Gary Clark Jr.’s fifth studio album This Land is 17 tracks of highly varied blues, rock, and soul that establishes the Austin, Texas, artist as one of the most versatile and skilled singer/guitarists of his generation.
At the show at Edgefield on Friday, September 13, opening act Los Coast warmed up the crowd (even inciting an encore), and then Clark Jr. came out in his signature flat-brim hat, sunglasses, and dapper suit, and kicked things off in typical fashion, with his slow-burning “Bright Lights”: “You gonna know my name by the end of the night, yeah,” he sang, backed by a stellar four-piece band.
Throughout Clark Jr.’s two-and-a-half-hour(!) set, he used four different guitars, including a custom Gibson Flying V. The sound quality was impeccable, and Clark Jr. was remarkably polished as he played elongated versions of tracks like “What About Us,” “Gotta Get Up to Something,” “When I’m Gone,” and “Feed the Babies.” One of my favorite parts of the night was the lengthy instrumental intro to the reggae-tinged “Feelin’ Like a Million,” which Clark Jr. kicked off by sparking a joint—something he couldn’t pull off as easily in his home state of Texas. The audience gleefully sang along with the song’s opening lyrics—“It’s Friday night and I just got paid!”—which for many of us was a fully true statement.
Other highlights from the night include his performances of “Low Down Rolling Stone,” instrumental bonus track “Highway 71,” and of course “Pearl Cadillac,” with its tender, ever-evolving guitar solo.
Around 8:45 pm, Clark Jr. left the stage for a few minutes, leading the audience to think his set was over. After we demanded an encore (I enjoyed shouting “Gary” in the voice of Spongebob Squarepants), Clark Jr. and his band returned to play for another 40 minutes: “The Guitar Man,” the rage-inspired “This Land,” and his ramped up cover of the Beatles’ “Come Together” (his most streamed song on Spotify) were some of the last songs on his setlist.
It’s really tempting to brand Clark Jr. as the second coming of Jimi Hendrix, if not for the fact that Clark Jr. has proven to have much more vocal prowess than the Seattle-bred guitar god. But to see Gary Clark Jr. live is to believe in another guitar-clad icon-in-the-making.
