Palais Theatre
Friday, March 26
ON THE eve of the grand prix in the next suburb, Jeff Beck delivered an aural version of speed, power and grace that ended too early.
The applause was still ringing in the rafters after the second encore. Here was a master at work. He held court, imperious in his playing, playful in his almost self-deprecatory acceptance of the warm recognition for his work.
Beck doesn't say much in his shows, and he never sings. Why sing when he can play? And how he can play.
He was backed by Narada Michael Walden on drums, Rhonda Smith on bass and Jason Rubello on keyboards. Together they fused into a unit that displayed equal parts virtuosity and an organic cohesiveness. Walden and Smith at turns locked into grooves so ferocious and throat-pumping as to rumble to the centre of the earth and then broke out into jaw-dropping solos. They almost stole the show, but not quite. For this was Beck's night.
He stormed, shredded, caressed and cradled his way through Hammerhead and Big Block, soared with tremulous delicacy on Somewhere over the Rainbow and Nessun Dorma, paid homage to the Beatles with A Day in the Life and ended with another cover, this one of Stevie Wonder's Cause We've Ended As Lovers.
Beck on Friday night fused two hands and electricity into a higher art.
