bigcoolguy.com

Last night (21 March 2005) I saw Jack Johnson at Canberra's Royal Theatre. I've seen him twice before at this venue - the first time he was supporting Ben Harper and I was very impressed with `this guy I'd heard a couple of songs by'. Jack Johnson's albums are now an integral part of our CD collection.

This time the usual combination of Johnson, drummer Adam Topol and bass guitarist Merlo Podlewiski was accompanied by keyboard player Zach Gill. At first this seemed problematic: this usually tight band sounded loose and flat. I tried to figure out if it was the piano playing - although the original versions of many of the songs do not feature piano, it sounded a little bit loose, but also in time. However, something still sounded like it was `dragging'. I spent some time looking at the various band members and none of them looked particularly inspired.

Then, after maybe 5 or 6 songs, a mix of old and new, they played Do You Remember from the recent album In Between Dreams and suddenly everything felt good. In particular, Topol looked to be having a lot of fun. Once I started enjoying the show the keyboards became a strong feature. When Gill switched to accordion and stood at the front of the stage with Johnson, sharing a lot more of the vocals, things were particularly enjoyable - they got into some really nice grooves.

The main part of the show climaxed with songs featuring support acts Xavier Rudd and G. Love. Although I didn't enjoy the support set played by Rudd (and I missed G. Love's set), both of them added a nice touch to Johnson's set. Included was a surprising and enjoyable cover of Madonna's Holiday, which blended seamlessly into the Jack Johnson original that followed it. Blurring one song into another is one of Johnson's talents, and he and the band use it well...

For an encore Jack Johnson played 8 to 10 songs solo, underscoring what a talented performer he is. He's a smooth character who is confident and inspired on his own. It was a little disappointing that there was only a single encore but, nevertheless, he did cover nearly all of the material from his 3 albums. Personally, I missed F-Stop Blues, which is one of my favourite Jack Johnson tunes.

All in all, a very good show. I don't mind starting with low expectations and having them proved wrong by an excellent performance. I'll be more than happy to go to another Jack Johnson concert... although I do hope he chooses better support acts...