MANDRILL

At the West Oak Lane Jazz Festival - Philly (6/21/08)

 


 

I got to the West Oak Lane Jazz Festival at 9:00pm, expecting Mandrill to begin playing, BUT THE GUYS WERE NOWHERE NEAR THE STAGE...it would be a long wait (until 10:00pm) before the Philly crowd was graced with the awesome Afrocentric/Latin/funk/rock/R&B sounds of MANDRILL.


At 10:00pm, Mandrill started with the signature show-opener, the African-style percussion-driven "Mandrill"...MAN, the drum solo was fierce and powerful (what was the drummer's name?)! Rollin' On" sounded so good, probably because Carlos Delano Wilson is back with the band (remember that he was a no-show at the last Philly show in 2007 at the Mann Music Center)...I also liked the "Rock & Roll" chant during the last couple of minutes of the song, provided by Lou Wilson! "Cohelo" was a beautiful flute spotlight for Carlos. "Children of the Sun" was followed by the FUNKY "Mango Meat...and the 50,000-plus was jammin' to this funky uptempo jam! Things started to get loose and dance-happy with the heavy pulsating basslines of the jungle funk sounds of "Hang Loose"!!

The One Sun Lion Ra (rapper and son of Lou Wilson) came out and performed a hip-hop piece called "Black Woman"...a very good performance with some nasty rhythm guitar licks by Jimmy.

"Symphonic Revolution" (a song I haven't heard live in a few years) was next...and the Wilson Bros. (Lou, Dr. Ric, Carlos and Wilfredo "Wolf") sounded so excellent on group vocals!! "I Refuse to Smile" was followed by the crowd favorite song dedicated to fathers & grandfathers everywhere "House of Wood". Marc Rey ripped an excellent guitar solo on "Fencewalk"and Arlan Schirebaum played some nasty organ while funkateers shook their booties on "Git It All"!! The encore performance of "Ape is High" was also funkatizing in the land of West Oak Lane!! The Mandrill show ended at 11:30pm.



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