THE DAVE JUTEAU BAND – Seeking Higher Ground

Dave Juteau 2014

THE DAVE JUTEAU BAND - Seeking Higher Ground

THE DAVE JUTEAU BAND –
Seeking Higher Ground

Tokyo-based international team find a vantage point in a pop-rock land.

Canadian singer and bassist Dave Juteau had quit music for good, and it took 2011’s Japan disaster to literally shake him and revive his creative juices. New songs emerged and, after a gig with Chilean guitarist Daniel Kubota and American drummer Mark Murdock – whose CV includes work with the likes of Peter Banks and Percy Jones – this band was born. Quite understandably, there’s a dark thread running through their debut CD, yet pieces such as the funky “Storm This Weather” and the hard rocking, if soulful, title track, all with firm focus on melody, have more than one connotation, which takes the album far beyond the tragedy.

So while “The Last Time” packs the blues punch, it has a life-affirming vibe to it, as does the infectious “Another Day.” More so, the six-string twang and synthesizer buzz conjure erotic magic on the bass-punctured “Lip Kiss Love,” whereas “Stuck Here In Time” swings on, helped by acoustic underpinnings, as a nice slab of vintage rhythm-and-blues. It’s only the Hendrix-channelling “One Nation” that bristles with anger, although it is smoothed with a reggae section – perhaps, here high idealism gets the better of the band. Other than that, the higher ground has been scaled now.

***3/4

March 16, 2015

Category(s): Reviews
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