits .... Ouch. Maybe John had just finished his shift at the car repair shop.
Aha! The very things that I like--the groove and the clothes--are the things that others don't like. John has his own quirky, edgy sense of style. I personally like what he's wearing here a lot more than the hipster garb he was wearing five years ago. Here, in effect, he's showing me something new. It's a costume--but it's also true to his Idaho roots. It's nothing that anybody else would wear onstage. It speaks to his absolute self-confidence. All that transmits instantly to me. It's what makes him modern. He's pushing the edge of what's acceptable fully as much as Jason was in some of his crazier punk-style hairdos and getups.
As for the groove: I didn't hear anything wrong with it, but I DID hear, pretty quickly, that it was a half-notch slower than most people would play it, and the band was good enough to hold it there. And John was skilled enough to work with it, massage it. The way in which he does that is as important to me as the particular notes he plays or the sound that he gets. I like Aki Kumar's playing more, in some ways--his tone, I should say--but I like both players for the way they honor the groove and make that groove-honoring a part of their strength as performers.
But that's just me. I'm looking for certain things--especially when I'm drinking my first gin & tonic of the night--and this track had what I was looking for.
Last Edited by kudzurunner on Apr 04, 2016 9:38 AM
I think the hi hat sins of the drummer can be forgiven because he's playing in the pocket and so is the whole band. It doesn't really swing, but I think that's the idea. It's like an edgy, funky sound to my ear, if it "swung" it would quickly get into a sort of hacky territory...I think. Nemeth really is a great singer and performer. The band has a sound inspired by the Junior Wells groups with Buddy Guy—sort of an angular and funky take on traditional blues. His harp tone and note choices kind of reinforce that...I would enjoy a gin and tonic to this, certainly.
I love John Nemeth's harp playing. For me it's always in the groove. He doesn't need to be overly flamboyant, he's just nicely laid back and totally in control of what he's doing. He's also one of the few harp players who sings as good as, if not better than, he plays harp.
Love the clip Adam posted but this is still one of my favorites... just great!
I like the costume better than that goofy hat he used to wear which I was never sure was a costume or not.
The drummer is funking up the groove and there's notifying wrong with that. It ain't supposed to swing. Aki Kumar's band is very tight, but they are caught in a time warp. These guys aren't.
I always get the feeling that John is a HUGE Junior Wells fan. Not a copy– but some pretty big hints in his demeanor and groove – plus the choice of that Sennheiser 421 for vocals like Junior had in a number of videos– yep.
People hating on the high hats have probably never listened to D'Angelo, J Dilla or Questlove. The drunk groove is pretty typical of neo-soul and some of the newer funk beats as well. Juxtaposing heavily swung hits with ones that don't swing so much at all to make it seem like the groove is always about to fall out of the pocket.
If you were to map it out on a piano roll, you'd notice a series of pretty purposeful-seeming inconsistencies, I'd imagine.
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