Jimmy Vivino - Steaks & Chops

By Quabidt

(Photo credit: Martin Brooks

The A&M Roadhouse on Murray Street in downtown Manhattan is a damn decent place to hear music. Walk in through a narrow bar and you’re in a funky two-story, brick-walled dining room. Aside from the standard restaurant crappola stuck on the walls there’s a dozens of handmade birdhouses hanging at various heights from the ceiling. Why? I don’t know. The stage is a foot-high raised platform with a bumper pool table shoved aside to make room for musicians. The furniture is plywood simple with room for maybe 60 to 75 people. And there’s plenty of barbecue.

It’s a pleasant little venue, but like most joints it’s got some idiosyncrasies. The distinguishing feature of this roadhouse is a ladies room at the back of the platform stage. This means that nearly every girl in attendance has to step up onto the stage at some point during the evening and promenade past the band. The guys did their best to focus on the music but occasionally the distractions won out over intense concentration. It’s a tough job, but . . .

So how about the music? No, not yet. First, a mini-fashion report from Mr. Kenneth. Jimmy dressed down for the evening in oh-so-comfy casual black. Black work shoes. Black khakis. Black white-lettered “Mikey Rules” Orange County Choppers t-shirt. And to top it all off a genuine ebony leather Mr. Funky Funkmeister beret. Bushy bearded Richie Pagano was optically brilliant in his red, white and blue bulls-eye t-shirt. Bassman John Conte wore something plaid – I think.

What about the music? Good. Duh! Unfortunately, your intrepid reporter forgot his personalized Pluggos™ and ended up sitting three feet from the Fender stage amp. Emergency ear protection with balled up napkin bits and chili nachos just don’t make it.

S & C are not Fab Faux, Muddy James, Vinny Kooper or any other Vivino family iteration. They’re more like those late nights at Manny’s after the band comes back from their sidewalk break. But now the gentlemens wear their specs to see their music and lyric sheets - stuff they couldn’t get out of their heads thirty years ago

You gotta love a show like this. But you gotta accept the misses to appreciate the hits. Jimmy opened with a neat organ effect from his guitar for the Band’s Stage Fright. John nailed the neat bass line. But Rich wasn’t quite as successful on the edgy Danko vocals. He made up for it with his best Lennon voice for Gimme Some Truth by the Plastic Ono Band. Now that’s a song you don’t hear every day.

From there S&C blasted some hot blues (Johnny Winter?) with wild wah-wah, and manic drumming. Then came Blind Faith’s Presence of the Lord. Winwood’s vocals in Blind Faith were pretty damn tough for Winwood let alone Rich and Jimmy. Fortunately, Mr. Vino squeezed every last ounce of wah-wah out of his Les Paul. Derek would be proud.

Al Kooper and Mike Bloomfied dropped by the roadhouse in spirit with S&C’s take on Al’s version of Paul Simon’s original 59th Street Bridge Song. An up-tempo break in the middle kept it honest and creative.

After a mandatory tequila & corona break Jimmy switched from his dark red Les Paul to a blonde wood guitar and slide for a Chuck Berry’s Run, Run Rudolf into Livin’ in the USA. This was followed by Jethro Tull’s Hymn 43 ( that Jesus Save Me song ) with a most excellent bass solo midway.

Jimmy went back to the black & white R.L. Burnside Danelectric for Rod Stewart’s Every Picture Tells A Story. That sucker just plain rocked. The guitar, the vocals, the drumming – everything was in synch on a throwaway pop hit that never had much else other than raw energy. It was a great sound with a nice fat break for bass solo and jamming.

Jimmy & Al Kooper love to turn Dylan songs upside down and sideways in performance by changing tempo, accent and phrasing. Jimmy, Rich and John did likewise with A Hard Rain’s a Gonna Fall and the result was beauteous. They gave it a warm bluesy feel on top of a backbeat that slowed everything down. It was a solid platform from which each instrumentalist could go off and do their own thing. Somehow Hard Rain ran into All Right Now by Free and ended in a Joe Walsh type guitar vamp. Way to end the first set.

The second set began with A Hard Way to Go by Savoy Brown with a brief segue into Light My Fire followed by Deep Purple’s Take Me Home and then a way slowed down version of We Won’t Get Fooled Again featuring some heavy duty vibrato. Then the boys ripped into Joe Walsh’s Funk #49 . And the hits just keep on coming.

By now the volume and guitar distortion was picking up and moving into Wall of Sound territory. Sometimes guys gotta be guys. Steaks and Chops is that kind of combo. It pays homage to hours of teenage hormonal rage in ‘burban basements across America. The energy produced provided an outlet to keep boys from turning into beasts. You could go down to the Crossroads with Cream and turn your soul over to Robert Johnson for a shot at being Clapton for a day.

Talk about ultimate guy music, Down By the River (I shot my baby)? Twisted machismo or not, the boys did a great job on the Neil Young version followed by Mr. Soul. Somewhere along the way I heard Jerry Garcia sneak into Jimmy’s voice and guitar. Then it was back to wah-wah for more Blind Faith’s Had to Cry Today.

The Shape I’m In was another Band song that drifted, but from there they did Jimmy’s Bird’s Nest from the Do What Now? album transforming into Rock Steady at one point. John Conte got his ticket to stardom with a competent vocal on the Stones’ Salt of the Earth. He even looks like Ron Wood.

Jimmy invited up a guest bass player to help out on the Muddy Waters tune She’s Nineteen Years Old. Then he invited a leggy brunette up to play cowbell on the Chambers Brothers’ Time Has Come Today. She actually kept the beat though it was hardly necessary.

John Harris did some vocals and harp playing for a smoking Hipshake which segueing into Shake That Moneymaker. Buy the time the last number rolled around the band and the crowd were pretty well cooked. So it was back to more ultimate male-bonding numbers by Cream – SWLABR and I’m So Glad.

Fair Warning! to all who dare spend an evening with Steaks and Chops: If there’s still some demon living deep inside who never totally let go of the ear-shredding adolescent rock of youth, these guys are right up your alley. It ain’t sweet. It ain’t subtle. But it is a full workout for air-guitarists of all ages.

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