Quick follow-up regarding the December 23 show with Tiny Boxes-

Kicking off around 9:45 to a packed house, the evening began with an opening set by LarJar, running through a number of their 70s-esque soul grooves, pulling a few pages from Robert Walter’s songbook (Panacea, To the Bitter End, Ain’t it Funky, Biplanes) and getting the crowd warmed up for what was to come. With each successive song, LarJar veered more into open territory, leaning on disco-funk beats and bringing out new original tunes (Tap into your mind) and tying it off with a raging take on Stevie Wonder’s “I Wish”.

Tiny Boxes took the stage after a brief interlude, with Bon Lozaga and Joel Cummins smiling ear-to-ear and ready to play for an anxious crowd. Tiny Boxes ripped through several Jimi Hendrix greats including “Castles Made of Sand” and finishing with “Voodoo Chile”. The drummer and bassist, recent additions to Bon’s musical endeavours, both draw deeply from gospel and funk roots, and it shows in their tight, crisp and funky playing. Bon and Joel lent vocals to a number of tunes, and the Tiny Boxes originals were mainly light-hearted, jazzy numbers with thick back-beats, personal lyrics and shredding solos. Joel very comfortably worked his way around the organ, clavinet and stage piano, even adding synth solos to occasional tunes.

The set drew to a close after 90 or so short minutes, and after a few moments of quick interaction between band members, shifting of cymbals and snare, LarJar was back up and ready to pummel the crowd with more jams. Plowing through Karl Denson’s “Elephants” (minor technical problems with the Clavinet aside) and the Benevento-Russo Duo improv vehicle “Big Whopper”, the band jumped into their own “Dart of Harkness”. This jungle-vibe tune, with heavy floor-tom rolls forming the core beat construction, rumbled along through the head/melody sections before jumping off into a deep space. As the band coasted momentarily, Bon Lozaga jumped on stage and lent some percussive riffing to the tune before busting out into a deep and angry guitar solo. Carrying through a dozen or so bars, the band began dropping out and only playing on rhythmic hits together to emphasize the powerful guitar shredding. With little warning to the crowd, Joel Cummins jumped back up in front of the keyboard rig, and he and Bon began trading off lead lines, improving over the band’s vamping with some deep synth-lead/guitar exchanges, while Dave continued to work the Clavinet and stage piano and Alan and Jason continued to hold down the rhythm, stepping back and forth between hits and a thundering bass-and-drums groove. The tune traveled into outer space before slamming back to earth as the piano signaled a return to the head of the tune and the whole band came screeching to a high-pitched halt.

Bon continued on with the band for the remainder of the show, lending some unique thoughts and emphasis to “Organ Donor” and the LarJar prog/blues finale “Ridin’ the Rails”. The crowd was ushered quickly out onto the sidewalks and into the night with little beyond memories to remind them of what they’d just witnessed.

Tiny Boxes is performing at the Outer Banks Brewing Station on January 9, 2010 and in Raleigh on February 5. You can check them out on Myspace. Umphrey’s McGee is playing an extended New Year’s run in Chicago and returning to the area in February to play Valentine’s Day at Ram’s Head Live in Baltimore. Check them out at Umphreys.com.

Thanks to jambands.com for mentioning the show in advance, it was the most crowded Wednesday we’ve seen in quite some time!