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Incognito's 30th Birthday: Indig02 22/09/09
So tonight celebrates 30 years since the formation of Incognito – and what a celebration it was about to be. He who is Bluey Maunick has honed a classic Jazz Funk sound easily distinguishable from any other contemporary classic artists and bands of that ilk.
Infact, in recent times, his influence shows more than ever in bands such as Down To The Bone, M-Swift and Reel People. As always, Bluey surrounds himself with the best and they were all in attendance tonight in front of what seemed like a couple of thousand people.
To a deafening welcome the band start with the evergreen funker ‘Talking Loud’ with Vanessa Haynes (who came to prominence in the early 90’s with the UK Street Soul scene) and continues on with the classy ‘Step Aside’. As always with Incognito there is a veritable barrage of frontline vocalists and to the fore comes recent mainstay Tony Momrelle – one of the UK’s most exciting discoveries of recent years, treating us to the down-tempo two-step Soul of ‘When The Sun Comes Down’. By now the crowd are up and dancing, and just as well because every song deserves justice from the hips. The next song (‘Jacobs Ladder’) features the busiest Trumpet player in the business – Sid Gauld – and you can see why he’s rated with his solo feature just Jazz Funk perfection. This song also introduced the 12-strong Midena String Ensemble and they gave their glorious touch to most songs throughout the next 2 _ hours. They could be heard loud and proud too, so they constantly lifted all of us on a carpet of incredibly arranged strings.
Next, original second-phase (post ’90) band-members came to the stage – Randy Hope-Taylor on Bass, Thomas Dyani on Percussion and Graham Harvey on keys and they burned through the latin flyer ‘Centre Of The Sun’. As anticipated, on comes special guest Maysa for a few songs to feverish applause. It was amazing to see her where she belongs – fronting this band.
After another 2-step winner from Tony on comes Jocelyn Brown. Again, the applause was deafening and she treated us to ‘Ain’t No Mountain High Enough’ and ‘Always There’. The concert was billed as featuring her but she only gave us these songs (and Maysa had already out-sung her), but we’re here to celebrate and it’s all about Incognito tonight not individuals (unless that individual happens to be Mr Maunick). The guests and old friends keep coming, such as Imaani (fresh back from having her child, and she’s looking as lovely as ever) and Bluey’s Indonesian discovery Dira who sang ‘Don’t You Worry About A Thing’ so well.
All the hits were played tonight (and we were even treated to a spectacular bit of organised Dad-dancing from the horn section on ’Reach Out’!). After nearly three hours and an extended bow from the band this exhilarating evening was finished off with a pounding, heavyweight extended version of ‘Nights Over Eqypt’. The lights went up and Bluey gave us a lovely heart-felt speech thanking everybody and sharing his philosophies with us and his messages of peace and love and finally, as expected (and as usual), on came Bob Marley’s ‘One Love’ and the place erupted one more time.
Congratulations from Blues and Soul Bluey, and thank you for your music.
All photos care of B&S' Romain Kedochim. For more visit ROMAIN PHOTOGRAPHY
Words SNOWBOY
