| 94-09-24 | Supper Club New York, New York, America |
| Unverified |
| Setlist: 01. Last Goodbye 02. Hallelujah Notes: | Jeff performed as part of the CMJ Music Festival on that weekend, which also included American Music Club, St. Etienne, Grant Lee Buffalo, Soul Coughing. Jeff played at the Supper club, sharing the bill with the band Tindersticks. Doors opened at 7pm, and tickets wher $10. Below is the NYT review, from which the (incomplete) setlist above comes from: "I'm not afraid to love you," Jeff Buckley whispered from the stage of the Supper Club on Saturday night, and he meant it. At a time when many rock songwriters (and fans) are gingerly about love, Mr. Buckley's songs plunge into it like a kayak heading for the rapids, riding every surge and whirlpool. Folky guitar licks drift toward hard-rock stomps, which melt away; the words find more longing than bliss. Mr. Buckley's riveting voice reveals every shade of pain and euphoria, of yearning and shame. He started his set with a display of bravado, volatility and tenderness, singing without words against a hovering guitar chord. A sustained "oh" glided into earshot, held steady, quavered with the microtonal turns of Indian raga, moved into a blues curlicue and then changed to a liquid, feminine croon. Mr. Buckley has inherited the protean, androgynous vocal instrument of his father, the songwriter Tim Buckley, although he has also been listening to Led Zeppelin's Robert Plant and others. He's not shy about his virtuosity; he unfurls swooping lines that curlicue upward, then loop down with quasi-operatic inflections. Like a soul singer, he also lavishes ornamentation on repeated words, like "baby," or hushes the band so he can sing unaccompanied. He ended his set singing "Hallelujah" (from a Leonard Cohen song) without a microphone. Yet for all its power and control, Mr. Buckley's voice never sounds overbearing; instead, it seems almost humbled by the emotion that pours through it. There are rhythm-and-blues singers who can match Mr. Buckley's technique, but most of them use their skills to portray love as a realm of simple, escapist sweetness. Mr. Buckley finds turbulence instead; in "Last Goodbye," his determination to break up crumbles when memories and passion overwhelm him, even though he knows better: "It makes me so angry, because I know that in time I'll only make you cry." Like the Smashing Pumpkins, Mr. Buckley is reinventing psychedelia, this time as a reflection of inner conflict rather than transformed reality. And with his voice, a world of tumult and obsession becomes almost seductive. The Geraldine Fibbers, who opened Mr. Buckley's C.M.J. Music Marathon showcase, are a Los Angeles band featuring Carla Bozulich, who used to sing with the band Ethyl Meatplow. Her low, sultry voice is perfect for borrowed country songs about distraught characters, and for the band's own material about infatuation and revenge, with songs that build from country and folk-rock to the explosiveness of the Who. Tindersticks, whose members wore jackets and ties, were more conventional rock romantics, somewhere between Bryan Ferry and the folk-rock side of the American Music Club. Following Mr. Buckley, they sounded overly methodical. " -- (complete Review, "Love Songs Reflecting Maturity", JON PARELES, New York Times, September 26, 1994) |