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Home > Austin Music Source > Archives > 2008 > March > 16 > Entry
SXSW review: Was (Not Was)
Best show, far and away: Was (Not Was), who probably played the last note of SXSW, since La Zona Rosa staff finally had to turn the lights on Saturday night and point us all toward the exit. If they’d given the band 10 more minutes, they could have just finished tearing the roof off, so we could all leave via levitation.
The band has been on a very long semi-hiatus — leader-bassist Don Was said it was the first show they’d played with all three original singers since 1992 (and the band’s first show in Texas in 20 years). But instead of sounding like they were shaking the dust off, they played like a band just peaking.
They opened with the Temptations’ “Papa Was a Rolling Stone,” a song you better not even try to go near unless you conveniently happen to have three singers as fantastic as Sweetpea Atkinson, Sir Harry Bowens and Donald Ray Mitchell, along with a killer rhythm section and a great guitar player. Randy Jacobs played a couple guitar solos so wild, all you could do was gape at the person next to you and maybe after 30 seconds form the word “Wow.” Don Was played like a monster — and a happy monster, because he was playing with drummer James Gadson, whom he introduced as the guy who played on “Express Yourself,” Bill Withers tracks such as “Use Me” and Marvin Gaye’s “I Want You.” Gadson played some of the funkiest beats I’ve ever heard in my life, and I could not stop dancing even though I’d been dragging around all day with sore feet and a hinky back just waiting for SXSW to be over.
The unfamiliar songs they played from the forthcoming “Boo!” were as irresistible as old favorites such as “Walk the Dinosaur” and “I Blew Up the United States.” Let’s hope the tour behind the album will bring Was (Not Was) back soon. What are they doing Tuesday? La Zona Rosa was nowhere near capacity for Was (Not Was), probably because everybody was wiped out by then. People, you messed up. Unless you were at X.
Seriously, I just told someone Saturday afternoon that I was tired of music and only wanted to watch TV, but I would pay $35 to go see Was (Not Was) play a full 90 minute show tomorrow night. Actually, I would pay $35 to see James Gadson play Motown tunes with a lousy cover band, or hear Atkinson, Bowens and Mitchell do karaoke, or see Randy Jacobs play air guitar.
Comments
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By david was
March 17, 2008 8:21 AM | Link to this
MWAH!!!!!!!!!!
:0
David Bin Latte
By david was
March 17, 2008 10:51 AM | Link to this
Wow….
A big gracias and two margaritas are in order….
U Rock!!!!
;0
D