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Pop: Hot Ticket
By PHILIP BOOTH
© St. Petersburg Times, published October 12, 2000
Little Feat reborn
Shaun Murphy, a mid-'90s addition to veteran Southern-fried boogie band Little Feat, has a husky, bluesy voice (think Bonnie Raitt) that makes a sensible match with the sound of the reborn group. The '70s rock 'n' rollers, responsible for tunes as memorable as Dixie Chicken, Fat Man in the Bathtub, Oh, Atlanta and Feats Don't Fail Me Now, reorganized in 1988, nine years after the death of founder Lowell George. Their return has been marked by uneven success: Reunion album Let It Roll went gold, but Little Feat since has relocated to smaller labels. This year's Chinese Work Songs, with longtime members keyboardist Bill Payne, drummer Richie Hayward, guitarist Paul Barrere and bassist Kenny Gradney, offers a mix of originals and covers of material by Bob Dylan, the Band, the Hooters and Phish. Little Feat, plus Leon Russell and Roger McGuinn, plays Saturday at 8 p.m. at Ruth Eckerd Hall in Clearwater. Tickets are $29.75. (727) 791-7400.
-- PHILIP BOOTH, Times Correspondent
Low, slow and simple
Ever been in a noisy bar and a band goes onstage and begins playing sweet, sad, slow music and the entire bar stops gabbing and clanging beer bottles and you can quite literally hear a pin drop?
Me neither.
But disciples of the "sadcore" band Low, from Duluth, Minn., swear the trio's music is that powerful. Like a math fraction reduced to lowest terms, Low's music is stripped down, just guitar, bass and drums. The soft brushes on snare come courtesy of Mimi Parker, who is married to guitarist Alan Sparhawk. (The two have known each other since elementary school; isn't that sweet?)
Tremolo and reverb splash up the guitar. Bassist Zak Sally plucks economically. It's all remarkably spare and restrained. Sure, the music is melancholy, but it's romantic. Low's debut, 1994's I Could Live in Hope, is a make-out must for indie rockers.
Low performs with Ida and Isobella at 9 p.m. Friday at the Orpheum, 1902 Republica de Cuba Ave., Ybor City. (813) 248-9500. Tickets are $8.
The Groove thing
It's tough to tell where the funk stops and the jazz begins, and vice versa, in the music of Groove Collective. And that's a good thing. This oversized Big Apple outfit, at home everywhere from dance clubs to the 1998 New York Texaco Jazz Festival, is packed with first-rate instrumentalists and rappers who know how to throw down good grooves and pump out solos that are more than mere decorations. The group, together since 1993, makes references in its music to Sly Stone, Earth Wind and Fire, Stevie Wonder and Parliament-Funkadelic, as well as acid jazz and instrumental jambands like Medeski, Martin and Wood. Groove Collective, with Tampa jazz-funk-fusion favorites Beanstalk, play Tuesday at 8 p.m. at Tahiti Joe's, 1327 E Seventh Ave., Ybor City. Tickets are $8 in advance. (813) 248-5533.
-- PHILIP BOOTH, Times Correspondent
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