BONNIE RAITT: BONNIE RAITT AND FRIENDS (2006)
1) Introduction; 2)
Unnecessarily Mercenary; 3) I Will Not Be Broken; 4) God Was In The Water; 5)
Gnawin' On It; 6) You; 7) Love Letter; 8) Two Lights In The Nighttime; 9) Well,
Well, Well; 10) Something To Talk About; 11) I Don't Want Anything To Change;
12) Love Sneakin' Up On You.
Once again, this significantly shortened
version of the show is objectively inferior to the complete DVD release — not
because more Bonnie Raitt (and friends) is better Bonnie Raitt (and friends),
but because watching the lady perform
is somehow always a more satisfactory experience than hearing the lady perform, even if for this particular evening
(September 30, 2005, at the Trump Taj Mahal in Atlantic City) it seems as if
she slightly overdid it with the «amazing technicolor dreamcoat», in Tim Rice's
words. Fortunately, no jealous brothers of Joseph stuck around long enough to
tear that outfit to bits after the show.
The actual guests include Wolfman, Dracula and
his son... that is, I meant to say, there is Keb' Mo', Ben Harper, Alison
Krauss, and Norah Jones — four major professionals with impeccable taste, four
«keepers of the flame» who keep it relatively low, but firm and steady, and,
just like Bonnie herself, each of them could be accused of being frequently
bland and even more frequently boring, but not of not knowing their craft.
Consequently and predictably, the album is even, well-combed, tastefully
sensitive, and instantaneously forgettable.
A large part of the problem is the setlist,
though: I was actually hoping that with a supporting pool like that, Bonnie had
a chance of actually going back to the roots of the roots and doing stuff like,
well, for instance, a whole bunch of cover versions of old urban blues and
country blues numbers — recuperate some Sippie Wallace and/or Memphis Minnie
obscurities, for instance. Alas, six
out of twelve numbers included here are taken directly from her latest album,
and most of the others do not go back further than Nick Of Time, either. So what's the big deal?
As it happens, Keb' Mo' is pretty much wasted
on ʽLove Letterʼ (he does play better lead guitar than on the studio original,
but the solos are too short and non-flashy to notice that). Norah Jones duets
with Bonnie on ʽI Don't Want Anything To Changeʼ, a limp, all-atmosphere ballad
from the latest album that hardly gains anything from the addition of Norah's
«affected» singing style (for some reason, that little «wheeze» of hers really
irritates me, direct predecessor as it is to the even more atrocious «husky»
style of such glossily packaged femme-fatales as Lana del Rey). Much better is
the duet with Krauss on ʽYouʼ — a good idea to bring in an additional spoonful
of vocal beauty to a song that was already quite pretty in the first place.
But arguably the major highlight is the duet between Bonnie and Ben Harper on
ʽWell, Well, Wellʼ, an old-timey blues tune with new lyrics (by Dylan himself) but
that old Blind Willie Johnson spirit. They tear it up on the acoustic and slide
guitars so fabulously (well, maybe «tear» is not quite the right word) that,
once again, I have no idea why so
much of that other space had to be wasted on the adult contemporary crap or
faithful renditions of decent tunes like ʽUnnecessary Mercenaryʼ and ʽGod Was
In The Waterʼ that simply sound like identical twins of their studio
counterparts. Yes, it is still «smooth» and «safe», but I'd rather see Bonnie
Raitt go on carrying a time-honored tradition than engaging in a
time-dishonored one.
Ultimately, if you want to interpret «Bonnie
Raitt and Friends» as «Bonnie Raitt gets together with some mighty fine blues
musicians and dabbles in old-time fun with the lot of 'em», do not. Really, this is mostly just Bonnie
Raitt promoting her latest album in a non-totally-dull fashion. That album was
not among her worst, and the friends do provide some extra amusement, and the
live CD goes down well (and the live DVD even better), but ain't nothing to
write home about even if you are in
the habit of writing home about Bonnie Raitt, in which case you must be a
pretty weird specimen of H.S.S.
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