Local
Grooves
Jackie
Payne-Steve Edmonson Band
Partners in the
Blues (Burnside)
Jackie Payne's got one of those back-of-the-throat squalls that'll
cause sistas to scream – in church or, in his case, juke joints.
The Georgia-born blues-and-soul journeyman has been plying his gospel-hewn
craft since the '60s, when Wolfman Jack beamed his "Go Go Train"
up the West Coast from a transmitter in Rosarito. Payne himself turned
up in the Bay Area a decade ago with the Johnny Otis Show and toured
with the Dynatones, where he met guitarist Steve Edmonson. Together
the singer and the picker deliver a refreshing take on mostly '60s R&B.
"That woman spends my money like it's goin' outta style / She gambles
just like a man, loses every time she go / She comes home broke and
mad and tells me, 'You can't cut the mustard no mo',' " Payne wails
in a raspy yet elastic low tenor on "My Money Ain't Long Enough,"
one of two tracks by the late Oakland tunesmith Al King on Partners
in the Blues. Other pearls are gleaned from the Little Willie John,
Johnnie Taylor, and O.V. Wright songbooks and served up with care and
passion by the partners and their solid, horn-laced band. The Jackie
Payne-Steve Edmonson Band plays Fri/20, Rasselas, S.F. (415) 346-8696;
Sat/21, Lou's Pier 47, S.F. (415) 771-5667; Sun/22, Half Moon Bay Brewing
Co., Princeton-by-the-Sea. (650) 758-2739. (Lee Hildebrand).
Variable Unit
Handbook for
the Apocalypse (Wide Hive)
If you miss the political urgency and evolved grooves of Gil-Scott
Heron, Variable Unit may provide some shelter from the storm. On their
second album, Handbook for the Apocalypse, core members such
as MC Azeem, Rhodes player Kat Ouano, bassist Matt Montgomery, and guitarist
Gregory Howe (aided by sax player Ralph Carney, percussionist Kevin
Neuhoff, flautist Tim Hyland, drummer Thomas McCrae, B3 organist Jacob
Aginsky, and DJ Sensei Quest) generate some laid-back jams and channel
generalized wartime anxiety and post-9/11 fear via lyrics and
samples of Howard Zinn and John F. Kennedy, among others. Too bad the
album also taps into one of my fears – of hearing the all-too-familiar
sample of William Burroughs grimly intoning "Towers Open Fire"
yet another time. But Azeem handles himself ably on the bottom-heavy,
buoyant title track, invoking Chicken Little, creating an air-conditioned
mood of paranoia, and warning of snipers, bombers, skydiving with scissors,
bottled air, and all-around lousy weather. Youth Speaks poet Paul S.
Flores's feistiness makes up for the lack of flow on "I Am on the
Journey to My Soul, But the Police Just Pulled Me Over," and the
band keep it cool throughout, occasionally rising to a refined bounce
on tunes such as "Beyond Babylon." In the end, V.U. don't
quite rewrite the book on politically conscious, jazz-drenched hip-hop,
but that doesn't mean this Handbook isn't worth cracking. Variable
Unit perform Fri/20, Boom Boom Room, S.F. (415) 673-8000. (Kimberly
Chun)
