Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
To wander into a cigarette smoke filled underground New York jazz venue during the height of decadence during the early to mid-1920s is a dream for those who see style and music as having an interlocked grip on the hearts and minds of those who attend certain gigs and performances; to step back in time, to feel a carefree sense of existence against the horrors that have perpetually dogged and beaten us, that is the dream of those who find themselves rightfully enamoured with Scott Bradlee’s Postmodern Jukebox and their jazz/ragtime artful twist they place on the contemporary and the beloved hits of the 20th Century.
Summer in Liverpool is within sight, the sense of expectation and free-spirited cool is upon the city by the Mersey and in a clamour of vintage appreciation, the passion that is adaption of the willing is edifying and classically captured by all within the musical troop on stage, and compered with class, delivered with deep satisfaction, and performed with immense talent…this was the undying brilliance of Scott Bradlee’s Postmodern Jukebox as they swung through a series of modern hits with a different flavour of musical view at their disposal.
Having the evening kicked off by their support The Lady Rise Duo, the opening of the main set was draped in first rate vintage, from Rock to Pop and Punk to one of the most celebrated songs of all time all performed with a tantalising harvest of expression.
Songs such as Def Leppard’s Pour Some Sugar On Me, Green Day’s Basket Case, Roxette’s It Must Have Been Love, Die For You, a segway of stunning performance in a snippet of Cell Block Tango (He Had It Coming) from the musical Chicago, Use Somebody, a haunting guitar solo of Eleanor Rigby, The Power Of Love, and a fitting, top draw, and haunting version of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah, with a mixing of The Beatles Let It Be placed within its shell in one of the most gratifying, heartbreaking, and alluring songs to have been played out on the stage of the Philharmonic Hall, and given spiritual energy by the fabulous Effie Passero.
This was an evening of high entertainment, the merging of style, history, and music giving those in attendance at the Liverpool venue a truly inspiring and valued memory; this was not just vintage in the clothes of modern appeal, this was outrageously good fun enjoyed by all.
Ian D. Hall