Line-up

Headliner
The James Taylor Quartet Last time in London: 1 month ago

Venue

Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club

47 Frith Street, Soho, W1D 4HT, London, UK

www.ronniescotts.co.uk/

View upcoming concerts

Additional details

Tour name: The James Taylor Quartet with special guest Yvonne Yanney

Doors open: 17:30

The James Taylor Quartet have set the standard for funky acid jazz and are largely responsible for the resurgence of the Hammond B3 in popular music. Their strong reputation as a live band remains to this day and their live sets focus on accessible rhythm-driven music, including plenty of improvised solos.

The James Taylor Quartet’s first single, Blow-Up (a funked-up version of Herbie Hancock’s main theme from the seminal 1960s film of the same name), was released in 1987 on the Re Elect The President label, which later became the Acid Jazz label. The track was championed by the NME and John Peel, appearing in Peel’s Festive Fifty chart for 1987.

The band’s debut Mission Impossible (1987) followed and predominantly comprised covers of 1960s film themes such as “Alfie”, “Mrs. Robinson” and “Goldfinger” in a rough, up-tempo, almost punk-like style, that was primarily focused on Taylor’s Hammond organ playing. Their second album, The Money Spyder (1987), was the soundtrack to an imaginary spy film, applying the band’s distinctive style to Taylor’s own compositions.

Concert in your area for Jazz.

Find out more about .

Live reviews

The James Taylor Quartet, are not to be confused with the country and western heavyweight James Taylor. This band are more of an obscure breed of music with their Acid Jazz and Jazz Funk breed of music that they have been writing and performing since 1985. They open with the song “Blow Up” which features some odd time signatures but of course the signature sound of a Hammond organ that glues everything together, and makes everyone dance. This is an all star band with solos being taken all over the place, such as Nick Smart on the Trumpet and Chris Montague on the Guitar. The audience is more of a polite and appreciative one rather than getting completely drunk and throwing beer around the room. James Taylor launches into what he does best, taking a solo on his Hammond organ which looks as though it was built in 1962, by someone on a farm. I can hear that is it being powered by a rotary motor from the type of tone that it is producing. Each song is a little bit of a jam, some virtuosic musicians playing music for themselves and getting a little bit self indulgent about the whole thing. They earned it though!

Report