MTV AMH Review

Soul Coughing/Jeff Buckley Rock the House

MTV News Staff, 5/6/95

Editor's Note: We found a pile of notes on the recent Jeff Buckley/Soul Coughing concert scribbled by our business manager, Steve McConnell. They were almost unintelligible, but after hours and hours of deciphering, we were able to piece together the following report.

Listen to Soul Coughing's debut album, Ruby Vroom, and you'd think the New York-based quartet were beat poets messing around with samples. See them in person however, and it is clear that they are from the New York white-boy school of rap (think low-keyed Beastie Boys). That was the most surprising thing about their terrific hour-long performance at the Great American Music Hall on Thursday night (May 4). "You all don't have to get up," said leader singer/rapper M. Doughty, as Soul Coughing took the stage. "I was kinda digging that campfire thing." He was directing his comments to the nearly 100 people sitting cross-legged on the floor of San Francisco's Great American Music Hall. Ruby Vroom has received some remarkable (and well deserved) reviews. The New Yorker called it "one of the best records of 1994"; Details noted that "this is some serious boho, Dada shit." Live, the group more than lived up to such praise. Soul Coughing is comprised of Sebastian Steinberg on upright bass; Yuval Gabay, drums; M'Ark De Gli Antoni, keyboards/samples; and Doughty on guitar and vocals. They emerged from the New York avant garde jazz scene (John Zorn gets a word of thanks in the album credits). Live, the group brought together elements of Morphine (the driving bass and narrative style), Digable Planets ( rap set to jazz samples) and the Beasties. But where Digable Planets come from the rap world and the Beasties arrived via punk, Soul Coughing bring a distinctive bohemian jazz sensibility to the mix. At the Music Hall, they performed nearly the entire album. Highlights included "Casiotone Nation," "Mr. Bitterness," "Down To This" and the amazing "Is Chicago, Is Not Chicago," which included the line "San Mateo is in the house." After performing that song, noting the enthusiastic response, Doughty said, "I guess San Mateo is in the house."

Headliner Jeff Buckley was in fine form, performing one of the most rocking sets of his current tour (at least according to a fan who saw the last four shows), stretching out many of the songs and improvising. Buckley played a taped-up red Rickenbacker six string guitar; his voice sounded even more beautiful and emotional than on his debut album, Grace. At one point someone from the audience yelled, "Shonen Knife?" "OK," replied Buckely, then played two minutes of a Shonen Knife song while the rest of the band smirked. Half way through the set Buckely played a loud and raucous version of the MC5's "Kick Out the Jams."