Jimmy Barnes

Soul Deeper: Live At The Basement (DVD)

The Basement in Sydney is ground central for jazz and blues in the Harbour City. A tiny club with low ceilings and the posters of athousand stars on the walls, the smell of tobacco and whisky always present. For one night only, Jimmy Barnes brought his soul revue into this hallowed room and frankly tore it apart. Jimmy's band had been drafted from the Mississippi Delta for the recording of his Soul Deeper album and they were, in the singer's own words, guys who had learnt this music before they could walk. Put the two elements together and you get a blues wailing, soul stirring rave up.

Jimmy's adventure in soul began a decade before with Soul Deep, a tribute to the R & B music he grew up with. At the turn of this century Jimmy went back to the deep South of the U.S. to further explore rhythm and blues, and the result was like Stax Volt to the Motown of Soul Deep. The harder edge of the Stax sound, the raw energy of Joe Tex, Otis and Sam and Dave suits Jimmy's enormous voice at least as well as sweet pop.

In these days of synthesisers, light shows, video clips and sampling, a rock show is often just a replication of something made in a recording studio. This is also true of R & B. The art of doing it for real, of getting to the elemental rawness, has become almost lost. For this show Jimmy assembled a band that could keep the groove still in the pocket, even as all hell broke loose on top. It doesn't get any more live than Jimmy Barnes at The Basement.

This evening began quietly enough with the sold-out house seated politely around tables and grooving to Respect, Money and Jimmy Ruffin's What Becomes Of The Broken Hearted, then you could feel the temperature rise. The crowd start to realise that this is not a cabaret show or some trip down memory lane like the band have done in theatres. It's pretty obvious from the sweat that's pouring down Jimmy's face that this is the real thing. This is like an R & B joint where the purpose of the exercise is to totally cut loose, to dance with the devil's music until you just can't dance no more.

By the time the set reaches Joe Tex's Show Me the tables have been cleared and the room is on its feet. They stayed that way through smoking versions of Land Of 1000 Dances, Chain Of Fools, 6345789, Ain't Too Proud To Beg, Hold On (I'm Comin'), Hard To Handle and Jackie Wilson's Higher and Higher.

Jimmy's other family is his old band Cold Chisel and he brought out his old soul brother from those days, Ian Moss. The lanky guitarist from Alice Springs is one of the great blues guitarists of all time and his mercurial touch put the steamer under Screamin' Jay's I Put A Spell On You. In the spirit of keeping it close to home, Jimmy added the one Australian composition that has become a jazz and blues classic, The Bee Gees' To Love Somebody, which he delivered with the level of intensity and passion that only Jimmy is capable of. Finally the band rocked out to The Easybeats' nugget Good Times, by which time the audience was as exhausted and sweaty as Jimmy and the band.

There was just enough left in the bottle for one last song, which was, appropriately enough, Arthur Conley's anthem Sweet Soul Music. The famous question "do you like good music?" was met with an overwhelming response from every man and woman in the room, "yeah yeah!"

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