[ATTENDED: October 25, 2023] An Evening with Les Claypool’s Flying Frog Brigade
I have seen Les Claypool play with a variety of other people. I’ve been a huge fan of Primus (although not their fans) and have always been interested in whatever Les has to offer. I have seen him with the Claypool Lennon Delirium twice. I really don’t need to see him any more, but there was one draw to this show–the band was going to play Pink Floyd’s Animals album straight through.
That’s one of my favorite albums and I knew that they would do a great job with it.
With the hindsight of two shows after this, I can say that either I have no tolerance for people anymore or that people just have no clue how to behave at a concert. This is Les Claypool, I expected lunacy and zaniness. Costumes were encouraged for crying out loud. It was supposed to be fun.
But there was a woman with calf-length dreadlocks slam dancing with nobody. She just whipped her hair around and made everyone miserable. I mean have fun, but don’t shit on everyone else’s party. And there were two different men with deep booming voices on either side of me who just wouldn’t stop talking “No, that’s a bass saxophone.” “Have you ever seen Claypool before? He’s really good.” During the freaking songs!
Holy shit.
So the band was pretty interesting. Sean Lennon on guitar (so it was like seeing the Claypool Lennon Delirium, Harry Waters (Roger Waters’ son) on keys, the legendary Skerik on saxophone, Paulo Baldi (from Cake) on percussion, primarily vibes and a revelation on these songs. And Mike Dillon on drums.
So pretty much all Claypool adjacent songs sound similar-thumping weirdo bass, varying guitar weirdness and everything else thrown on top.
They actually played songs from the Frog Brigade album, but I hadn’t listened to that in a pretty long time. So I didn’t know the first two songs, but they were Primus-adjacent and there for interesting.
Their cover of The Beat’s “Mirror in the Bathroom” was super fun. An early highlight of the night. “That was worth the price of admission,” one of the loud jagoffs said loudly possibly three times, certainly twice.
There was the lengthy, trippy “Blood and Rockets” from the Delirium records. And then an old Claypool song that I knew: “Hendershot.” This is a simple straightforward song, a surf rock song that’s not all that weird.
However, the one big difference between the Frog Brigade and Primus is that the Frog Brigade is a jam band. And they are more like a jazz jam band in which everyone gets a solo (except the drums, mercifully). That meant that if one of them got a solo, you knew there were going to be three more. Ho hum. The saving grace was that they were chatting during the solos and Les is hilarious so any chat is good for me. They were talking about surf rock with Les teasing Shiner (Sean) asking if that was the best surf rock guitar solo he had ever played. Then he asked Harry about his surfing experiences and it was all in good fun. But the loud jagoffs around me started complaining about this talking business.” Play fucking music.” I was pretty peeved by the end of the first set.
I seriously considered packing it in and going home. But I knew the next set started with Animals and I really wanted to see that.
And I’m glad I didn’t leave because Animals was outstanding.
The set opened with Sean on acoustic guitar (on a stand) and Les singing Pigs on the Wing. They jumped right into Dogs, the most rocking of the songs. Sean’s guitar was great and Harry’s keys were perfect. Paulo Baldi added delicate vibes here and there which really fleshed out the high notes wonderfully. And Les’ bass was louder in the mix, letting us hear those bass lines properly. Skerik was not included, which was great because there’s no sax (or need for it) on these songs.
In Pigs (Three Different Ones), everything was right on (even the crowd mostly settled down for these songs–except for the guy who kept bumping into me and the apologizing profusely. Relax dude. When it came to Dogs, everyone sang. Sean sang the first line and when the long vocal note was held in the record, Les took over from Sean–sounding seamless and perfect. It was really impressive. Harry added vocals as well, and really, it was all a great exercise.
The ended as they begin with Pigs on the Wing and it was a glorious 40 minutes of music.
From there, they got back to the wild business of Claypool. Precipitation was a rollicking fun song.
But I was thrilled to hear them play “Riddles Are Abound Tonight” a great song from Les’ first spin off band Sausage. I never imagined that I’d get to hear this song live and it was absolutely great to sing “huh, hoy yo!”
I also really enjoyed Les’ first solo album the Holy Mackerel so it was fun to hear “Running of the Gauntlet.”
There was more soloing from each member and Skerik came back for the last few songs.
I didn’t recognize immediately when they started “Cosmic Highway.” I knew it but wasn’t quite sure how well knew it. But a soon as that cool riff started–and genuinely sounded like a sitar–I really enjoyed the lengthy jam.
And then Les left the stage for a minute or so. And he came back with … the Whamola–essentially a metal stick with a bass string on it. You hit it with a drum stick and change pitch with a handle at the top. I’ve seen this in videos but it was amazing to see him play it live. The song “Whamola” is weird and fun and invites participation from everyone.
I had originally thought I might leave early but I’m so glad I stayed to see Whamola!
I could have gone to the show in Montclair the night before instead of this one. But upon seeing the setlist I’m glad I didn’t choose that one. Yes, they got Thela Hun Gingeet as an opener, which would have kicked butt. But I much preferred Mirror in the Bathroom, plus we got the Sausage song, a great Cosmic Highway and the exceptional Whamola. So the crowd may have sucked but the music was pretty great.
- David Makalaster [with Southbound pachyderm tease]
- Lust Stings §
- Mirror in the Bathroom [The Beat cover]
- Blood and Rockets: Movement I, Saga of Jack Parsons – Movement II Too the Moon Æ
- Hendershot Ψ
Pink Floyd: Animals
- Pigs on the Wing, Part 1 @
- Dogs @
- Pigs (Three Different Ones) @
- Sheep @
- Pigs on the Wing, Part 2 @
SET TWO
- Precipitation Ψ
- Riddles Are Abound Tonight ℘
- Running of the Gauntlet Ψ
- Rumble of the Diesel §
- Cosmic Highway ⊗
- Whamola ⊗
@ PINK FLOYD: Animals (1977)
℘ SAUSAGE: Riddles are Abound Tonight (1994)
Ψ Les Claypool and the Holy Mackerel: Highball with the Devil (1996)
⊗ THE LES CLAYPOOL FROG BRIGADE: Purple Onion (2002)
§ LES CLAYPOOL: Of Whales and Woe (2006)
Æ THE CLAYPOOL LENNON DELIRIUM: South of Reality (2018)
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