J J Grey & The Mofro
02 Academy Islington , London, United Kingdom
Wednesday 18th March 2015
Given that his latest album on Provogue ‘Ol’ Glory‘ includes some fairly introspective cuts, JJ wisely opts to rock up his set here in London tonight by playing some of the new release plus some stage favourites and deep soul gems. The band hit the ground roaring as JJ plays some vicious wah wah guitar and sings up a storm, his Les Paul player rattling out the chords, bass and drums hitting an ominous groove and the fabulous horns blaring. From that point, the man from Florida can do little wrong and the sound quality carries this over, although this is one of those venues where if you’re not in early and down the front, you cannot easily move forward. Our lens man is made of sturdy stuff and gets some great images for us, shared with our good friend and ace promoter Pete Feenstra for his own site review.
Grey is a natural front man, sometimes playing guitar or strident harp and putting his blues–soul pipes to good use, his stage chat is natural and he seems pretty proud of his players. It’s a sort of Southside Johnny group sound moved South, horns a-plenty but guitar and keys driven at the same time.
Particularly impressive – ’99 Shades of Crazy’, ‘Light A Candle’ and ‘Everything Is A Song’..electric soul/blues as it should be delivered.
We did get the chance to meet the man ahead of this show and will feature on this site the chat with JJ – it hopefully makes sense of his sound and what he is doing musically.
Pete Sargeant
