Brooklyn-based jazz-funk veterans Lettuce will perform at the Newport Music Hall on Thursday, February 20th. Doors open at 7:30pm. Lettuce formed in 1992 at a summer music program at Berklee College of Music in Boston, MA when all of its members were high school students. The band has had an on-again, off-again history since then, as its members have often had other competing musical projects. The most prominent of these other projects is Soulive – two of its co-founders, guitarist Eric Krasno and organist Neal Evans, are original and current members of Lettuce, and other members of Lettuce have contributed to Soulive over the years (Taking into account last Thursday’s Alan Evans Trio show at Brothers Drake, the entire Soulive lineup is coming through Columbus within the same week). The eight-piece band has taken a bottom-heavy, horn-driven approach to funk, drawing influence from James Brown and his disciples, Parliament-Funkadelic, Tower of Power, and numerous soulful touchstones. The band celebrated its 20th anniversary with the 2012 release of its third studio album Fly! and has been spreading the word through tours in the meantime.
Here’s few funky videos to give you a taste: