![]() He was ebullient after the set, and said, “I'm also playing trumpet again - my instrument from age 8 to 18 - and getting pretty good except for running out of lip!” Indeed, the last time I saw Geils play live was with the Jay Geils Blues and Jazz Revue in 2010 he played jazz and blues sitting down. I was tired of playing our brand of high-energy rock ‘n’ roll.” “I founded the band as a Chicago-style blues band and it evolved into a bluesy rock band. “Of course, I'm proud of our legacy,” Geils told me two years ago, of the J. He did so with Bluestime, the New Guitar Summit and the latest incarnation, The Jay Geils Blues and Jazz Revue with guitarist Gerry Beaudoin. Geils Band and reached an agreement with his former band members to use the name “Jay Geils” (as opposed to J. I honestly don't remember where and when my last show was with the band.”īut by 2013, he considered himself out of the J. Geils joined some of those reunions, but played with the band for the last time, he told me two years ago, “at the Fenway Park show in 2010 and maybe one or two after that. Geils Band has reunited several times over the years and last played Boston the summer of 2015. They carried on two more years, making one album, with keyboardist Justman taking over lead vocals. But all that momentum skidded to a halt in 1983, when Wolf left the band. Geils Band - which opened huge shows for the Rolling Stones in 1982 - was on the way to the top. It built on the success of “Sanctuary” in 1978 and “Love Stinks” in 1980. The band found greater fame in the early MTV era with their more pop-oriented direction via their “Freeze Frame” album in 1981. They signed to Atlantic Records in 1970, Wolf and Seth Justman started writing original material, and over the course of four studio albums and the incendiary live album, “Full House,” they became New England’s “house party” band, rocking arenas from Boston to Bangor. The newly re-christened band played scorching blues and R&B covers. What happened was that three guys in Geils’ Worcester-based group merged with Wolf and his drummer from Boston-based band The Hallucinations. They could stand toe-to-toe with any band in the world. Boston doesn’t have the roster that New York or LA does, but set the bar for rock 'n' roll as far as I was concerned. They knew how to take a whole arena and just tear it up. They definitely were like Sly and the Family Stone, and two or three other bands had that thing. You probably expected that that’s how rock is. “I mean, man, if you saw that band when they were in their prime, you were spoiled. You probably expected that that’s how rock is." Joe Perry "I mean, man, if you saw that band when they were in their prime, you were spoiled. It was always about the band and about the show. The image I have is him driving the band, whether he’s playing rhythm or lead. He played great solos, he knew blues inside and out and they just took it to the max. But Jay was all about the song, the music. "They always had such showmanship and dynamics. "They would start off as a three piece and then another guy would come up on stage, and then another guy, and finally Peter would come out," Perry said. Perry recalled being in those audiences as "a dewy-eyed kid." The Tea Party was Boston’s key late-‘60s rock club and the J. “I remember those days of going to the Tea Party and seeing them,” Aerosmith guitarist Joe Perry said Tuesday night, reached in LA. He was found dead from undisclosed causes on Tuesday at his home in Groton. ![]() A former mechanical engineering student at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, he tended to hang back on stage during concerts. Geils (John Geils Jr., professionally billed as Jay Geils) was the oft-shy guitarist, skilled in rock, blues and jazz idioms. ![]() He was not the wild man at centerstage, bouncing up and down, whipping the crowd into a frenzy. Geils Band bore his name and his imprint, but he was never the focal point. Geils Band via Facebook) This article is more than 5 years old.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |