Taylor, Browne take Columbus audience down memory lane
The soothing concert by James Taylor and Jackson Browne at Nationwide Arena Saturday night offered an engaging study in differing ways of moving on after achieving success as a singersongwriter 50 years ago.
Browne, who is still best-known for songs from the early ‘70s and albums such as “Late for the Sky,” worked within a well-worn groove. He stuck with a standard rock setup with the added frill of three backup singers, who added depth to Browne’s sometimes cracking and raspy voice.
Playing an unhurried set in front of a sedate audience planted firmly in their chairs, Browne alternated between familiar hits such as “Fountain of Sorrow” and “Doctor My Eyes” and newer, more didactic numbers such as the title track of his new album, “Downward From Anywhere.”
Pausing frequently to chat about, for example, that returning to places inspired memories that he didn’t dare explicate, Browne kept the mood mellow and veered little from the standard length or instrumentation of the songs he presented. Though he stopped occasionally to introduce band members, the spotlight was firmly on him, as author and subject of the songs, throughout the set.
Both the pace and audience enthusiasm picked up a little when Browne was joined by Taylor late in the set for “The Pretender,” a song on which the two spurred each other on, and one that allowed for some playful variations on the familiar. Taylor stuck around for “Running on Empty,” stepping into the shadows to sing backup.
When Taylor returned to center stage after an intermission, he did so in the company of what he calls, with little exaggeration, his “All-star Band.”
Concertgoers may have gotten restless listening to his leisurely introductions of the many, many members of the band over the course of the evening, but those musicians were what made the Taylor segment of the evening so richly rewarding and added variety to even the most familiar numbers.
Taylor, who recently released an album of standards, one of the more obscure of which, “Easy As Rollin’ Off a Log,” he performed at the concert, has clearly been working at keeping his voice as supple as ever, and it stood up as well as any instrument in his band.
While most of the material, inevitably, was what the audience expected and wanted, Taylor kept the tempo of the set varied.
At times, he stuck with a simple approach, sitting on a stool to sing the classic “Sweet Baby James” and “Fire and Rain” much as they appeared on the original recording.
But often, he would step out of the spotlight and permit other musicians, or his five backup singers, to show their stuff, allowing the music to spiral out in surprising directions.
If Taylor started out in the folk-rock tradition — a tradition to which Browne still adheres — over the past few decades, he’s moved out in the direction of blues and jazz, giving even what is obviously a carefully structured show an improvisatory feel. His cheerfully hokey take on “Steamroller,” scat singing and all, is one playful example.
Twice postponed, this concert scratched an itch for those who had been waiting more than a year to hear the two singer-songwriters in concert. While it may have been more gently fulfilling than electrifying, it had more than enough memorable moments to satisfy concert attendees until the next go-round.
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