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To be "Big in Japan" is one of those perpetual rock cliches. Images of a packed Budokan come to mind, with bands performing frighteningly over-the-top stage shows of Spinal Tap proportion. Cheap Trick were Big in Japan.
Jim James' guitar only has one neck (Cheap Trick's Rick Nielsen's had six, by way of comparison), and his band My Morning Jacket are not pushing platinum in the land of the rising sun. Playing to a crowded Paradiso, Amsterdam's premier concert venue, it's safe to say that the Louisville four-piece - James, along with cousin Johnny Quaid on guitar, J. Glenn on drums, and Two Tone Tommy on bass - are huge in Holland. "It's weird but awesome. Everything's so new to me, because I've been playing for years, and nobody ever gave a fuck." Deservedly reclining backstage on a long, black, and extremely comfy couch, James ponders the varying levels of success the band enjoy back home in the US and over in Europe - in Holland, of all places. "People are much more friendly here, and they're much more ready and willing to give something new a try. In America, 99.9% of people like the Backstreet Boys, Dr. Dre, and fuckin' Limp Bizkit - bullshit like that. So then you've got the other 0.1%, which is the underground, but all those kids like Slint, June of 44, and Cat Power - indie shit like that. There's nothing wrong with it, but people don't give things a chance as easily as over here."
Tonight, they performed a blistering, back-breaking show, and it's almost unfathomably difficult to imagine what shape My Morning Jacket will take on in a year or two. As confident as a rooster in a cage full of hens, James' presence is a treat to watch: He grips his guitar with all of the conviction of a wayward Southern Baptist preacher man, swaying, staggering, strutting around the stage. But it's not merely a Duck Walk - one that would make old Chuck Berry extremely proud - it's THAT VOICE. Every time Jim James opens his mouth, he exorcises the little demons hibernating in his soul. His voice - strong but tender, raw but sweet - soars high above the Paradiso's rafters, straight into the ether.
Propelled forward by an incredibly tight rhythm section and Johnny Quaid's gritty and deft guitar work, My Morning Jacket's repertoire is stunning. Southern Boogie, Blues, shades of New Wave even - it's all here in the miraculously poignant songs of young Jim James. "I get songs in my head. I just get them from nowhere, and those are the ones that are just really weird. They reveal themselves to me after a while, what they mean. Then there are the other ones - if I'm thinking about something I want to write about, then I sit down and try to figure it out. I just kind of play around, write lyrics... A lot of them come from nowhere. They just pop into my head when I'm in the shower. It all just comes in one big piece - the finished song comes into my head."
The next few years will be interesting ones for My Morning Jacket. At such a young age (James is 21), the band's future looks exceedingly bright. Jim, although, ever the modest, down-to-earth kinda guy, puts it simply: "We have to take everything one step at a time. The Beatles would never have been able to make 'Sergeant Pepper's' without first making 'Love Me Do'."
Watch out Osaka. My Morning Jacket are heading your way.
http://www.kindamuzik.net/achtergrond/my-morning-jacket/my-morning-jacket/494/
Meer My Morning Jacket op KindaMuzik: http://www.kindamuzik.net/artiest/my-morning-jacket
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