Steve Kimock
2013-03-31
the Session Room at Hopmonk Tavern
224 Vintage Way. Novato, CA
9:00 PM, Sunday, March 31, 2013

[9:02 PM go, 9:04 PM SK hello]

1. Crazy Engine †
2. Sun, Sun, Sun ☺♀
3. 5 B4 Funk †
4. That's What Love Will Make You Do ♀
5. Tongue 'n' Groove
6. Red Hot Mama ☻†
   [set ends 10:20 PM]

[10:52 PM musicians back onstage]

1. Franklin's Tower †♀
2. 54-46 (That's My Number) rap ♂
3. Hey Man †
4. TLC ♂
5. There's Gonna Be Butter ♂
6. Burning Down the House ☻†♀♂
   [12:06 AM Steve says goodnight]
    
   Encore
   [12:09 AM back onstage for one more]
7. Stella Blue †
   [show ends 12:18 AM]

* Andy Hess: bass;
* Wally Ingram: drums;
* Steve Kimock: guitar;
* Bernie Worrell AKA Dr. Woo: Hammond B-3 organ, Hohner Clavinet D6, electric piano, ☻ lead and harmony vox;
♪♫ with special guests ♫♪
* ♀ Sunshine Garcia Becker: lead and harmony vox;
* ♂ Chris “CB” Burger AKA Charlie Bravo: rap vox;
* † Jason Crosby: 6-string violin, harmony vox;
* ☺ Jessica Fierro: vox.

I had a great time on my first visit to this venue, which opened last Thanksgiving weekend. Located in a giant shopping mall next to Hwy 101, it's certainly got ample parking and easy enough freeway access. The Session Room is a long skinny space, somewhat of a rectangular box, approximately 40' wide and ~100' deep (by my wild-guess!), but with both the ceiling and one long side broken up a bit … a good thing for the sound, which was pretty darn good (thanks Charlie!). The low stage is placed off center, leaving room on Stage Right for backstage and bar access, and I was told that it was filled with several tons of construction sand, the better to prevent unwanted bass resonances. A steel beam about halfway back became the center of a small forest of mic stands; presumably recordings of the show will surface eventually. The house sound mixer's station takes up an enclosed space in the right rear of the room, leaving a bit of space on the left for merch and a few tables. And while the show was purportedly a sellout, after the first 30 min or so, it wasn't all that crowded up front – perhaps due to the mellow Marin crowd.

As for the show, it was lots of fun. I had a great time seeing SKB at Hardly Strictly last fall, and was really looking forward to seeing the band again – enough to buy tix to a Sunday night gig about 40 miles from home! Steve greeted the crowd with a remark about the band being psychedelically jet-lagged – a mysterious comment given that they've been touring CA this week, but they had been in Japan until Wed, so I suppose they still had their time zones crossed up. Jason Crosby joined the band as they began to warm up, apparently he's been playing with them on and off over the past week.

Thanks to Michael Zelner, I now know that the show started off with Crazy Engine. I thought I recognized the opener as an older SKB tune, Thing One, but after checking in on YouTube, I've listed the title as questionable, since I seem to have a poor hit rate on guessing the instrumentals correctly. Presumably the fan club recording will list the proper titles, and I'll fix things up later. Steve sounded really good, whanging away on a large Weissenborn guitar while Jason Crosby added interesting textural runs with his 6-string violin. Next up, Jessica Fierro and Sunshine Becker took Jason's place at center stage, with Sunshine contributing harmony to Jessica's lead on Sun, Sun, Sun while Steve spun silvery lines from his Gibson hollow-body guitar – our nostalgic “Meester for Easter” special, according to Steve's comments after the tune ended. Next, Jason jumped back up after Jessica and Sunshine stepped off, and the energy level ramped way up with opening rumble of 5B4 Funk. Steve rocked hard on his white Fender, and the crowd was surprisingly on with the big “Woooooo” shouts – hardly anyone coming in late or twice, though Steve still teased us with his cue, “now it's time to redeem yourselves” right before the finale. I particularly enjoyed how contributions from Bernie (teasing the Gilligan's Island and Flintstones themes!), Jason and Andy took this tune to new places during the jammy exploration sections.

As Andy began laying down the characteristic bass run for That's What Love Will Make You Do, Sunshine swapped places again with Jason, and off we went! Steve played his teak Cripe for this one, and Sunshine laid down a whole lotta scattin' in addition to the regular lyrics. Tongue 'n' Groove, an older Zero instrumental followed, with Steve starting out on the white Fender before switching to a really beat up, small bodied gold-on-black guitar for the finish. Jason rejoined the band, and they ended the set with a blistering funk workout on Funkadelic's Red Hot Mama, with Bernie singing lead while Andy teased various Hendrix tunes, notably Voodoo Child and Hear My Train A-Comin'.

After a half-hour break, the band returned, with both Jason Crosby and Sunshine Becker joining for a festive workout on Franklin's Tower, Steve starting out on the white Fender before switching to steel guitar. Things took a left turn next, as rapper Charlie Bravo swapped in as Jason and Sunshine swapped out. CB asked us if we wanted to hear some Toots, and while the band played the rocksteady classic 54-46 (That's My Number), CB rapped about this, that, and just about everything except the lyrics to the original tune. It was kinda fun, especially when Steve was playing lightning breaks on his Gibson acoustic, but it got me distracted enough that I didn't get around to noting my guess for the next instrumental – a slow tune, with a nice reggae break from Andy and excellent spacey dub keyboard work from Bernie. When CB returned for more after that, i kinda just screwed myself down to endure it. The message of his raps was certainly uplifting and positive, but it really wasn't what I wanted to hear, and the fact that Steve spent most of the time idly strumming acoustic furthered my disinterest. Still, a portion of the crowd was quite enthusiastic about the rapping, so I guess I shouldn't be too grouchy about it. I think the third rap tune was a Parliament/Funkadelic cover, as Bernie added enthusiastic harmony vocals now and then, but I didn't catch enough to identify it properly.

Burning Down the House was a blow-out finale (gee, who coulda guessed that was coming?), with Steve tearing it up on his big Gibson hollow-body while Bernie snag with a crazy off-kilter tempo that I found really entertaining. The string of jams led to a pair of crowd singalongs orchestrated by Bernie, the first splitting the chorus into a girls-guys thing and then just a collective shout of the whole tag line.

What with Steve's penchant for playing right on through to the end of the allotted time span, I assumed the show was over when they wrapped things up a little past midnight, but the mildly enthusiastic crowd hooted and hollered long enough to draw the band back for one more, a tender instrumental cover of Stella Blue featuring Steve on steel guitar, mostly unmarred by drunken sing-a-long.

Given the preceding description, you might be surprised to read that I'm sorry I won't be down at the Santa Cruz show tonight, but really, if I could master that trick of being in two places at once, I'd go, and I'm still looking forward to next weekend's gig with Zero up in Sebastopol.

PS: Double special thanks to MZ for setlist corrections and such.