QCONLINE.COM — James Taylor, Bonnie Raitt provide comfort and joy at TaxSlayer show

By Jonathan Turner

MOLINE — If there are two more beautiful, humble, generous, and enduring souls in the pop music business than James Taylor and Bonnie Raitt, I can’t think of any offhand.

The two staggeringly talented veterans — he’s 70 and she 69 — proved that Saturday night to a packed TaxSlayer Center, in their first joint concert ever in the Quad-Cities.

In these often dark, chaotic, depressing times, it was just so nice to luxuriate in the genuine goodness, comfort and joy of these legendary artists and their amazingly tight, virtuosic bands.

Both Raitt and Taylor, who have been friends and have performed together for years, seemed sincerely touched by the adulation bestowed on them by the Moline crowd. Nearly all available seats Saturday were filled, and it appeared odd that the upper deck’s back center section was curtained off; surely those could have been sold as well.

In her first appearance at the almost 26-year-old arena, Raitt offered an all-too brief set of just over an hour, blending her signature husky, alluring vocals with fine finger-picking on guitar. Her slow, slinky challenge, “Love Me Like a Man,” was followed by the fun, rocking release of “Something to Talk About.”

Like Taylor did later, Raitt gave grateful credit to songwriters of some hits, including the great Bonnie Hayes’ “Love Letter,” and the incomparable ballad “I Can’t Make You Love Me,” co-written by former Bengals football player Mike Reid (talk about a gentle giant!). She delivered a soaring, impassioned and sorrowful performance.

Raitt also took advantage of Taylor and a big member of his crew on a couple standouts. Longtime backup vocalist Arnold McCuller joined her on “Nick of Time,” the title track of her 1989 Grammy winner, which he recorded in 2011. Can it be 30 years old already? That song certainly gains significance with the passing of time, and Raitt paid tribute to all the loved ones who have passed on, making it all the more precious.

She did a glorious mashup of Chaka Khan’s “You Got the Love” and her own “Love Sneakin’ Up on You.” James joined Bonnie just before intermission on a jubilant “Thing Called Love.”

While both sets were a nostalgia-drenched trip down memory lane, over a similar five-decade period of time, Taylor’s was even more so, with the help of massive multimedia. He brought a much bigger high-tech video presentation than I’ve ever seen before.

He last performed at the Moline arena in November 2014, and he performed with his son, Ben Taylor, at Davenport’s Adler Theatre in March 2011. He also played at what was then The Mark of the Quad Cities in July 1998.

Saturday’s show began with a mini-bio (like the fans don’t know?), a flurry of old videos and photos, including Taylor’s North Carolina childhood, and excerpts from interviews and songs.

It flowed seamlessly into his live opener, “Carolina in My Mind,” with his gorgeous quartet of backup singers. A feast of perfectly matched photos and video provided fitting backdrop for every song, and each time Taylor introduced a band member, the screen showed a few photos of them as a child or youth.

A lesser-known early song, “Sunny Skies” (from 1970) was accompanied by video of Taylor and his adorable pug dog. “There’s really nothing we won’t stoop to,” he joked afterward, one of many characteristically droll asides. Taylor related an unprintable joke about the first day of May that his Dad used to tell, as prelude to his irresistible samba-themed “First of May,” from one of my favorite albums of his, “Never Die Young” (1988).

This was also among several numbers that featured crack solos and layers from percussion, horns and flute. Some of the night’s best solos were in a favorite Taylor seemed to reluctantly haul out, “Steamroller” – which he noted doesn’t mean anything to him, unlike most of his songs, and that it takes longer to play it than it did to write it. The trumpet, Hammond B3 and electric guitar licks were awesome, and the number had its usual drawn-out, ecstatic finish.

The Carole King-Gerry Goffin hit “Up on the Roof” was delivered before dazzling black-and-white images and video of New York City’s skyline and landmarks.

Like Taylor must have done countless times, he relayed his breakthrough story of how he was discovered by the Beatles in 1968 and was the first artist signed to their Apple label, but he again conveyed it with the wide-eyed wonder and monumental importance it must have had when he lived it at age 20.

That tender ode, “Something in the Way She Moves,” he neglected to point out (as he sometimes does) gave George Harrison the “inspiration” to use that title as the first line for his Beatles hit, “Something.”

Taylor briefly told the story about the 1970 cowboy lullaby “Sweet Baby James,” written for his nephew. The sweet, perfect song remains magical, though the brother he wrote it for is tragically not around to relive it. Alex Taylor died of a heart attack in 1993 at 46.

James offered needed balm for another loss closer in time and place, as he dedicated the tremendously powerful “Shed a Little Light” to the victims of the recent shooting in Aurora, Ill. Inspired by Martin Luther King, Jr., Taylor implores us remember the “ties between us – all men and women living on the Earth. Ties of hope and love, sister and brotherhood. That we are bound together.”
That moving meditation seems all the more relevant and necessary today than it did when he wrote it in 1991. Through his classic, yearning ballads like “Fire and Rain” and “You’ve Got a Friend,” and exuberant party anthems like “Your Smiling Face” and “Mexico,” Taylor knows how to bring us together and unite us for a common, higher purpose.

He’s the ideal cultural ambassador, and over 50 years later, he still knows how to freshly, honestly deliver the goods, and the goodness. That light surely shined bright Saturday.

source: https://qconline.com/news/local/james-taylor-bonnie-raitt-provide-comfort-and-joy-at-taxslayer/article_8846ef13-aa68-5762-9db0-c56a5609029a.html#2

BILLBOARD – James Taylor’s Self-Titled Debut Turns 50: A Track-by-Track Retrospective

By Morgan Enos

James Taylor spent his late teens in psychiatric hospitals and rehab facilities — but rang in his twenties at the feet of the Beatles. He’d been a troubled young songwriter with dim prospects in the real world, but raw talent with a guitar in his hand.

Back in early 1968, he caught the ultimate break: a try-out for the Fabs’ new label Apple Records. Sitting cross-legged in front of Paul McCartney and George Harrison, he wowed them with his love ballad “Something in the Way She Moves.”

Needless to say, Taylor passed the audition: his self-titled debut album was released 50 years ago today (Dec. 6).

Over a five-decade career, Taylor has been renowned for hits like “Fire and Rain” and his cover of “How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You)” — but had it rough early on. He was hospitalized for depression in his college years and developed a nasty heroin addiction that threatened to consume him.

But time was on Taylor’s side. Desperate to be heard, he looked up Peter Asher, who had made waves as one half of the pop vocal duo Peter & Gordon. One night, Asher got a cold-call from a “rather nervous-sounding American with a very pleasant speaking voice.”

He caught him at the right time; Peter & Gordon were no longer a going concern, and Asher had become Apple Records’ A&R man. He was impressed enough by Taylor’s demo to land him an audition with only an hour’s notice. (“I wouldn’t have slept for a week if it had been a week ahead,” he later recalled.)

Asher was floored by Taylor’s performance, and he called up the staircase for McCartney to hear him too. He and Harrison would join Asher in giving Taylor the seal of approval, and Apple handed him a contract.

Taylor had handful of heartfelt folk songs to his name, most pulled straight from his life history; “Knocking ‘Round the Zoo” was a humorous rave-up about his time in a psychiatric hospital, and “Carolina in My Mind” was a homesick ode to the Tar Heel State.

Despite the strength of the material, James Taylor’s production mostly reflects its era. McCartney and Asher brought in Richard Hewson to add strings, horns and harpsichords; his rococo arrangements threaten to subsume Taylor on his own record.

It turned out you didn’t need frilly production to appreciate this singular talent. James Taylor proved he could mix darkness and light into the same cocktail. “Like dust in the wind, you’re gone forever / You’re a change in the weather,” he sang in the autumnal “Something’s Wrong.”

Even in this youthful setting, he sounds wizened, as if he’d undergone enough brutal personal change to guide us through ours. Although he wouldn’t truly find his chops until classics like 1970’s Sweet Baby James and 1971’s Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon, James Taylor introduced the world to his singular voice.

In honor of James Taylor’s 50th anniversary, here’s a track-by-track retrospective of the original album.

“Don’t Talk Now”
As a high school senior, Taylor was interred at the McLean Hospital in Belmont, Massachusetts. “Don’t Talk Now,” the first song anyone would hear from him, refers to his emergence from struggling with mental illness: “Where I’ve been, you don’t know / And what I’ve got, baby, it don’t show.” If Taylor is mum on the details, not expressing much more than wanting someone to shut their trap (“Don’t talk roads / Don’t talk sand / Don’t talk dust, don’t talk no man”), then Asher’s fussy baroque arrangement helps this harsh medicine go down.

“Something’s Wrong”
In a 1973 interview with Rolling Stone, Taylor described the motivation of an addict in his own words. “What the junkie is looking for,” he said, “is something that will be the same every time and that will completely supersede all other goings-on.” “Something’s Wrong” is a moody folk song about how depression and addiction affects our relationships. He convinces the song’s subject to walk out on his unhappy home altogether: “Take some bacon, go and leave your watch chain / She won’t count on nothing more.” Coming from a singer who had a monkey on his back, “Something’s Wrong” comes off as all too real.

“Knocking ‘Round the Zoo”
Just as James Taylor threatens to come off as overly dour and one-dimensional, we get this razzing, comedic jam. Barring Suicidal Tendencies’ “Institutionalized,” “Knocking ‘Round the Zoo” could be the ultimate jam about being locked away in an asylum. Taylor wrote “Knocking ‘Round the Zoo” about his own experiences at McLean Hospital, but it could be a lost scene from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. To boot, it even features a Nurse Ratched-style battleaxe: “She’ll hit me with a needle / If she thinks I’m trying to misbehave!”

“Sunshine Sunshine”
On this Victorian-sounding deep cut, Taylor explores the relative merit of “sunshine,” “laughter” and “smiling faces” before considering the opposite: “Things ain’t what they used to be / I say pain and rain / Illness in the family.” Hewson absolutely loads up this lesser track with weeping violins and plucking harps. The arrangement of “Sunshine Sunshine” could be the audio equivalent of James Taylor’s cover photo, in which the singer poses uncomfortably in an ill-fitting suit with a leaf on his lapel. Bells and whistles didn’t flatter him.

“Taking It In”
“Gravy, chicken and rice / Isn’t it nice? / Tell me the cost of food.” Who knows what Taylor, Asher or anyone else was thinking on “Taking It In,” a bit of fluff that rounds out Side A. McCartney and Harrison were recording the White Album in the same studio as Taylor; perhaps self-conscious about their proximity, he sings off-brand Beatle-isms. “What happens when it rains for eight days on your week off? / It’s all a matter of opening up your eyes and looking around.”

“Something in the Way She Moves”
Taylor recorded one of his greatest songs, “Something in the Way She Moves,” in the midst of the Beatles — but he would end up feeding their muse, too. Perhaps swayed by his solo rendition in the Apple offices, Asher and Hewson left well enough alone: the man and his guitar were all you needed for this stirring ballad. Famously, Harrison lifted the opening verse for a tune he was writing for his wife, Pattie Boyd; his resulting hit for the Beatles, “Something,” was one of his most elegant contributions to the band. From a single, shared verse, both men wrote their most evocative love songs.

“Carolina in My Mind”
In Timothy White’s 2001 biography Long Ago and Far Away, Taylor described his Chapel Hill, North Carolina, upbringing as “more a matter of landscape and climate than people.” With his father often absent for military duty, he led a solitary childhood in rural environs. He distilled those memories into “Carolina in My Mind,” a mellow Taylor classic that’s become an unofficial state anthem. He’s not just lost in the past — the lyric about the “holy host of others standing before me” shouts out McCartney and Harrison. Perhaps the signal got through; they respectively played and sang on this bittersweet song.

“Brighten Your Night With My Day”
A rather slight and commercial track, but at least it uses Asher’s production to facilitative rather than distracting ends. On “Brighten Your Night With My Day,” a soft brass part accentuates Taylor’s jazzy phrasings, even as he sings about natural phenomena seemingly at random: “Daybreak, sunset, hot and cold.” There’s appeal in this vaguely bossa nova song if you’re looking for it, but sequenced next to the stone-classic “Something in the Way She Moves” and “Carolina in My Mind,” it floats away like mist.

“Night Owl”
The Night Owl was a real club in Greenwich Village frequented by the Turtles and Lovin’ Spoonful; Taylor’s first band, the Flying Machine, appeared there often. The silly, disposable “Night Owl” is his tribute to his favorite haunt, where a “catfish tends to groove on the water” and a “monkey kind of flashes on fruits and bananas.” Though the blaring R&B backing wasn’t Taylor’s strong suit, “Night Owl” is a hoot.

“Rainy Day Man”
“I was addicted all the time I was recording the album on Apple,” Taylor admitted in Mark Ribowsky’s 2016 biography Sweet Dreams and Flying Machines. “Peter didn’t know I was on junk. I guess he just thought I was really sleepy or something.” That said, it’s hard to hear “Rainy Day Man,” a song from his Flying Machine days, as about anything but a dealer. It’s about having a “hole much too big to mend” that warrants giving the titular character a ring. Even if “Rainy Day Man” is just about a generic magic man, its lyrics about dependence ring true for Taylor’s situation.

“Circle Round The Sun”
This tune wasn’t written by Taylor at all, but belongs to the public domain. It’s his reading of “I Know You Rider,” a traditional blues song that lent itself to the Grateful Dead, the Byrds, Joan Baez and many more. While Taylor may have pulled it out of his back pocket as filler, “Circle Round the Sun” gives a flower-power sheen to this old blues number.

“The Blues Is Just a Bad Dream”
Any flashes of sunshine on James Taylor are short-lived, and “The Blues is Just a Bad Dream” ends Taylor’s debut on a dark, forbidding note. It starts with him comparing his psyche to a tree in his backyard, with the “branches all twisted / Its leaves are afraid of light.” He goes on over a skeletal 12-bar arrangement, with eerie strings: “That nightmare had come to stay with me, baby / My thoughts just don’t belong.”

Taylor’s addiction would remain lurking in the background; he wouldn’t fully kick heroin until 1983.

The uncharacteristically sunny music on Taylor’s debut belies his lyrics. On James Taylor, a great American songwriter faced down his demons on record. It would just take a few studio pros to brighten his night.

PHILLY.COM — A night of reminiscing with old friends: the Eagles and James Taylor

by A.D. Amorosi

In Don Henley’s “The Boys of Summer,” the ruminative vocalist and cool cofounder of the quintessential dark Californian band the Eagles sang of a man’s aging process, reminiscing about friends lost and left behind. Henley’s great loss, and that of Eagles Joe Walsh and Timothy B. Schmit, was the death of bandmate Glenn Frey in 2016, leaving a creative hole akin to the Rolling Stones’ Jagger losing Richards.

“I don’t see how we could go out and play without the guy who started the band,” Henley told the Washington Post in 2016.

Two summers later, the Eagles have seemingly healed and filled that void, bringing Frey’s singing son Deacon into the fold — along with smoldering country-blues guitarist Vince Gill — and touring with genial, melodious James Taylor. Such California melancholy country/rock/soul and blissful, mellow pop was the perfect soundtrack to a breezy Saturday night at Citizens Bank Park.

Opening with the opulent vocal harmonies of “Seven Bridges Road” might have seemed odd, as it came from a band outsider (outlaw composer Steve Young). But Saturday’s finest moments radiated the plight of the insular outsider (“New Kid in Town” and dusky “Desperado”), and from songwriters J.D. Souther (“How Long”), Tom Waits (a noirish “Ol’ 55”), and Jackson Browne (“Take It Easy,” cowritten with the late Frey).

Despite the inclusion (infusion?) of young Frey and Gill (“the new guy at 61,” he announced), much was the same about the Eagles’ live sound. Their harmonies were so clean you could operate on them. At 71, Henley’s clarion rasp and cutting falsetto on groovers like “One of These Nights” sounded like that of a 20-year-old. Schmit’s high voice on ballads like “I Can’t Tell You Why” made him sound like a baby Barry Gibb (Schmit is also pop’s most underrated bassist, with a signature fluidity that gives the Eagles their soulful heft). The group has been criticized for its live, rote, note-by-note perfection, but precision like that was to be applauded.

Frey — wearing a Phillies shirt, cheering Philadelphia’s Eagles for the team’s Super Bowl victory — looked exactly like his old man on the cover of 1973’s Desperado. Deacon’s plaintive voice sounded like pop’s as he warbled through the country-like “Take it Easy” and “Peaceful Easy Feeling.” The surprise was how many Glenn Frey songs Gill sang (they were pals for 35 years), and how soulful and comfortable he sounded coursing through the louche “Tequila Sunrise” and “Lyin’ Eyes.”

Where things were different was how expansive several of the Eagles’ hits have become, such as the diabolical Morricone-esque take on “Hotel California.” When it came to loosening rules, blame Walsh and country-jazz guitarist Steuart Smith for giving “Witchy Woman” its bluesy rattlesnake rumble, crafting a series of unbound, expressive solos, and adding massive doses of dusty funk to the proceedings. All that was topped with a surprising number of aggressive solo Walsh numbers (“Life’s Been Good”), slide guitar, and talking, box-driven tracks from his James Gang days (“Funk #49”), and his disco-sounding Eagles hit, “In the City.”

It’s weird to think the future of the Eagles could be in the hands of Walsh and Gill doing more of their thing within the legendary band’s framework (Gill performed his own “Don’t Let Our Love Start Slippin’ Away”), but, to partially quote Henley at the show’s start, “we’ll keep playing these touchstones, because things are changing fast.”

While a vast understatement to the Eagles’ big show, Taylor offered a lovely, lively and supple opening set.

Filled with his unmistakably understated and vibratoless crooning on smartly literate and sweet ballads such as “Sweet Baby James,” “Fire and Rain,” and the quaintly tender “Carolina on My Mind,” Taylor turned a huge stadium into a back porch on a quiet morning. Yet, he and his large ensemble didn’t shy away from grooving, horny R&B as they tackled the dirty blues of “Steamroller” and the playful “Mexico.”

For a sound so intimate, Taylor’s rich, gentlemanly tenor, his kind, cool demeanor, and the curvaceous chord changes of his memorably melodious songs filled up every inch of Citizens Bank Park. It was an elegant start to a perfect evening.

source: http://www.philly.com/philly/entertainment/eagles-james-taylor-tour-concert-review-citizens-bank-park-20180729.html

MILWAUKEE JOURNAL SENTINEL – How sweet it was seeing James Taylor and Bonnie Raitt together at Summerfest

By Piet Levy

Controversy is the last word you’d ever associate with James Taylor, but the celebrated singer-songwriter took a very small amount of heat four years back when he was caught on camera comparing the fans at his last Milwaukee show to wood at an Illinois gig.

He apologized. But honestly, he was right. And honestly, Taylor was very wooden himself that night.

That certainly wasn’t the case during his two-hour Summerfest show Thursday at the American Family Insurance Amphitheater. From the beautifully rendered video backdrop — often reflecting a cinematic scrapbook — to spectacular and engaged renditions of his gems, this show was vastly superior in every way.

One reason Taylor may have had a bit of pep in his step: his opener and practically lifelong friend Bonnie Raitt, whom Taylor introduced himself Thursday, calling her “as generous and gracious a soul that walks this earth.” And she came as close to living up to those words as any person could performing on stage for an hour.

This was one of the first shows Raitt has performed since an undisclosed medical issue forced her to cancel the first leg of Taylor’s tour. When she said she felt grateful she could still perform, it clearly wasn’t a line. Neither was her praise for friend and Milwaukee music veteran Paul Cebar, who welcomed Raitt as his guest on his WMSE-FM (91.7) show. In addition to Cebar, Raitt praised the talent of several Milwaukee musicians, quite high praise from an 11-time Grammy winner.

Across 10 songs, she showed she was worth every accolade and then some, including a smoking blues-rock rendition of Talking Heads’ “Burning Down the House” (with Ivan Neville’s keys throwing a bit of gas on the flames).

And she dedicated a sparsely gorgeous cover of John Prine’s “Angel From Montgomery” to women suffering around the world, including those “separated from their children right now,” an apparent reference to the immigration crisis.

And before she wrapped up, she slapped on some lipstick as Taylor returned to the stage to jam along to John Hiatt’s “Thing Called Love,” the friends huddling together, electric guitars in hand.

Raitt returned the favor during Taylor’s encore, sitting by his side for an intimate rendition of “You Can Close Your Eyes” and paying tribute to Chuck Berry with her own sweet and spicy guitar riffs to “Johnny B. Goode.”

Taylor was accompanied by 10 other excellent musicians who brought the best out of his material. Andrea Zonn’s dusty fiddle solo set the tone for “Country Road” before Steve Gadd’s thunderous drums took the tune off-roading. Cuban percussionist Luis Conte quickened the show’s pulse with some Latin jazz-infused takes on “First of May” and “Mexico.” Lou Marini, best known from “The Blues Brothers,” supplied sweet sax notes for “Don’t Let Me Be Lonely Tonight” and Arnold McCuller’s soulful falsetto brought a gentle glow to “Shower the People.”

They all seemed to really fire up Taylor, who offered jumps and Chuck Berry-style stage struts, even an excitable “woo,” in addition to his more mellow moments. He rightly lavished the band with praise early in the night — before turning over his acoustic guitar to reveal a note that read “Help Me” in big letters.

It was one of several funny, and some not-so-funny, bits. Taylor actually dropped an F-bomb talking about the crude joke his dad used to make that partially inspired “May.” “Handy Man” was accompanied by footage of construction mishaps akin to an “America’s Funniest Home Videos” montage. And “Steamroller” — which featured great moments from guitarist Michael Landau, pianist Kevin Hays and trumpet player Walt Fowler — was nearly ruined by Taylor’s cringe-inducing, bluesman-style vamping. It was like something you’d see Michael Scott do on “The Office.”

But Taylor was sincere, and engaged, when he needed to be, particularly during a loving cover of Carole King’s “You’ve Got a Friend.” As he sang, he even ad-libbed a few things to say about his Milwaukee fans: “Everyone here at Summerfest is the best.”

Well, thank you, James. You’re pretty great yourself.

source: https://www.jsonline.com/story/entertainment/festivals/summerfest/2018/06/29/how-sweet-seeing-james-taylor-and-bonnie-raitt-summerfest/744173002/

ON MILWAUKEE — How sweet it was: James Taylor and Bonnie Raitt charm the Big Gig crowd

By Lori Fredrich

It’s not often you experience a show put on by two musical veterans whose combined experience comprises nearly a century. But last night’s American Family Insurance Amphitheater show featuring James Taylor and special guest Bonnie Raitt offered exactly that.

Raitt was less an opening act than Taylor’s partner in crime; they’re friends delighted to be on the road together, and together their performances rang far more true as a double billing.

The show began with an appearance from Taylor, who took the stage and addressed the crowd with a humble introduction: “It’s my great honor and pleasure to introduce to you the woman, who in my opinion epitomizes the musical art of our generation … my dear, beloved friend, Miss Bonnie Raitt.”

Taylor slid into the background as Raitt took her place on the glowing purple-lit stage showcasing the backdrop of a vibrant sunset, she remarked: “We’ve never played this big giant, but we’re gonna fill it up …”

And fill it up she did.

Raitt, who missed the opening leg of her tour with Taylor due to emergency surgery, was in prime form, effortlessly moving between genres – from acoustic blues to funk, R&B and pop – with deft guitar and impassioned vocals.

In fact, her too-short hour-long set was quintessential Raitt, complete with Delta-style bottleneck work, political commentary and a bit of roadhouse rumble.

Raitt has always been a gifted interpreter, magically taking ownership of songs she may not have written but may as well have. And her show at the Amp aptly demonstrated her talent.

Over the course of the next hour, Raitt showcased her prowess on electric guitar with a rollicking, music festival appropriate version of the Fabulous Thunderbirds cover “I Believe I’m in Love” and poured an impressive bit of heart into an acoustic soulful version of “Devil Got My Woman,” a song written by Delta blues singer and songwriter Skip James. She also grooved from behind a keyboard to “Nick of Time,” a song she performed with Arnold McCuller, a James Taylor All-Star Band member and solo artist who has appeared on numerous Raitt albums.

Meanwhile, her trademark slide provided the connective tissue for an ultra-sexy, amped up version of “Need You Tonight,” a song that went beyond simple nostalgia and became something worthy of homage to the late Michael Hutchence.

Her commentary was brief, but ranged from political to personal.
Before drifting into the uncannily appropriate “Everybody’s Crying Mercy” by jazz artist Mose Allison, the vocally political singer took a brief jab at President Donald Trump, having noted the sluggishness of traffic caused by his Milwaukee visit, “I wonder how much that cost? I guess we’ll find out …” she noted.

Throughout her 10-song set, she clearly exhibited her 11-time Grammy-winning worthiness while graciously offering nods to numerous Milwaukee musicians – including friend and artist Paul Cebar, who’d featured her as a guest on his WMSE-FM show.

Although the audience took a while to warm up, Raitt got them going with crowd-pleasers like “Something to Talk About,” her raspy vocals purring the lyrics as the crowd sang along. Meanwhile, she dedicated a beautiful rendition of John Prine’s “Angel From Montgomery” to women around the world, including those “separated from their children,” evoking a standing ovation from a formerly seated crowd.

After a fiery jaunt through the Talking Heads’ “Burning Down the House” which brought the crowd to its feet, Raitt wrapped up her set, welcoming Taylor back to the stage.

The two friends took up their guitars and played “A Thing Called Love.” And while their voices didn’t blend perfectly, the admiration and affection between them was palpable. And it reverberated into the audience, the majority of which remained standing, bobbing and tapping their feet in participatory bliss.

Taylor performed his show with an exceedingly talented group of musicians, including percussionist Steve Gadd and “Blues Brothers” sax player Lou Marini. A moving performance of “Country Road” featured a stirring fiddle solo from Andrea Zonn, while Cuban percussionist Luis Conte added international flair with Latin-inspired grooves on both “First of May” and “Mexico.”

The evening was dappled with “Grandpa” jokes, brief zingers delivered in Taylor’s classically awkward-yet-endearing style. There were also self-deprecating stories, told playfully, often as keen set-ups for songs.

During “Sunny Skies,” the audience was treated to funny little home videos of Taylor’s dog, of which he remarked: “There’s nothing we will not stoop to in meeting all of your entertainment needs.”

There was also amusing profanity. Before performing the danceable, salsa-flecked version of “First of May,” he told the tale of a little ditty his father was known to recite without fail every May Day: “Hooray, hooray, the first of May. Outdoor f*cking starts today.” But somehow, when James Taylor drops an F-bomb, it has a way of coming off vaguely sweet, even church-worthy.

“Handy Man,” a song I knew throughout my childhood only as the “Comma” song, was performed against a backdrop of comic videos depicting handymen of all stripes – some exhibiting the ubiquitous plumber butt, others operating tractors or heavy equipment – experiencing any number of amusingly unfortunate accidents.

There were also more personal selections. Take “Something in the Way She Moves,” a song he performed for the audition which earned him an inaugural contract with The Beatles’ Apple Records. Taylor relayed the story of the audition, which rendered him “clinically” nervous. He also threw a slight barb at George Harrison.

“Paul liked the song enough to sign me to his record label,” he remarked, “and George liked the song so much he went home and wrote it himself,” he noted with a chuckle, a reference to Harrison’s blatant use of the song for the 1969 Beatles hit “Something.”

Despite two hours of largely impressive performances, the show wasn’t without awkward moments. Take for instance, Taylor’s performance of “Steamroller,” during which the 70-year-old Rock and Roll Hall of Famer hammed it up, strutting across the stage with his screaming electric guitar, sometimes upstaging talented guitarist Michael Landau. It was almost a relief when the song quieted and Taylor moved deftly into the ballad, “Lonely Tonight.”

But those moments were largely overshadowed by beautiful musical interludes and impressive harmonies. Taylor’s voice – miraculously unscathed by time and excess – easily danced through the 20-song set without a hitch. And his delivery of moving lyrics, relayed without frill or pretense, gave credence to his reputation as the harbinger of the singer-songwriter era.

The personal nature of his work was evidenced in tunes like the “cowboy lullaby” written for his older brother’s newborn son, “Sweet Baby James.” During his performance, a video pop-up book featuring the lyrics scrolled across the screen, creating a mood that linked the audience to the song in a palpable way.

Between songs, he’d pause to offer generous – and well-deserved – accolades to a member of the band or to marvel at the moon rising over Lake Michigan. And one couldn’t help but realize how much this artist – a man whose complex journey was marked with both challenges and successes – is truly present, living life in each moment.

And even as he sang “Fire and Rain” for what was likely the 35 millionth time, there was the same clarity, the same emotion in his voice that there’s always been. And the lyrics – written at least 48 years – rang as true as ever.

To my surprise, I also found myself beaming during “Smiling Face.” It’s a cheerful song, for sure. But it was the way the video cameras panned the audience, capturing the delighted looks, smiles and moments of surprise as audience members realized that their swaying, singing countenances were being displayed on the big screen.

These moments held reminders that Taylor’s songs, his art, are intimately bound to both the everyday moments and emotions we all experience. It’s what makes his music so relatable. So infinitely singable. So real for so many.

The encore included a rousing rendition of Chuck Barry’s “Johnny B. Goode” during which a hyped up Taylor performed once again with Raitt, who added raspy vocals and spirited guitar licks. That was followed by the infinitely singable “You’ve Got A Friend,” and “You Can Close Your Eyes,” a duet that seemed to highlight the love shared by Raitt and Taylor while offering a soulful and heartfelt farewell to the audience.

It was a fitting close to a concert that reminded everyone that, in an age when music tends toward the homogenized and impersonal, there’s still an awful lot of heart and soul in the world.

source: https://onmilwaukee.com/seasonal/festivals/articles/james-taylor-summerfest-review-2018.html

STAR TRIBUNE — James Taylor and Bonnie Raitt deliver playful, electric show at the ‘X’

By Jon Bream

This rarely happens at a big-time arena concert: The headliner comes out at the beginning and introduces the equally famous opening act.

James Taylor made an exception on Friday at Xcel Energy Center, taking the stage to welcome “my dear friend, my idol” Bonnie Raitt, who certainly needs no introduction.

However, Raitt missed the opening leg of her spring/summer tour with Taylor due to emergency surgery. Friday marked her first night on the road.

Raitt, 68, has had major emotional nights onstage in the Twin Cities, where she recorded her 1971 debut album and her brother, sound engineer Steve, lived for more than three decades. There was the night at the Minnesota State Fair a day after Raitt’s pal Stevie Ray Vaughan, the guitar hero, died in a helicopter crash in 1990. There was the night at the fair a few months after Steve Raitt had died of cancer in 2009.

On Friday, Raitt had a different kind of emotion — joy. And gratitude. Both were expressed in conversation and in song. In fact, her too-short hourlong set was quintessential Raitt — acoustic blues, hot slide guitar, funk, R&B, a political piece, pop, rock, ballads and impassioned vocals in all styles. And some preaching politics to the choir of 13,000 fans.

Dedicated to women around the world, the slow and twangy/bluesy “Angel from Montgomery” has never sounded more penetrating. And a solo acoustic version of the Skip James’ blues chestnut “Devil Got My Woman” illustrated that whatever was ailing the Rock Hall of Famer, her voice and guitar skills are as potent as ever.

Raitt was able to cross pollinate with Taylor’s musicians, notably with Arnold McCuller, upping the sexiness of “Nick of Time.” And Taylor himself strapped on an electric guitar for “Thing Called Love,” during which the usually laid-back quintessential 1970s acoustic singer-songwriter suddenly transformed into a shoulder-shaking, knees quaking and head bobbing rock ’n’ roller.

That helped infuse Taylor’s mood for his own 110-minute set. He has never been funnier in concert in the Twin Cities. In fact, who knew he was funny? Playful with a gleam in his eye, he told self-deprecating stories, setting up songs, several of which were complemented with old photos and videos.

For instance, during “Handy Man,” there were videos of him repairing a fence and other workmen falling off ladders and experiencing unintended pratfalls. During “Sunny Skies,” Taylor’s dog pranced across the video screens.

“We’ll stoop to anything,” he proclaimed with a wink in his voice. “Pictures of the dog.”

And the 70-year-old Rock Hall of Famer hammed it up on “Steamroller Blues,” by mock duckwalking, extracting feedback from his amplifier and jumping (not a big one) to end it.

If the humor made this Taylor concert memorable, the music didn’t take a back seat. Backed by his immaculately sounding band, he sang with deep felt conviction, whether it was the folk-rock of “Country Road” or the soul of “How Sweet It Is.”

And, of course, Taylor gave the fans something to talk about by bringing Raitt out for a rip-roaring encore of Chuck Berry’s “Johnny B. Goode” and then a gorgeously tender sit-down duet of Taylor’s “Close Your Eyes,” accompanied only by Taylor’s acoustic guitar.

As he played the outro on his guitar, she put her hand on his knee. He smiled at her as he gracefully plucked away on the final notes. Then he kissed her.

An unforgettable ending to an unforgettable evening.

GREEN BAY PRESS GAZETTE — James Taylor, Bonnie Raitt deliver a night of cherished songs, friendship at Resch

By Kendra Meinert

ASHWAUBENON – James Taylor held out on “You’ve Got a Friend” until the encore of his concert with Bonnie Raitt, but it played like the night’s theme song before he ever started.

Songs so warm and lovingly worn they felt like an evening spent with old friends. Two old friends so appreciative to be back on the road together the heartfelt embraces were at times as life-affirming as the music. The music such a touchstone for a generation of old friends and lovers, you could almost see the affection wash over the audience like some glorious wave sent from 1975.

How sweet it was Saturday night at the Resch Center, where a sold-out crowd of about 8,000 basked in the happiness that comes with having Taylor turn the pages on one of music’s most beloved songbooks.

From the collective feel-good celebrations of “Shower the People” and “Your Smiling Face” to the slip-your-arm-around-your-spouse-and-give-them-a-peck-on-the-cheek moments of “Don’t Let Me Be Lonely Tonight” and “Up on the Roof,” it was nearly two hours of blissful reminiscing from the iconic singer-songwriter.

It was this summer’s version of last summer’s Billy Joel concert at Lambeau Field: nostalgic escapism of the highest order by one of the greats, the ultimate baby boomer Saturday night out, an electrifying stage production worthy of the grandest concert venues — give or take about 35,000 people. The original JT (pre-Justin Timberlake) might not have the same multi-generational appeal of Joel, but his show felt just as big and just as special.

Raitt was billed as a special guest, but it was more like a double bill both in stature and fan love. It was only her second night on the tour after having to miss the first leg for undisclosed medical reasons.

Raitt, 68, and Taylor, 70, have been friends since she was 20 years old, she told the crowd. He broke with concert tradition to come out onstage to introduce her and send her off on her hour-long set with a hug. The crowd responded with a standing ovation.

Raitt dedicated “Rainy Day Man,” one of his songs she cut when she was 24, to Taylor for his support during “recent tough times.”

She was in fine form, effortlessly moving between genres — from roots to blues to funk — grooving from behind the keyboards on “Nick of Time.”

“This feels pretty good up here, just like a little club in Ann Arbor,” she said after “Have a Heart.”

She dedicated her stirring rendition of the John Prine gem “Angel from Montgomery” to her mother’s generation, which didn’t have all the choices women do now. It earned her a lengthy standing ovation and left her visibly moved.

Then she and her four-piece band laid into the Talking Heads cover “Burning Down the House.”

Taylor joined her for a free-wheeling joy ride on “Thing Called Love” to close her set. She would return at the end of his for the Chuck Berry classic “Johnny B. Goode” and “You Can Close Your Eyes.” If one of them was more grateful or delighted than the other to be there onstage, it was impossible to tell which.

During a collage of photos, videos and interview clips that spanned the half-century of a remarkable career to open his show, Taylor says, “I don’t present a character. I don’t present a version of myself. I present myself.”

That approach defined his concert, as he introduced nearly every song with a story, accompanied it with personal photos or slipped in an endearingly corny joke (and two f-bombs in explaining how one of his dad’s sayings inspired “First of May”).

He opened with “Carolina in My Mind” off his 1968 self-titled debut. The stage cleverly transformed to look like his childhood home in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, which was sold in 2016.

The staging was spectacular, with a huge video wall backdrop and five smaller panels of assorted shapes that moved in front of it for a multidimensional effect. It was stunning and sophisticated — the stuff stadium shows are made of. (It’s going to look fabulous at the 23,000-seat American Family Insurance Amphitheater in Milwaukee for a Summerfest stop on Thursday.) It quickly put to rest any worries that Taylor sitting on a stool strumming a guitar would somehow be a sleepy affair.

No chance of it, not with his 10-member All-Star Band. They turned blues parody “Steamroller Blues” into a lethal jam, including a mean trumpet solo from Walt Fowler, and unleashed an arena dance party with “Mexico.” Flanked by backing vocalists Arnold McCuller (a standout all night with both Raitt and Taylor), Kate Marcowitz and Andrea Zonn across the front of the stage, “Shed a Little Light” swelled to show-stopping Broadway number proportions.

From the joyful “How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You)” to the poignant “Fire and Rain,” it was a night where the comfort of music won out over the weight of the world. A throwback to simpler times and a respite from the tough ones. An evening among good friends — onstage and off.

source: https://www.greenbaypressgazette.com/story/entertainment/music/2018/06/24/james-taylor-bonnie-raitt-prove-something-special-resch-center/682222002/

FORBES — James Taylor Showers The People With Love At Hollywood Bowl Show

By Steve Baltin

During the second of his two sold-out shows at the Hollywood Bowl singer/songwriter icon James Taylor did everything right to keep the collective eyes of the 17,500 adoring fans on the stage. He was backed by a superb band, one that he called “The finest group of musicians ever assembled”; he danced during multiple songs, with opener Sheryl Crow in “Mockingbird” and during a show-stopping “Mexico,” and he displayed home movies, like ones of his dog during “Sunny Skies,” prompting the self-effacing and very funny Taylor to call out the fact there was nothing they wouldn’t do to please an audience.

It was a brilliant show from a masterful performer. And yet many of the best parts of the two-hour performance were spent focused not on the stage, but on the audience. The people watching at a Taylor show is some of the most compelling part of the story, whether it was the guy a few seats away from me reverentially closing his eyes singing along to every song, wiping his eyes during “Sweet Baby James,” or the mother and daughter behind me, the mom crying during “Fire And Rain” and “You’ve Got A Friend,” the daughter smiling as she rubbed her mom’s back.

I remember years ago watching a Taylor concert on PBS and smiling as the camera panned over the audience, at least 50 percent, if not more, in tears as Taylor sang “Fire And Rain.” It’s understandable; the song still has that effect on me, as it did last night.

If forced to pick a favorite song ever, I’d go with “Fire And Rain,” and that’s been my answer for years, through countless life changes. And what’s remarkable is how the song stays relevant and meaningful through all of those changes, from first hearing it as a kid and thinking you’ll never see close friends and loved ones again as they move away or you drift apart to hearing it as an adult and thinking of friends who’ve passed away or mortality as you hear it and think of dying family members.

Watching the show last night, it was clear that as much as I might feel the song is the soundtrack to my life there are millions who feel the same about “Fire And Rain.” But for others it might be “Sweet Baby James,” “Carolina On My Mind” or “Shower The People.”

Though I’d argue Bruce Springsteen has the strongest bond of any artist with his fan base, you’d be hard pressed to find anyone whose audience feels a deeper connection with the songs than Taylor’s fans do. Once on the cover of Time magazine, in 1971, as the face of the singer/songwriter movement with a caption that read “The new rock: bittersweet and low,” Taylor has, at times, faced a backlash over the emotion in his music and maybe it is way too sentimental for fans who want to be cynically cool.

It is definitely uncool to share your feelings as Taylor advises to do in “Shower The People,” where he sings, “Just shower the people you love with love/Show them the way that you feel.” But that unbridled optimism and sentimentality have also created an almost 50-year career for Taylor, who has never gone out of style with his millions of fans or the artists who love him, like opener Crow.

Filling in stunningly for the injured Bonnie Raitt, Crow, who delivered her own string of hits like “Strong Enough” and “My Favorite Mistake” with a joyful and stellar precision, spoke numerous times about her love and admiration for Taylor, who she called one of her musical heroes.

The adoring throng last night related completely. Taylor is a hero to them, as obvious from the countless shouts of “I love you” and more from the crowd, including one guy who asked, “When do you go back to heaven?” But more than a hero, he is a friend, someone who makes his audience feel like he has been with them throughout their journey. Whether it’s an author, a filmmaker, actor, painter or musician, creating that kind of connection with any fan, let alone millions of them, is the mark of a great artist.

source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevebaltin/2018/06/02/james-taylor-showers-the-people-with-love-at-hollywood-bowl-show/

ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER — Singer-songwriter James Taylor delivers a terrific night of classic tunes at the Hollywood Bowl

By Peter Larsen

At the end of the night, as James Taylor sang the final notes of his last song, Sheryl Crow, who’d opened the show and had come back out to sing harmony on “You Can Close Your Eyes,” wiped a tear or two from her eyes and gave a kind of bashful smile as Taylor hugged her and smiled at the audience that filled the Hollywood Bowl on Thursday.

It was a warm moment on a night filled with many, and perhaps a small acknowledgement by Taylor that he knew he’d done his job well if it moved Crow, a star in her right, and the crowd, some of whom were also mixing cheers with tears, to feel something real.

Taylor, at 70, remains one of the defining figures of the singer-songwriter era that emerged in the ’70s. And with a catalog of hits and voice still strong and pure, he’s also one of the best still performing. (It’s been a good few weeks at the Bowl for this kind of music, with three nights from singer-songwriter Paul Simon just done as Taylor arrived for a pair of his own.)

“Carolina In My Mind” opened his two hours on stage, with Taylor sitting on a stool with an acoustic guitar and three backing vocalists providing gorgeous harmonies, and as the night unfolded that kind of lovely moment happened again and again.

The show at times felt like a family reunion of sorts, between Taylor and fans, who cheered early numbers such as “Country Road” and “Walking Man,” but also between him and the musicians he bills as His All-Star Band, each of whom got a separate introduction after a solo or featured spot in a song, with a photo or two of them as kids shown on the video screens like pages pulled from a family album.

And while his songs often have a wistful, yearning quality – a lot of these are love songs of different sorts – Taylor also flashed his sense of humor at times, telling a ribald story about his dad by way of introducing the Brazilian-tinged “First Of May,” or introducing his 1977 hit “Handy Man” as “a lovely song about a male prostitute.”

After a relatively laid-back opening run of songs the energy on stage and in the crowd started to pick up around the time Taylor switched from acoustic to a Carolina blue electric guitar for a gritty run through “Steamroller Blues” that ended with lead guitarist Mike Landau’s rousing solo, and after a gentler take on the Carole King-Jerry Goffin classic “Up On The Roof,” a lively version of his own “Mexico” which got the crowd to its feet once more.

But the true highlight of the night came a few minutes later in the back-to-back pairing of “Sweet Baby James,” the title track of his breakthrough 1970 album, and “Fire And Rain,” its biggest single, and one of Taylor’s signature songs. These two songs as much as anything capture the essence of the singer-songwriter genre in the intimate, personal stories the lyrics tell, and the sensitive, emotional accompaniment of his guitar and the band. On the album they are standouts, and at the Hollywood Bowl played live they were that on Thursday as well.

“Fire and Rain” is beautiful but quite a serious song, inspired by the suicide of a childhood friend, his battle with addiction, and struggle with failure and fame, so he rightly shifted gears to wrap up the main set on a more uplifting note, running through his own songs “Your Smiling Face” and “Shower The People,” before closing with his cover of Marvin Gaye’s “How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You),” all which had the audience on their feet to dance and sing along.

The encore offered more happiness for everyone including Sheryl Crow, who duetted on “Mockingbird,” left the stage for “You’ve Got a Friend,” the Carole King classic, and returned to close out the show with tears and hugs and warmth all around.

In her own hour-long opening set Crow, who replaced Bonnie Raitt on these dates after Raitt had to bow out for medical reasons, shared that the second-ever concert she attended on her own as a 15-year-old in Memphis was a James Taylor show and she was smitten from the first.

“He was wearing a white suit and I was so sure I was gonna marry him,” she said with a big grin. “I missed the boat but he’s still my favorite.”

She played a strong set of her own material, though traffic and long lines at the gates kept many from hearing “All I Wanna Do,” her breakout hit. She and her band were strong throughout, though, with highlights such as “If It Makes You Happy” and “Every Day is a Winding Road,” her closing number for which Taylor came out to play guitar and sing with her.

No tears, though. At least as far as we could see.

source: https://www.ocregister.com/2018/06/01/singer-songwriter-james-taylor-delivers-a-terrific-night-of-classic-tunes-at-the-hollywood-bowl/

VARIETY — Concert Review: James Taylor Brings Heart and Soul to Hollywood Bowl

By Malina Saval

James Taylor is Martha’s Vineyard in the 1970s, campfire circles in the New England woods and sun-drenched barbecues in western Massachusetts. He’s Boston’s Fenway Park and preppy college frat parties in the 1980s and acoustic guitar by the Charles River on muggy summer nights. And today, Taylor, American folk-rock hero with over 100 million records sold worldwide and five Grammys to his name, remains, at age 70, one of the most impactful singer-songwriters in the American music canon, a wistful and winsome troubadour with sweeping cross-generational influence. Just ask any of the gangly tweens sitting cross-legged around a bonfire roasting marshmallows at sleepaway camp this summer while singing “You’ve Got a Friend,” the Carole King-penned classic included on “Tapestry” but made famous on Taylor’s 1971 album “Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon.”

Taylor brought his All-Star Band and special guest Sheryl Crow to Thursday night’s Hollywood Bowl performance, the most recent stop on his summer world tour, which kicked off May 8 in Jacksonville, Fla. and runs through end of July. With a catalog of tunes teetering at the nostalgia-tinged intersection of mirth and melancholy (Taylor famously checked himself into McLean psychiatric hospital in Belmont, Mass. his senior year of high school), the nearly three-hour show was a night of familial warmth and blossoming camaraderie, from the musicians on stage to the fans in the seats, weepy and laughing and dancing at intervals as Taylor performed hits ranging from “Carolina In My Mind” to “You Can Close Your Eyes,” his closing encore number with Crow, stepping in for previously booked guest Bonnie Raitt, who will be rejoining Taylor’s tour following her recovery from an unspecified medical condition and surgery.

A theatrical backdrop of falling leaves accompanied Taylor on “Walking Man,” evoking those crisp, autumn East Coast days for which the song, off Taylor’s 1974 album of the same name, seems always just right. During ”Steamroller Blues,” Taylor danced across the stage as the song crescendoed into its hardcore bluesy peak, his signature cabbie hat turned to the back. “That got a little out of control,” joked Taylor, flipping his hat back around. After “Don’t Let Me Be Lonely Tonight,” “Handy Man,” “Up on the Roof” (his rendition of the Gerry Goffin and King-penned song made famous by the Drifters) and “Mexico,” with backdrop visuals featuring a vibrant explosion of saturated splatter-painted pinks and blues and greens, Taylor segued into “Something in the Way She Moves,” the romantic ballad he auditioned with in 1968 for Paul McCartney and George Harrison, who would go on to sign Taylor to Apple Records, the first artist signed to the Beatles’ London-based label.

“Pretty much the whole decade is missing,” said Taylor of that period, during which he infamously struggled with an addiction to heroin that nearly killed him, an addiction from which then-wife Carly Simon could not save him. It took, in fact, the fatal overdose of close friend John Belushi to help turn things around for Taylor, who writes about the experience in “That’s Why I’m Here,” off his 1985 studio album of the same name.

“I’m pretty sure I was nervous,” Taylor added of the audition. “I’ve also been told I had a good time.”

In the midst of a set that included “Sweet Baby James,” a “cowboy lullaby” Taylor wrote and recorded for his newborn nephew in 1969, and “Fire and Rain,” the teary 1970 song recounting a friend’s suicide and Taylor’s own experience with depression, failure and fame, a female fan in the crowd called out, “I love you, James Taylor!” In response, Taylor, ever so charming, quipped, “This is so sudden. I love you, too. I can’t explain it, but there it is.”

“Your Smiling Face” and “How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved by You),” Taylor’s spin on Marvin Gaye’s 1964 hit single, brought the Bowl audience to its collective feet, while McCuller’s spirit-filled, gospel-inspired solo during “Shower the People” was a mesmerizing showstopper, complete with projected video clips of audience members dancing, singing and clapping.

Crow returned to the stage to pair with Taylor on the peppy, flirty “Mockingbird,” the Inez and Charlie Foxx tune Taylor and Simon re-recorded for Simon’s 1974 studio album “Hotcakes.” And, of course, Taylor made sure to sing “You’ve Got a Friend,” the feel-good anthem of togetherness and love of deacdes gone by, kept alive by those who sing “winter, spring, summer and fall” today.

James Taylor & His All-Star Band returns to the Hollywood Bowl Friday night with special guest Sheryl Crow.

source: https://variety.com/2018/music/concert-reviews/james-taylor-hollywood-bowl-2019-1202828623/