Jeff Beck with the Jan Hammer Group - Live

Jeff Beck with the Jan Hammer Group Live

This is a live collection documenting the tour subsequent to the timeless Beck release Wired, and at its best, it builds on the muscular, peerless power of that period of Beck's output, even if it ocasionally trips over itself. The backing band is of course led by ex-Mahavishnu Orchestra keyboardist Jan Hammer, but otherwise not as interesting as past Beck sidemen like drummers Richard Bailey and Narada Michael Walden (another Mahavishnu alum).

The opener is Freeway Jam, and it is a juicy piece of jazz-rock, with an almost southern tweak to it in spots. Lots of furious playing, but none of it aimless. In other spots, songs seem to reflect various motifs; funk vamps reminiscent of Stevie Wonder (who wrote for Beck the classic Superstitious but ended up recording it himself at his managers request) and staccato peaks of crisp melody lines, delta blues snarl (especially on She's A Woman) and some incendiary fusion shredding. While Beck's expressiveness has improved over the years, the truth is he seems to have been born into music with a fully developed and highly resolute musical persona. Even when the material is not his best, his personal contributions in performance are very much up to snuff.

About the only weak spots are the few vocals (Jan...stick to the ivories wouldja? Thanks), the one notable exception being the vocoder on Full Moon Boogie, which just skates through pretty cleanly, as does the aggro electric violin by Steve Kindler. I think my favorite track right now is the long and involved madness of Darkness/Earth in Search of the Sun, which is a mutant piece of electrified chamber-fusion that builds a slow but relentless climb to fruition. The Hendrix meets Mahvishnu blues-freakdown of closer Blue Wind is also memorable.