Photo: Bucci/Getty

One of my live highlights of 2007 was Jeff Beck’s hour of firefight-guitar fusion at Eric Clapton’s Crossroads Festival in Chicago. Live at Ronnie Scott’s (Eagle) was recorded four months later, during Beck’s stand at that London jazz club, with the same quartet (drummer Vinnie Colaiuta, keyboard player Jason Rebello and bass guitarist Tal Wilkenfeld). The set list is mostly post-Blow by Blow staples with a startling exception — the return of 1967’s “Beck’s Bolero” — but Beck attacks them with seasoned ferocity and improvising vigor that is all-natural bent-string tone and soprano-amp sustain. You don’t see his cock-of-the-walk posing, but you will: There is a DVD on the way as well.

[From Issue 1066 — November 27, 2008]

Related Stories:

• More from Issue 1066

• Fricke’s Picks: Scheinman’s Singing Strings

• Fricke’s Picks: The Solo Martin Rev