TORTURED SOUL at Wrongbar, Friday, June 21. Rating: NNNN
Cameras are a given at live shows these days, but they were a bit more noticeable at Tortured Soul’s Wrongbar show, since the NYC soulful house band were filming the gig for an upcoming DVD. Capturing them in an intimate small club like this is a smart move, they’ve always been a more impressive as a live act than a studio project. Sure, they’ve had a few truly massive deep house hits in the early to mid 00s, but it’s their strength as performers that has really sustained their career since then.
People who only know the band from their recordings are often surprised to see that the singer is a bald white guy sitting at a drum kit wearing a shirt and tie, but there’s no question that he’s an effective frontman. Their mix of house, disco and jazz-funk isn’t pushing a lot of musical boundaries, but that doesn’t diminish the experience hearing of it done this expertly. What was the deal with the lizard tongue flicking though? Were we supposed to be doing that back at him?
