Jack Bruce Blows Hot and Cold : Former Cream Bassist Packs Plenty of Bluster Into Uneven Two Hours at the Coach House

To paraphrase a song title from one of his old buddies, “Let It Blow” seemed to be Jack Bruce’s objective Tuesday night at the Coach House.

The recently inducted Rock and Roll Hall of Famer and his two young helpers blew freely in a loud and torrential display of power-trio indulgence. But those who appreciate the range and nuance of his exceptional talent would be justified in muttering that Bruce was simply blowing it.

That range and nuance, as well as his capacity for musical adventure and beauty, are present on the former Cream bassist’s latest solo album, “Somethin Els.” But the record’s keyboards-based sound and balladic slant hardly lend themselves to a power-trio blowout.

So Bruce blew off the good new stuff and mainly just wailed, using a repertoire of Cream oldies, blues chestnuts and a smattering of familiar and unfamiliar numbers from his solo career as fodder in a nearly two-hour show.

He’s a great bass player, and as he exhibited his awesome control and plangent, punchy tone, one wished somebody would run out and find Bootsy Collins, the great Parliament-Funkadelic bassist, so they could have a showdown. King Jack vs. Bootzilla in a cutting contest would have been a lot more entertaining than the cooperative endeavors of Bruce and his young guitar protege, Blues Saraceno. They teamed with drummer Gary Husband in a display of much technical acuity applied with minimal sense of subtlety, restraint, or graceful interaction.

Since Bruce knows what good is in a guitarist (some admirable Eric Clapton contributions to his new album being Exhibit A), one can only surmise that he’s hanging with Saraceno because he enjoys the kid’s youthful enthusiasm and respects his big sound and fast-flying-fingers technique.

But Saraceno is of the school of young players who must have grown up loving the sound of sirens and dental drills, leading to guitar embellishments that repeatedly strive to replicate those effects. Moreover, Saraceno, who has that lean, mop-of-curls look championed by Slash, the Guns N’ Roses guitarist, doesn’t know when to shut up and listen. His playing was an endless cascade of flash.

If a note could stand up straight quite nicely on its unvarnished own, he would bend it. Actually, he’d bend it five times in rapid succession. He came closest to reining himself in during the riff passages of “Sunshine of Your Love,” a lily that’s almost impossible to gild, but he got even on the solos.

Clapton has remarked that his highest ideal would be to play one perfect note and nothing more. Saraceno might one day strike such a note, but he’d never be able to find it in the haystack of sound he creates.

That left Bruce to rumble along impressively with flash of his own, sometimes squaring off with Saraceno and playing parallel patterns, but never striking up an interesting interplay of voices and ideas. After all, you can’t have a conversation if one person never stops talking.

By far the highlight of the set was Bruce’s opening gambit of three ballads he played on a piano.

That included the ethereal “Childsong,” from the new album, and an especially grand and fervent reading of the epic “Theme for an Imaginary Western.” Some heavy-handed synthesizer embellishments from Husband during this segment merely got in the way.

Bruce might consider a solo piano tour, as John Cale, a songwriter of comparable sensibilities ranging from winsome balladry to guts-out rock, has done.

Bruce was in good spirits, quipping humorously throughout the show and effusively thanking the appreciative audience. He was in husky voice, though--far from the trademark purity he can still muster in the studio.

The blues numbers, with wryness in the singing and some funk in the rhythm, offered the best trio moments. A driving number that ended the show was a good example of headlong frenzy played for the fun of it, Bruce intoning his lines in a whooshing voice amid the rushing storm. Not much of the night’s blowing was that focused.

Local blues-rock trio Raging Sun got short shrift (an allotment of just 18 minutes) in its opening set. The group still managed to show some spark and promise, if not much originality, in songs that called to mind such sources as Bad Company and Rod Stewart. Front man Steven Copeland sang passably though not quite convincingly, and generated some genuine heat on guitar.