Jools Holland is a misplaced individual. He has got the classic British stiff demeanour, the slightly awkward smile, the pinkish complexion, he even gives off a slightly regal wave. But he jams on the ivory like Jerry Lee.
He evokes the bayous of Louisiana, the showrooms of Vegas; he busts the Creole swing as though he was kicked to the curb of Bourbon Street with a songbook and a can of beans and basically went from there.
You can envision Kerouac and Cassady pontificating, Dizzy Gillespie tapping along, Nina Simone probably griping in the corner (she’s notoriously difficult to please according to many peer-reviewed accounts). The whiskey’s burning in the veins and excreted from the flesh of a barroom full of revellers and Ginsbergs scribbling away in a Moleskine.
Yes, he’s done stuff with Sting, George Harrisson, Howard Devoto’s Magazine, bloody Bono - he even founded a small cool-as-cats outfit known as Squeeze who did some great songs, ‘Up the Junction’, ‘Tempted’, ‘Labelled with Love’, ‘Hourglass’, and a whole bunch of others. But playing his solo stuff live, you can hear where he draws his real inspiration from.
Paul Heaton
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