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Chicago Tribune, Chicago, Illinois (Wed, Oct 5, 1994) by Greg Kot: Love it or hate it, hip-hop and its quick-cut, channel-changing aesthetic continue to transform pop. Its energy could be seen and felt in the music of Luscious Jackson at the Double Door late Monday, even though the white, female quartet from New York isn't really a hip-hop group. Guitarist Gabby Glaser does deliver lyrics in a sing-speak style that could be called rapping. And there's deejay augmenting the group's guitar-bass-drums-keyboard lineup with turntable scratching and break beats. "Merengue! Pele! Reggae!" goes the irresistibly nonsensical chant of one looped vocal in the band's repertoire. But Luscious Jackson also delivers pop melodies that predate hip-hop and recall the tough-but-vulnerable '60s sound of the Shangri-La's, pounds out syncopated beats and keyboard fills from 70s funk and fusion (Roy Ayers, Gil Scott-Heron, P Funk) and ties it all together with a dose of post-punk, post-feminist attitude. To begin the set, there was this rather pointed message from bassist Jill Cunniff to some poor slob who done her wrong: "Hey, energy sucker, I'm a goddess, not your mother." It was a more convincing slice of sexual politics than "Strongman," an equality plea that didn't get beyond cliche. But the mix of sweetness and bite on "Citysong" and "Angel" was intoxicating, and the in-too-deep-for-my-own-good "Deep Shag" swooned even deeper. Like Arrested Development, Basehead and labelmates the Beastie Boys, among others, Luscious Jackson uses hip-hop as a way to reinvigorate and play with the rock format. In mid-set, Kate Schellenbach emerged from behind her drum kit to join the others up front for some line dancing, the music stripped down to bass, organ and tambourine. While the band proved adept at faster tempos in songs such as "Surprise," it preferred a more relaxed groove. Schellenbach is an inventive but unobtrusive drummer whose variations on the beat never got fussy, and Cunniff filled out the pocket with melodic bass lines. Glaser played guitar in the chicken-scratch rhythmic style of Jimmy Nolan and Nile Rodgers, while Vivian Trimble added splashes of electric keyboard. It was an effortless minimalism, funk at its airiest, that kept the crowd bobbing amiably like corks at sea (with the exception of a couple of rowdies who got tongue-lashed by Cunniff). Like all true children of hip-hop, Luscious Jackson made their genre splicing seem second nature. In the same way, opening act Ben Harper expanded on the bluesy, back-porch feel of his debut album with conga inflected rhythms. Stevie Wonder's "Superstition" and Harper's "Like A King" became extended dance-trance meditations, with Harper spinning like a bearded, braided shaman. |
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