Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Photos: Aleš Podbrežnik
Location: Ljubljana / Channel Zero (Metelkova) / Slovenia
Concert date: 26.02.2013
Attendance: 60
Ticket price: €15.00
Thomas Michael Stevens, T.M. Stevens for short, is one of the best bassists on the planet. His venerable reputation is crowned by collaborations with a whole galaxy of top-tier performers and big earners of the music business, starting with the late Miles Davis and James Brown, then moving on to the still-living Joe Cocker, Cyndi Lauper, Tina Turner, Billy Joel, plus Pat Travers and Carmine Appice, The Pretenders, Stevie Salas, Richie Kotzen and, of course, Zappa’s former pupil Steve Vai. T.M. is a colossus of a bassist. Once he pulls on his trademark, brightly colored Zulu getup and slides on the shades, he turns into an electrified acrobat who, in his famous funk metal tradition, lets his racket loose across the room, as far as the noble decibels will carry it!
This time T.M. Stevens dragged along on tour the outstanding guitarist Neil Zaza, who has worked with names like Joe Satriani, Dweezil Zappa, Steve Vai, Yngwie Malmsteen, Vinnie Moore (UFO) and the brothers Steve and Mike Porcaro (both Toto), among others. Behind the kit was the »wacked-out« TC Tolliver, a former member of the legendary American punk metal outfit Plasmatics, whose singer was once the infamous Wendy O. Williams, all too well known to Motörhead fans too, and especially to Lemmy Kilmister, with whom TC also worked during his career. TC is, by the way, the original drummer of TM Stevens’ Shocka Zooloo band, and he also helped out Kiss in the golden mid-eighties – again through the Plasmatics connection with Wendy O. Williams.
A few curious souls were here once again, ready to get swept up in the famous funk magic, since it’s well known that we Slovenes love a fusion of jazz funk and metal, a proper »cross over« thing, plainly put. The clock strikes ten at night. There’s a trio on stage. TM Stevens is a contagious, charismatic guy who wins the crowd over in no time. He borrows a swig of booze from a punter standing right next to his monitor at the edge of the stage, and the whole club is his. »Thaaanks!« and then straight after, »Pleeeease«! Both words in a row out of TM Stevens’ mouth! The show can begin. Everything went as usual. Opener It’s All Good, then Supernatural and a thoroughly reworked Led Zeppelin classic, Kashmir, then the original Turn Me On. Suddenly TM signals »stop«. The band halts and leaves the stage. Ten minutes later they’re back. TM is first on stage, knocks over the hi-hat stand, and as the cymbal crashes to the stage floor, he just smirks. Hmm, something is seriously wrong here. They start again, and three minutes later it’s over again. After a short chat with Zaza, TM leaves the stage. From here on, the club got the Neil Zaza show. Neil told the audience that TM Stevens can hardly sing because of a throat infection. Okay, okay… Here’s what happened: Neil Zaza and TC Tolliver »play Jimi Hendrix«. First up, Voodoo Chile. Used to all kinds of cruelty, the good, patient crowd accepted the painful fact and surrendered to the trillion-times-heard »Hendrixisms«. There were quite a few musicians in the audience that night. Very good ones. Slovenian stock. Even some who make their living purely from it. Among them was Gašper Kržmanc, guitarist of Nula Kelvina.
Even better was seeing TM Stevens show up in the crowd while his buddies TC and Neil were raging on stage with an adaptation of Don Nix’s Going Down… The rock-solid Nula Kelvina guy Gašper didn’t hesitate. He stepped up to TM, exchanged a few words with him… When the number wrapped up, or rather Neil and TC’s jam, Gašper climbed on stage and strapped on TM’s bass. From there on, Gašper held down the background of the Neil Zaza show, which the trio stretched out with covers of Jimi Hendrix’s Purple Haze and Red House. Gašper held his own admirably, even though you could tell his fingers are tuned primarily for guitar (a few weaker notes here and there), while Neil got to spread his fingers wide and deliver that pinch of something we’d been shortchanged on because of TM’s health troubles. TC Tolliver had to morph into the lead vocalist and pulled off his secondary role with flair.
Toward the end TM wandered back on stage, and the band belted out two more songs, including Mama Said. TM’s voice was cracking at the seams, and you could feel and hear that he couldn’t squeeze out anything more than a muffled rasp. Real shame. An unusual turn of events, but one that conjured up a one-of-a-kind, thrilling adventure in our concert epics. Spiced them up with a juicy new story.
TM simply made a fool of himself this time. The tour had kicked off the day before. In Slovenia, with the first gig in Postojna. Flirting with alcoholic beverages demanded its victim. On stage at Channel Zero, TM was joined by a giant tiger (a »hangover«) that he couldn’t tame. Neither his voice nor his balance stabilizers would obey him. It happens sometimes. That’s just how the merry-go-round of music goes. Not the first such story, not the last. Let’s hope the man cleared his head and delivered the show a day later at Pekarna in Maribor the way he’s expected to. Ah, that forever-crazy head of TM Stevens.
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