Description:
Listeners shouldn't get too hung up about
Jeff Buckley's bloodlines--although they're impossible to ignore. His father was Tim Buckley, one of the most poignant, enigmatic figures of the 1960s' folk scene; but young Jeff grew up with his mother and didn't even meet his father until one Easter when he was eight--two months before Tim Buckley's death. While the ecstatic, keening quality of
Jeff Buckley's vocals recall the haunting timbre of his father's voice, there are also overtones of a young Robert Plant, Van Morrison, Delta blues legend Robert Johnson, Pakistani vocal master Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, and something indefinable--the sound of an individual talent beginning to blossom. On this splendid live EP, LIVE AT SIN-E, we hear
Jeff Buckley transmuting, transforming and ultimately transcending his influences before an audience at a small Irish club in Manhattan's East Village. Standing there with nothing but his voice and an electric guitar,
Jeff Buckley is simply mesmerizing. Buckley's Telecaster playing on "Mojo Pin" and "Eternal Life" is exceptional: orchestrating his vocals with a torrid stream of chords and melodic counterpoint, a la Jimi Hendrix and Jimmy Page. He never descends into stock licks or hackneyed accompaniment; his classical arpeggios on Edith Piaf's "Je N'en Connais Pas La Fin" impart a calliope-like grace to her tune. The ecstatic nature of Buckley's art is showcased on his extended journey through Van Morrison's "The Way Young Lovers Do", where the lyrics gradually dissolve into long scatting choruses of wordless moans and cries, as his voice and flamenco-styled guitar evoke an almost gospel fervor. Buckley's lyrics are just as personal as his voice. "Mojo Pin" is a dreamscape full of delirious visions and moody imagery of lost love, while on "Eternal Life", his rolling blues chords set the tone for nightmares about his own mortality, recalling the tormented hellhounds of Robert Johnson. A talent like
Jeff Buckley's comes along once in a lifetime, and LIVE AT SIN-E certainly whets the appetite for his debut album GRACE.
| Disk 1 |
| 1. |
Be Your Husband
|
| 2. |
Love You Should Have Come Over
|
| 3. |
Mojo Pin
|
| 4. |
Monologue – Duanne Eddy, Songs for Lovers
|
| 5. |
Grace
|
| 6. |
Monologue – Reverb, the Doors
|
| 7. |
Strange Fruit
|
| 8. |
Night Flight
|
| 9. |
If You Knew
|
| 10. |
Monologue – Fabulous Time for a Guinness
|
| 11. |
Unforgiven (Last Goodbye)
|
| 12. |
Twelfth of Never
|
| 13. |
Monologue – Café Days
|
| 14. |
Monologe – Eternal Life
|
| 15. |
Eternal Life
|
| 16. |
Just Like a Woman
|
| 17. |
Monologue – False Start Apology
|
| 18. |
Calling You
|
| Disk 2 |
| 1. |
Monologue – Nusrat, He’S My Elvis
|
| 2. |
Yeh Jo Halka Halka Saroor Hai
|
| 3. |
Monologue – I’M a Ridiculous Person
|
| 4. |
If You See Her, Say Hello
|
| 5. |
Monologue – Matt Dillon, Hollies, Classic Rock Radio
|
| 6. |
Dink’S Song
|
| 7. |
Monologue – Musical Chairs
|
| 8. |
Drown in My Own Tears
|
| 9. |
Monologue – The Suckiest Water
|
| 10. |
The Way Young Lovers Do
|
| 11. |
Monologue – Walk Through Walls
|
| 12. |
Je N’En Connais Pas la Fin
|
| 13. |
I Shall Be Released
|
| 14. |
Sweet Thing
|
| 15. |
Monologue – Good Night Bill
|
| 16. |
Hallelujah
|
More Buckley, Jeff
shopping cart