Charmaine Jones @ The GovernorHindmarsh, Adelaide (31/07/08)

Sun 2nd Aug, 2009 in Gig Reviews

The blues enthusiast in me was looking forward to a Friday night journey through the rich and rewarding history of RnB music. Charmaine Jones and her band delivered a show that was technically good, but it missed soul.

The Roots Revisited show included songs by the usual suspects such as Chaka Khan, Stevie Wonder and Alicia Keys performed by a 10 piece band fronted by Adelaide’s Charmaine Jones. The format of the show was long and was inexplicably broken into two sets that were peppered with unnecessary costume changes throughout. The show began strongly and the first set was definitely the best on offer for the night.

A darling of the Adelaide jazz and gospel scene, Charmaine attracted a decent crowd that gazed adoringly at her from their seats throughout the show and shook their tail feathers on the dancefloor.

Charmaine and her backup singers, Kate Wadey and Jo Arulampalam, worked hard to engage the crowd with choreographed dance moves and heavy hitting vocals. Charmaine’s powerhouse vocals consistently hit the mark as she belted out renditions of songs by some of the world’s finest singers. I was disappointed that the songs stayed true to their original form, hoping that Charmaine would make her mark with innovation and some originality.

Given that the songs were performed as wrote, I found myself a little bamboozled by the need to have sheet music in front of all of members of the band, Charmaine included.

Roots Revisited delivered a standard cover show by musicians that are capable of so much more. It was a very good technical performance and the vocalists and band delivered spot-on renditions punctuated with two cracking sax and guitar solos.

As I left the Gov, I couldn’t help but feel let down by the promise of the night. Charmaine Jones is a fine vocalist and her band consisted of some of Adelaide’s best session musicians, but the show lacked the passion and creativity that I was searching for.