Table 110,
Seat 3 – table for 4, 3rd row back, a little to the right of center
stage
Another
great couple hours of music in Annapolis. Boston soul
singer-songwriter-guitarist Jesse Dee opened with a nice solo 35-minute set,
almost all originals (I assume), with “A Little Bit Of Soap” thrown in as a
change of pace.
James and
the rest of the band were in their usual fine form, with an 18-song main set
that included 6 tracks from his new Hold
On! album, along with plenty of older Hunter songs and the inevitable cover
of The “5” Royales’ “Baby Don’t Do It”. He introduced one other song as a
tribute to Allen Toussaint, suggesting another cover was on its way, but it
turned out to be Hunter’s “The Gypsy”, which he based on Toussaint’s “Fortune
Teller”. The solos were particularly impressive on “Don’t Do Me No Favours”
near the end; I had figured that for the finale, but they went on to do two
more songs, with Dee coming back out to add some vocal assistance on “Believe
Me Baby” before the band left the stage briefly and then returned with an
extended version of “Talking ‘Bout My Love” for the encore. That song and “No
Smoke Without Fire” were the only two entries from one of my favorite albums of
all time, but I won’t complain.
