Legendary is a term tossed about a bit too freely, in these days of celebrity-obsessed madness. Anyone who’s made some mildly differentiated output or caught the public eye for 15 minutes and a few seconds seems to be in the acceptable pool from which to pull and apply the label. So when you get to see someone who actually does have the background, the body of work, and the still current mastery to carry the label with authority, it’s a real treat.
BERT JANSCH is someone of this rarefied group, a veritable giant of acoustic guitar, having made huge contributions to the British blues and folk idiom via his solo work, and with seminal U.K. group PENTANGLE. Even if most people aren’t familiar with the somewhat narrow musical spectrum from which Bert operated, odds are pretty good that most have at least heard LED ZEPPELIN’s first record, where JIMMY PAGE pretty much did a note-for-note approximation of Jansch’s take on the traditional “Blackwaterside”, claiming it as his own and renaming it “Black Mountain Side”.
Bert’s had some health issues over the last few years, but seems like he’s got them sorted enough to do a short tour over to the States, and a few lucky cities were the recipients. I’d seen JOHN FAHEY after his BYRON COLEY-fueled resurrection, but the skills had faded, and he wasn’t interested in playing the sort of music which drew me to him in the first place. Not so with Bert. Jansch is still clearly a top player, 40 years on and not missing any of the prodigious talent he started with and nurtured. Straightaway from the one-two openers of “It Don’t Bother Me” and “My Donald,” sorrowful and bitter resignation spill from the storyteller.
“Blackwaterside” was next, but Bert made no mention of Page’s theft, instead telling us he’d wrote it a long time ago for a girl, ANNE BRIGGS. He was also quick to give credit when playing songs he’d not written. KAREN DALTON’s turn on the traditional “Katie Cruel,” hers titled as “When I First Came to Town” (also covered by NICK CAVE AND THE BAD SEEDS) was from the most recent LP The Black Swan, but BETH ORTON’s sweet vocals from the studio version were missed.
He also played songs from BIG BILL BROONZY (“Trouble In Mind”) and of executed Chilean folk singer VICTOR JARA (“Let Me Sing”). The tone of that song was also expressed in a cover of “The Old Triangle,” an Irish song written by DOMINIC BEHAN (brother of the more well-known writer BRENDAN BEHAN), a very moving protestation against capital punishment. Indeed, Bert capped the regular set with “Poison,” proclaiming that “everyone should write a protest song at some point in their life.” The strength of the latest record was clearly demonstrated by the fact that the encore comprised of two songs from it (“The Black Swan” and the bleak “High Days”). Excellent night of music from a titan.
Opener PAT GUBLER (a.k.a. P.G. SIX) played a well-mannered set of modern troubadour music, sometimes a bit too mannered. He’s veered pretty far away from his more experimental days as a member of TOWER RECORDINGS, and now comes across a bit like a ‘00’s version of JAMES TAYLOR, albeit a more skilled guitar player.
