Cleary a New Orleans treasure
The Star Ledger - August 7, 2006
BY BRADLEY BAMBARGER

NEW YORK -- That New Orleans produces the world's funkiest rhythm sections was an unassailable truism long before rock'n' roll, as well as after. One wonders if, with all the city's post-Katrina challenges, the lineage can continue. Such worries were put off on Friday, though, as Jon Cleary and his Absolute Monster Gentlemen shook the chandeliers at Coda as if the Manhattan club were an especially busy bordello.

The Cleary foursome's groove is tight but loose, with the way the air moves around the beat being the Crescent City's secret spice. Yet, true to their ideal name, the group has gentler virtues to go along with that monstrous pulse. The rhythm eventually got Friday-night dirty in "Unnecessarily Mercenary," but the tag-team vocals that introduced the song were Sunday-morning sweet.

Bassist Cornell Williams, guitarist Derwin Perkins and drummer Terence Higgins making like choir boys behind singer/pianist Cleary illustrated the fine line that divides R&B and gospel in the South. But nighttime is their right time: For three hours on either side of midnight, they thrilled the full house by putting extra grease into highlights from Cleary's four albums plus a string of New Orleans classics.

The forty-something Cleary -- born in England but a fixture in New Orleans for two decades -- is known for his wide-brimmed hats and an ability to wear musical erudition like easy charm. His bread-winning gig is as Bonnie Raitt's keyboard player, and she has incorporated several Cleary tunes into her own songbook.

Cleary's playing style -- the settings on his digital keyboard switched from ivory-hued piano to gritty clavinet and back -- mixes Professor Longhair, Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder into one roiling gumbo. Like any Crescent City pianist, he's always ready to rumba, with his solo introduction to Professor Longhair's deathless "Tipitina" embodying the "Latin tinge" that Jelly Roll Morton first touted as essential to New Orleans music.

From 1990's "Alligator Lips and Dirty Rice" to 2004's "Pin Your Spin," Cleary's albums have been increasingly well-crafted, as meticulous as they are muscular. But, as with most New Orleans music, that art is a pale imitation of life. The instrumental "Ain't Nuttin' Nice" was far earthier in the flesh, with Williams' bass tone rivaling any bone-rattling subway. Cleary is also an especially expressive singer off the cuff, his gruff melisma putting the muddy water into his "Port Street Blues."

Early on, Higgins kicked off "C'Mon Second Line" with a drum solo that served as an object lesson on the New Orleans parade beat. The spotlight must have felt a bit hotter than usual, though, as Meters drummer Zigaboo Modeliste was in the house (his band having played the Nokia Theater here the night before). Cleary always pays homage to the Crescent City funk pioneers, and Friday night was no exception, with fierce fantasias on the Meters' "People Say," "Just Kissed My Baby" and "Hey, Pocky Way." Cleary shouted out a dedication to Modeliste, and Higgins did the same without words, his virile kick drum speaking volumes.

If Cleary has a weakness for smoochy soul ballads, there was always a stabbing riff, rhythmic turnaround or ecstatic holler to redeem each one. It was too bad that he didn't play one of his most irresistible compositions, the swaying Latin number "Oh, No No No." But, poetically, the night climaxed with Cleary's "More Hipper," its swaggering groove backing up the chorus: "What we got is more hipper than what you got." More than just muso-one-upmanship, it sounded like an irrepressible statement of cultural pride.