MDB Immedia 2013
Good Lordy, miss Clawdy: rock ‘n’ roll assassin gets back in for a kill.
Hot ‘n Sticky – Live
Not many concert photos capture the essence of a show as perfectly as does the cover of this record laid down in Hollywood’s “Viper Room”: it’s a blinding performance from the man who’s missed such an action for many years. A film screen inhabitant, Michael Des Barres started off as a rocker, and 2012’s "Carnaby Street" saw the Marquis return to his roots, yet the gravitation which resulted in that bang of an album had been slow-burning and low-profile, so “Hot ‘n Sticky” is as far from the vanity fair enterprise, beloved of many a movie star, as it gets. Here’s why among the highlights on display are the scintillating covers of the jittery “Get It On” – a climax of the medley where the incurable bug of “I Don’t Need No Doctor” is pitched in the groovy patch of the singer’s original “My Baby Saved My Ass” – and the fervent “Stop! In The Name Of Love” baring Michael’s glittery soul.
One of the many shows MDB’s been playing before and after his comeback platter, it doesn’t rely on the past and features none of SILVERHEAD’s songs and sticks instead to the latterday material, from the last album’s title track, heavy and deliciously raw, on to the heat-radiating “Little Latin Lover” with its irresistible boogie. But the footstomping, careening to an out-of-tune guitar punkiness “Detective Man” from the artist’s DETECTIVE phase and the spiritual uplift of “Please Stay” add a conceptual layer to the set list that cuts to the emotional bone thanks to “You’re My Pain Killer” – a reason Des Barres needs no medicated lotion – that drips honeyed hurt from its Hammond-oiled heart. So does, only with infectious swagger, “Hot ‘n Sticky” which hangs on a sleazy riffage before crumbling into classic rock ‘n’ roll licks. The atmosphere gets palpably steamy long before the show ends leaving the listener longing for more, and when the Marquis invites everyone back to Carnaby street, it’s so carnal, you’re tempted to not let him go alone.
****3/4
