Soul’s Rux Pursuades Eloquently

Weaving powerful words around a soulful groove, New York-based Carl Hancock Rux limned the modern black experience in stark but not entirely bleak lines for a packed room at LunaPark on Saturday.

Although the charismatic poet-playwright, performing in L.A. for the first time with his band Rux Revue, had little in common with the current R&B; crooners who claim the legacy of such icons as Marvin Gaye and Curtis Mayfield, his work’s depth and conviction made him a much more fitting heir.

Rux is more steeped in spoken word, evoking Gil Scott-Heron with his deep baritone and his way of making urgent social observations at once personal and political. Yet he displayed his own dynamic style during the hourlong set, blending preacherman testifyin’ with soulful vocalizing in selections from his critically acclaimed 1999 debut album, “Rux Revue.”

His quartet provided nuanced mixtures of soul, funk, blues, jazz and rock, while two stellar female singers added color and subtext to the tales.