Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

There are spaces in life which are just too big to be filled by anybody or anything else. Whilst they are not around the hole gets bigger, it is more and more noticeable and the bleak feeling they leave in their absence turns to raging at the moon and the cursing the stars.

For Edgar Jones to have been away from the Liverpool stage is akin to feeling adrift on a sea with only a single plank to sit upon as the sea crashes around your mid-rift, it is unfathomable why the predicament should have happened and the world is somehow poorer for it having taken place.

The surprise for many attending Dr. John’s gig at the Liverpool Philharmonic was having the undoubted and rampant voice of Edgar Jones striding with confidence and agility, despite stating with sincerity and humility that he wished he had been on better form, it was an understatement that did him proud as he captivated the Philharmonic Hall audience with a quiet rage, the voice of angel who has found out that his maker has been lying to him and is not in the mood for deceit from someone of lesser standing.

If Liverpool audiences have missed Edgar Jones then his voice, a mixture of seething beauty and thundering growl but stirred with absolute passion, has been that hole and ahead of Dr. John, it was great to see the cavity start to shrink and contract. Tracks such as Mellodown, Acting My Age, Foolish Ways, the superb new track Wait and Hard Act To Follow were delivered with polish and unmistakable refinement, and despite his protestations, Edgar Jones was truly on so much form that he really was a hard act to follow; even for the likes of the legendary Dr. John.

Outside forces may have conspired to keep Edgar Jones from the Liverpool scene but no hole is allowed to get too big, no hole is legitimate enough in which to keep such a man down, thankfully holes have no voice, no say in the matter, all that matters in the end is that Edgar Jones has taken back what was left behind and music is better for it.

Ian D. Hall