Music from paradise
Rickie Lee Jones gives the Echoplex a long drink of her cool tunes
“You make me feel like a rock star,” said a smiling Rickie Lee Jones at the end of her Monday show at the Echoplex, where the veteran singer-songwriter had a weekly residency all month. Her run was supposed to end with this February 25 concert, but the local treasure has proven so popular, drawing a bigger crowd with each performance, that she’ll be back again next week.
Jones said Monday’s concert aimed to honor the many cowriters she’s had over her 28-year recording career. That was a rare treat for diehards, but even better was that the show lasted two hours and 15 minutes, taking listeners on a fabulous tour from her self-titled 1979 debut through last year’s The Sermon on Exposition Boulevard.
She offered rarely-performed numbers like “Tigers” (from 1993’s Traffic from Paradise), along with many fan favorites, including “Woody and Dutch on the Slow Train to Peking” (performed with cowriter David Kalish), “We Belong Together,” and “A Lucky Guy” – all from 1981’s Pirates.
Wearing a knee-length skirt, striped sweater, and high-heeled ankle boots that she eventually took off, Jones thanked everyone for waiting in the long line that had snaked down Glendale Boulevard. Eccentric and affable, she made dry asides and humorous offbeat comments about different songs, conducting her young band with the casual authority of an artist who’s used to being in control. While the set list was wide-ranging, the night had a definite jazzy bent, with strong flavors of Hendrix and the Velvet Underground, Van Morrison and Tom Waits, and even a dash of rock pioneer Buddy Holly.
Not all of the cowriters were in the house, but first up was Alfred Johnson, who played piano on a slow-ish version of “Young Blood” (from her debut album), while Jones strummed and jammed on acoustic guitar. She recalled performing on Thursdays at a La Brea club called the A la Carte, before crooning the poignant, heartbroken ballad “Company” while Johnson played electric piano.
“Sal Bernardi is in Paris, so I didn’t even bother calling him,” Jones deadpanned about her Pirates collaborator and onetime boyfriend, bringing out bassist Rob Wasserman while she took over the piano for the Bernardi cowrite “Traces of the Western Slopes.” She sang the ’93 Leo Kottke cowrite “Stewart’s Coat,” another moody, wistful number about pining for someone. The crowd clapped along to her boho slice-of-life “Weasel and the White Boys Cool” (another early Johnson cowrite). And the band got into an almost Stonesy bag when it sprawled out a watery, bluesy groove during the Kottke collaboration “Running from Mercy.”
Although the instrumental interplay with Wasserman and the rest of her band made for many fine musical moments, Jones’s singing was the best, most thrilling part. Her reedy, elastic voice has always been one-of-a-kind, and she got almost saxophone-like tones out of it, hanging dangerously behind the beat yet never losing a song’s thread, and punctuating lyrics with breathy intonations and throaty yowls.
Ghostyhead collaborator Rick Boston was on hand, and Jones spent a while with that 1997 collection, on which she experimented with trip-hop beats and samples. Highlights included the wry, scatty “Road Kill” and the title track’s keening, wraithlike exhortation. Her pit bull Julietta yelped along to “Lap Dog,” from 2003’s The Evening of My Best Day, and lounged on the stage during that album’s popular Dubya putdown, “Ugly Man.”
Jones wrapped up the timeline with songs from Sermon, her collaboration with Peter Atanasoff and Lee Cantelon that offered her own intensely personal take on the life of Jesus Christ, reflected in the testifying crescendo of the Velvet-y “Nobody Knows My Name.” But she closed the night by going back to the beginning, with the quiet rumination “After Hours (Twelve Bars Past Goodnight),” the final track from her debut album.
It was an epic circle, a comprehensive reminder that Jones has refused to be predictable since she made her mark with the 1979 hit “Chuck E.’s in Love.” Taking her music wherever she wanted it to go hasn’t been easy – and, indeed, her world is still small enough that her merch table was manned by her adult daughter, Charlotte – but, judging by the attentiveness and enthusiasm of the Echoplex crowd, it’s certainly brought her respect – and love. V
Rickie Lee Jones performs Mon., March 3, with special guests Petra Haden, Lili Haydn, Rob Wasserman, and more, at the Echoplex, 1154 Glendale Blvd., Echo Park, at 8 p.m.. Tickets: Ticketweb.com.
Published: 02/27/2008
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