Toots & the Maytals
Toots & The Maytals were one of the original Jamaican acts to experience international fame at the end of the 60s, and on this, their 50th anniversary tour, it was great to see that a large, mixed age crowd had gathered on a Sunday night to pay homage to this legendary band.
Before the main event though the audience were warmed up by Captain Accident & The Disasters a reggae band from Cardiff. I’m always a bit wary of white British reggae acts if I’m honest, but on the whole the Captain and band more than did a decent job of getting the crowd moving and they had an air of authenticity about their playing which pretty much won me over.
Toots & The Maytals we are told by guitarist Carl Harvey just as the set was starting, were the first act to ever use the word ‘reggae’ in a song title, thus naming the genre that took over from Ska & Rocksteady as the major musical force from the island of Jamaica. Settling immediately into a heavy groove, the band were soon joined by Toots himself looking resplendent in a two-piece red leather suit, a bold look that few could get away with. An issue I had throughout the whole night was the vocal mix, Toots still has an impressive voice, but it wasn’t high enough to make it the focal point in that way that it needed to be. The sound could also have been louder, it was just a touch too polite for my tastes. Still, the crowd were as animated as I’ve seen at the LCR for an older band, no thoughts of Monday at all, the whole floor was a dancing mass.
The set was peppered with some of their biggest hits – Never Grow Old, Funky Kingston and Monkey Man all getting a huge response. I found though, even during a single song, that sometimes there was a lull after the initial rush of recognition, before lifting back up again with the chorus. Some of the songs were also not as well known – new track Marley was pretty flat for example. I mention this chiefly to accentuate the biggest, most unforgivable disappointment of the night. After the band returned for an encore Toots said that they had time for just one more song and I felt a sense of dread growing within me. The encore of course was all-time killer tune 54-56, That’s My Number and what a great end to the set it was…BUT that meant they didn’t play Pressure Drop. They didn’t play my favourite song, easily one of their 3 best known tracks in a 90 minute set. Fun though their cover of Country Roads was I’d have swapped it for Pressure Drop in a heartbeat. So it was the night ended tinged with the sense of an opportunity missed.
Live reggae can be a fine line, it’s all too easy to veer towards the middle of the road. Toots and group largely avoided this; the band were top notch, as were the two female backing singers who massively helped to lift the vocals. It was a fun night, a good night and I’m very happy to have seen Toots & The Maytals live after missing them a couple of years ago, but if truth be told it could have been so much more if they’d turned up the vocals, turned up the bass and played THAT song.
