L.A. Beat

If Jimi Hendrix lived past age 27, he might have ended up sounding something like Wild T and the Spirit.
Wild T, aka Toney Springer and his crack band  left a good sized Monday night crowd at the Slice, with their jaws on the floor, March 29.
Bluesman Wild T pulled out all of the stops, playing guitar behind his back, between his legs and with his teeth, beaming ear to dreadlocked ear all the while.  Bassist Guenther Kappelle and  his drummer kept step with him. Kapelle was a marvel in himself, playing  effortlessly solid  intricate bass lines without looking like it was any trouble at all.
 But Wild T was a blur of energy and good vibes, playing about a dozen different guitar tricks sometimes in a single song including as lot  of Eddie Van Halen style fretboard tapping, but then would switch into Bob Marley’s  ‘Everything’s Going to be All Right’ then back into a crazy jazz inspired improvisational jam.
 In between the wah wah and octave soaked guitar pyrotechnics a couple familiar songs could be recognized including a couple from his latest Cd ‘Fender Bender,’ like  and ‘My Next Ex Wife,” as well as some old favourites like ‘Telephone Freak, ’ ‘Love Crazy, ‘Life Goes on’ and ‘Midnight Blue.
 With so much craziness including a little bit of old school funk a la James Brown and soul classics like ‘Dance to The Music,” it was easy to forget exactly which song he was playing, but it was all good.
I enjoyed one at the end which appeared to be called ‘Why, Why, Why’ near the end of the show, though he appeared to be willing to play all night  unfortunately I lost my energy around 1 a.m.
He stepped aside near the end to let Kapelle and his drummer shine for  a couple solo segments which were both impressive.
 The Shawna Romolliwa band opened up with a  tight set of old school R and B and blues. With two amazing vocalists, Pat Ackerman on bass and two guitarists, they sounded great. They were called back for an encore of ‘Hound Dog.’