upcoming

Soulive featuring Karl Denson (funk/soul/jazz)

What:

Funkin’ the Fab Four.

Some things never change. This past week, due to the impending 30th anniversary of John Lennon’s death, The Beatles music and influence seemed even more inescapable than usual in both media and conversation. How intense was it? Forget the lame iTunes announcement; to the horror, one would imagine, of a healthy portion of its viewers, even Fox News ran an hour-long special called “Fox News Reports: The Last Days of John Lennon.” Here locally, along with the usual “War is Over” banners that pop up this time of year, lyrical idealism could be celebrated at a Wednesday night gathering of Lennonites at Old Town Coffee & Chocolates. Like it or not, the nerve the Fab Four hit is still throbbing.

Being one of the most influential musical groups in history, it seems only natural that The Beatles are also one of the most covered groups. Licensing fees be damned. Though it might seem like an odd career move for a critically acclaimed, Hammond B3 organ-led funk/soul instrumental trio to make, the members of Soulive decided to ignore the inherent risk in attempting to breath new artistic life into a bunch of songs that people have heard, oh, a zillion times and indulge their less obvious Liverpudlian influences.

With just over ten years in the pocket together, Soulive have managed check a lot of boxes in the “people worked with” and “places played” columns. The New York-based group has opened for Stevie Wonder and The Rolling Stones, recorded with Dave Matthews, Talib Kweli, Robert Randolph and Chaka Khan and toured extensively in Japan, through most of Europe, as well as Russia, Brazil and Ghana. Next stop, HumCo, a place still enough in love with the 1960s to boast a population riddled with Beatles fans who likely would have never experienced Soullive had the group not “gone mop top” on their latest album and subsequent tour.

Released in September, Rubber Soulive presents eleven of The Beatles most familiar melodies in restrained but upbeat arrangements. The songs — which, to be clear, are not comprised solely of Rubber Soul tracks — often feature guitarist Eric Krasno handling melody lines, drummer Alan Evans hitting those skins with significantly more drive and nuance than Ringo could have mustered on his best day, and Neal Evans filling in the holes with tasty B3 soundscapes. (You can listen to a handful of excerpts from the tracks on Soulive’s label’s website www.royalfamilyrecords.com.) As you might assume would happen when an accomplished jazz group leans into three-minute pop dittys, the songs themselves often act as the framework for longer, more virtuosic instrumental workouts. You can’t trust jazz dudes to color in them lines.

You can watch those lines get scribbled over this Sunday when Soulive gets all Beatley at HumBrews in Arcata. On this west coast swing of their tour, the trio will be accented by the presence of San Diego saxophonist Karl Denson who, for many years, played in Lenny Kravitz’ band.

-Andrew Goff

When/where: