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Aeromsith looking for new singer as Steven Tyler contemplates solo career
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Singer Roberta Flack, Elvis impersonator, alternative hip-hop are eclectic offerings
Published on Thursday, May 15, 2008
As we collectively wait for other members of the Cavs to decide that scoring isn't just the primary job of LeBron and ''WAL-LY,'' why not take a break from all the NBA playoff tension, get outside and then go inside and hear some music?
A few weeks ago, contemporary gospel scion CeCe Winans performed in the area to benefit Emmanuel Christian Academy. This week, another icon, singer/songwriter Roberta Flack, is coming to Northeast Ohio to play for the Cleveland School of the Arts.
Flack will perform an ''intimate'' concert Saturday at John Hay High School. She has her own Roberta Flack School of Music — a program in the Hunt's Point neighborhood of the Bronx that encourages disadvantaged children to explore their inner musicians at no cost.
Flack hasn't recorded much in recent years — unless you count her Japanese-only Friends: Roberta Flack Sings Mariko Taka that was released in 2006. But her catalog is already filled with great songs, such as Killing Me Softly, Feel Like Making Love and The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face. And with her classic duets with the late Donny Hathaway, including The Closer I Get to You and Where Is the Love? I'm sure her set list will be familiar.
Tickets are $125, but you also get a post-concert celebration with international foods, drinks, the CSA jazz ensemble and student exhibitions.
Slightly less well known and closer to home, Musica in Akron will have a rare, local, live, hip-hop show tonight featuring Akron rapper/poet Ace Boogie. Ace and his brother Dee have a record label/online portal dubbed Nappy Grooves Records (http://www.aceboogie.com) that features ''alternative'' hip-hop artists. (I'll assume by ''alternative,'' they mean you won't hear too many of their artists spitting verses about strippers' pelvic thrusts or the latest overpriced product on which they've wasted their money.)
Ace has been rapping and independently making music for more than a decade and has a recent album, The Process That Struggle Brings, that I haven't heard (hint, hint).
Lyrically, Ace has a poet's eye for detail. The women in his songs are ''chicks'' at worse and he eschews unbridled aggression, product placement, tough talk and gunplay for songs about love and doing something to better yourself and your people without preaching.
He's a blue-collar rapper making adult hip-hop for those of us who grew up on the music but have a hard time connecting with much of the mindless party jams that permeate ''Blazing Hip-Hop and R&B radio.''
Ace's flows are smooth, as are the beats made by himself and many other local beat makers.
Additionally, every time I've seen him live, he has put on a good show. He's not just walking back and forth grabbing his junk and rapping to the track. He's got an easy, charismatic stage presence mixing rap tunes with spoken word pieces. And he usually has a few musicians and a backup singer.
Since we're already at Musica, please allow me a few moments to flog the dead, desiccated, rotting horse that is the R&B band once again. Saturday at Musica will be local R&B band Winslow. The band released an album in March that I still haven't heard (another hint, hint), but I have seen the group live a few times. Winslow plays smooth funk and old-school R&B (you know it's old school because it is a BAND) that recalls the retro funk and acid jazz sound of the Brand New Heavies.
Winslow is pretty groovy and worth checking out.
Theoretically, Winslow is opening for local alt-rockers Lovedrug, but since Lovedrug is in California recording its new album with big-name producer Michael Bienhorn (who has worked with Soundgarden, Korn, Marilyn Manson and the Red Hot Chili Peppers), it will no longer be on the bill. Still, that leaves you with Winslow, Gallery, Birds and Elephants and Drew Danbury, which should be plenty of live music.
King is back . . . sorta
Elvis Aaron Presley is still dead.
But that small fact (we all agree that's a fact now, don't we?) shouldn't stop you from enjoying the next best thing this Saturday night at the Akron Civic Theatre, where Shawn Klush, one of the few impersonators with the blessing of Elvis Presley Enterprises, will perform Fanfare 2008: The Ultimate Elvis Experience to benefit the Akron Symphony.
Klush, who won an Elvis impersonator contest at Lock 3 Live several years ago (in retrospect, it seems a bit unfair, as he was the only true professional), has made quite a career out of pretending to be a dead guy.
He has toured Europe and won the BBC's World's Greatest Elvis competition and has been dubbed by Elvis Presley Enterprises as the ''Closest to the King'' (the title is capitalized, so you know they mean business).
Klush is so ''in'' with the EPE that he gets his costumes designed by Presley's personal designer Gene Douchette and last year he won the EPE-sponsored Ultimate Tribute Artist Contest at Graceland.
He's received compliments from personal friends of Presley, such as ''Diamond'' Joe Esposito, a former member of the Memphis Mafia (they are the guys who told Elvis he was still totally cool and looking good while procuring artery-clogging fried banana sandwiches and an array of prescription drugs that would eventually kill him). Esposito told Klush that his onstage mannerisms were so close to the King's that it was ''downright scary.''
Klush has also performed with Presley's old backup group, the Jordanaires, who also heaped praises on him. And he recently won the People's Choice Award from Gibson Guitar in Nashville.
Klush will be performing with another group that backed up Presley, the Imperials, and he has a new CD/DVD coming featuring 30 songs, many of which were never recorded by Elvis but most likely would have been.
I didn't make that up. That's what the press release says.
In other words, Klush knows the King and if you're a big, big fan of Elvis and/or the Akron Symphony, you should enjoy yourself, because the guy is quite good.
Malcolm X Abram can be reached at mabram@thebeaconjournal.com or 330-996-3758.
Get the full article here.
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