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Concert
Review by Nick Morgan |
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ROBERT 'BILBO' WALKER
Ground Zero Blues Club, Memphis,
Tennessee, October 17th 2008
I
don’t think it was really Robert
‘Bilbo’ Walker’s
fault. The gig, I mean, not the name. Not that
he was responsible for that either, what with
his daddy, Big Robert ‘Bilbo’ Walker
having had it and all. So Little Junior ‘Bilbo’
grew up to be just plain ‘Bilbo’ when
his daddy passed away, a name which apparently,
“he hates” to this day. As perceptive
readers will note, this account begs a certain
question, but in case you’re wondering Mr
Walker is neither diminutive, nor does he have
furry feet, he’s not 111 years old (though
he certainly looks a bit more than fifty), I don’t
believe he’s a burglar, no-one calls him
‘ring-bearer’, “it like riddles,
p’raps it does, does it?”, and the
only time he disappears is when he takes a well-earned
rest in between sets. He has, as his son-in-law
tells the Photographer, been travelling a lot
and he’s tired. |
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| But
like I say it’s not his fault. Maybe it’s
the place. We’re in the Memphis manifestation
of Ground
Zero Blues Club, a cousin of the joint set up
in Clarksdale seven years ago by, amongst others,
Morgan Freeman (he’s also got a fine
restaurant there – if you ever visit I
thoroughly recommend the Shrimp and Grits with Onion
Gravy – just perfect!). Ground Zero occupies
the cavernous ground floor of an ugly modern building
and has the appearance of half snooker hall, half
blues club. The snooker bit is empty, the blues
club half-full. This could be because, although
Mr Walker is certainly the best gig of the night,
most of the city is at the FedEx Stadium a few hundred
yards away for an evening of ‘Memphis Madness’
with college basketball team Memphis
Tigers. It’s not even a match, just a
training session, and the stadium is packed to the
rafters. Leaving us in the company of a largely
disinterested and easily distracted audience, working
their way solidly through a fistful of frozen Margaritas,
burgers, deep fried onion rings and collared greens
(well, that’s what the Photographer was doing
anyhow). |
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| It’s
certainly not his fault, and no one could be surprised
when it all gets a bit too much for Mr Walker, an
impossibly tall (well, certainly for a hobbit) and
rather lonely- looking figure, up there on the stage
with his trademark red Stratocaster and white suit.
It’s that bad boy of blues Mr.
Bobby Rush – again. You see around the
bar and hall there must be ten or more TV screens,
and they’re on (sound down) even when Mr Walker
is playing his engaging Delta take on primitive
rock and roll. That’s bad enough, but when
all of the males (I was only looking for the purpose
of this review, Serge) and not a few of the females
in the room are gradually transfixed by the mesmerising
gyrations of a troupe of Mr Rush’s impossibly-shaped
dancers, it gets, well, a bit too much. “You
here to see Robert ‘Bilbo’ Walker or
you here to see Bobby Rush? I don’t see no
Bobby Rush on this stage. And if Bobby Rush wants
to come here and try and play his blues with Bilbo
then just let him try, ‘cos let me tell you
this stage belongs to Robert ‘Bilbo’
Walker and there ain’t no Bobby Rush coming
here tonight. So you give me some respect when I’m
playing for y’all here. This is Robert ‘Bilbo’
Walker”. No, you can’t blame Mr Walker
at all, and it’s sad to observe that his outburst
only resulted in the screens being switched off
for about ten minutes, such is the North American
penchant for continual visual stimulation.We left
about half way through the second set, by which
time Mr Walker’s daughters were singing with
him. They’re recording an album together in
California where he now lives – “they’re
not supporting me, I’m supporting them”),
taking the edge off his raw Mississippi sound, best
heard on his 1997 album ‘Promised land’
(with the ubiquitous Mr Sam Carr on drums). But
by then we had at least witnessed his duckwalk (I
hope I can do that when I’m in my seventies),
and the famous one-handed guitar solo, a piece of
absurd showmanship steeped in the heritage of the
blues. And I have to say that given another occasion,
no basketball, and no TV screens, we would rush
(oops) to see him again. - Nick Morgan (photographs
by Kate) |
| Listen:
on Mr
Walker's official web site. |
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the index of all reviews:
Nick's Concert Reviews
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There's nothing more down there... |
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