Americana music with a horn section? Delbert McClinton makes it swing.
Delbert McClinton/The Renegades.
7:30 p.m. July 27. Renfro Valley Entertainment Center, 2380 Richmond St. in Mt. Vernon. $42-$49. renfrovalley.com, delbert.com.
To surprise even a devoted audience after six decades of making music is a pretty neat trick. But Delbert McClinton is doing exactly that this very weekend.
At 78, the longstanding Lone Star stylist is releasing his 26th studio album, “Tall, Dark and Handsome.” Don’t let the somewhat generic title fool you. The record diverts from the mix of roadhouse rock, blues and R&B that long ago earned the singer/bandleader an international following for sideroad adventures in swing, jazz and big band blues.
We saw some of this coming with McClinton’s 2017 release “Prick of the Litter.” But “Tall, Dark and Handsome” cements the new takes on vintage sounds while still retaining the rootsy authenticity of the ABC, Capricorn and Capitol albums that came to define his sound in the ‘70s and ‘80s.
The album-opening “Mr. Smith” immediately establishes the new record’s temperament with a charge of brassy swing that transfers the energy McClinton packed into previous honky tonk blues-soul hits like “Givin’ It Up For Love” and “B Movie Boxcar Blues” back a few decades into a Kansas City-style big band setting. Though stylistically removed from the kind of music longstanding fans may expect from McClinton (hence the sense of surprise), the new/old setting becomes an easy and natural fit for the singer. Ditto for the elemental, syncopated groove of “If I Hock My Guitar,” which takes us to the juke joints of Mississippi, and “Loud Mouth,” a slightly more expected blues-soul shuffle that sounds like something Eric Clapton could have cooked up on either side of the Atlantic until the scratchy animation of McClinton’s vocals and the wisecracking slant of the lyrics enter. “You’re not really a fool,” he sings with sly assurance. “You just act like one. That just about says it all.”
McClinton will celebrate the July 26 release of “Tall, Dark and Handsome” with a July 27 performance at Renfro Valley Entertainment Center. Let’s see how Texas, Kansas and Mississippi sounds play out in the heart of Kentucky. Given the frequency of McClinton’s concert appearances in the region through the years, they should go down just fine.
Eric B. and Rakim
7 p.m. July 28 at Manchester Music Hall, 899 Manchester St. $35-$75. 859-537-7321. manchestermusichall.com, ericbandrakim.com.
Hip-hop was a simpler but no less potent musical force when Eric B. (Eric Barrier) and Rakim (William Griffin Jr.) tore out of Long Island three decades ago. But in a short, supercharged period that saw the release of four hit albums in a scant five years, the two became one of the country’s most acclaimed DJ/MC duos and an integral part of a continually evolving East Coast hip-hop sound.
After the release of 1992’s “Don’t Sweat the Technique” and an avalanche of subsequent legal entanglements, Eric B. and Rakim went their separate ways for 23 years. The two reunited for a tour that began at the famed Apollo Theater in 2017 and have been performing again regularly ever since.
On July 28, Eric B. and Rakim will bring vintage hits like “I Ain’t No Joke,” “I Know You Got Soul” and “Paid in Full,” along with music from Rakim’s solo career, to the Manchester Music Hall.
Interludes
▪ Lake Street Dive must like it here. The Boston-bred quintet is making its second Lexington concert stop next week since the release of 2018’s “Free Yourself Up” album and at its fifth outing since “Bad Self Portraits” served as a nationwide breakthrough for its blend of power pop, jazzy soul and increasingly expansive rock ‘n’ roll in 2014. The band’s July 31 show at Manchester Music Hall, however, will be its first local outing since the release of a stylistically far-reaching, five-song companion disc to “Free Yourself Up” titled “Freak Yourself Out.” Among the highlights is the melodically bouncy but lyrically quirky pop reverie “Angioplast” (“I fell in love with an angioplast, blowing up my insides, letting things pass”). (8 p.m.; $28-$30).
▪ Yonder Mountain String Band is pretty fond of Lexington, too, from dates nearly two decades ago at the long-defunct Lynagh’s Music Club to more recent shows at Manchester Music Hall. On Aug. 1, the Colorado-based ensemble, which has long used bluegrass instrumentation to fuel a variety of Americana-esque tunes and jam explorations, performs at The Burl, 375 Thompson Rd. This will be the first regional stop by YMSB since the June death of mandolinist and co-founding member Jeff Austin. He left the group in April 2014 and was replaced, after numerous temporary substitutes, by mandolinist Jake Jolliff and fiddler Allie Kral. Arkansauce will open (7:30 p.m.; $29.50).