45 years later, rockers Little Feat hit the road again with show at Count Basie

When a live LP is arguably a band’s best-loved album, that can set a mighty high bar for decades to come. Such is the case for eclectic American rock ’n’ rollers Little Feat and their storied 1978 release, “Waiting for Columbus.”

Compiled from a series of 1977 concerts on both sides of the Atlantic, “Waiting For Columbus” is a titantic document, boasting essential versions of Little Feat classics such as “Fat Man in the Bathtub,” “Dixie Chicken,” “All That You Dream” and “Willin,’ ” bolstered by the Tower of Power horns.

The platinum-selling double LP was named one of the best live albums of all time by Rolling Stone, and hailed by NPR’s Ed Ward as “probably the best live album of the decade.”

“The stakes were set with that album,” said pianist, singer, songwriter and co-founder Bill Payne. “So what are you going to do thereafter to bring people into the fold, to match it?”

Nearly half a century after the shows that would make up “Waiting for Columbus,” Payne is still on the road with the current iteration of Little Feat. The band plays the Count Basie Center for the Arts in Red Bank on Monday, Sept. 19, and the Capitol Theatre in Port Chester, New York, on Tuesday, Sept. 20.

“Especially with the arts, you’re only as good as what you were last week,” Payne said. “And I think that’s unfortunate because a lot of people get a wider berth when it comes to things. But you pay your money, you come into a venue, you buy and album or you buy a CD or you stream music — whatever it is that allows you to hear what people are doing. And the expectations, as you said, are baked in: ‘Is this going to knock my socks off or not?’”

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Little Feat now features Payne and longtime comrades Kenny Gradney on bass, Sam Clayton on percussion and vocals, and Fred Tackett on guitar and vocals. The four are playing alongside a pair of new enlistees: Scott Sharrard, formerly of Gregg Allman’s band, on guitar and vocals; and drummer Tony Leone, formerly of Ollabelle and the Chris Robinson Brotherhood, who has also performed with Phil Lesh.

Payne and Little Feat have played on with an evolving roster over the years. Co-founding singer, songwriter and guitarist Lowell George died in 1979, followed by drummer Richie Hayward in 2010 and Paul Barrere in 2019.

Discussing the band’s continuation, Payne recalled seeing British blues rockers the Yardbirds in Pismo Beach, California’s Rose Garden Ballroom in August of 1966. He was there to see guitarist Jeff Beck, but by that time Beck was out of the band and in his place was a pre-Led Zeppelin Jimmy Page.

“We didn’t know who Jimmy Page was. We’d never heard him,” Payne said. “And yet it was like, ‘Well, that’s OK.’ So we were putting Little Feat together for (the 1988 album) ‘Let it Roll’ without Lowell and it’s a (gutsy) move to do something like that, but I was thinking back to the Yardbirds with Jeff Beck and with Jimmy.”

“You know, Lowell’s not a person you can replace, nor is Richie Hayward, nor is Paul Barrere,” Payne said. “But you don’t replace them — you’re augmenting the conversation, musically.”

Still 'Waiting'

Payne and Little Feat find themselves touring once again behind “Waiting for Columbus.” Just in time for the album’s 45th anniversary, Rhino released a re-mastered, super deluxe edition of the album in July. Spanning eight CDs and also available through digital and streaming services, the set enhances the original album with three previously-unreleased shows from that same era.

For as well-worn as “Waiting for Columbus” has become, the new collection is revelatory. Presenting three 1977 shows in full illustrates just how comfortably bold the band was in serving up its singularly American jamming gumbo of blues, jazz, country and good old rock ’n’ roll.

Heard from England's Manchester City Hall on July 29, 1977, the sequence of the instrumental “Day at the Dog Races,” Barrere’s “All That You Dream” and Allen Toussaint’s “On Your Way Down” is a blissfully ragged all-hands-on deck affair. But when the band approaches the same triptych less than two weeks later at an Aug. 10, 1977, performance in Washington, D.C.’s Lisner Auditorium, there’s an inescapable hint of cloak-and-dagger menace, almost as if they’re stalking the songs.

“It’s a lot like home movies,” Payne said of the set. “I was there doing it, so I’m not really digging into it as heavily as somebody like yourself might because it’s new to you. ... I didn’t walk away with any revelations from it other than the fact that I’ll point out my own thing, which was singing ‘Red Stream Liner’ my voice was cracking. ... I almost told them not to put it on the record and finally I convinced myself that this is the way I was singing back then, at least on that song. ... It’s good to give people a snapshot of really what was going on. And the band was terrific.”

The collection’s Aug. 2, 1977, performance at the Rainbow in London boasts an exquisitely expansive, Payne-driven run through the band’s rollicking “Dixie Chicken” that sways from boogie-woogie bounce to ballroom elegance and back again before utilizing a punchy, locomotive “Tripe Face Boogie” as a thoroughfare to a lived-in “Willin’,”  the band’s signature world-weary trucker anthem.

“Waiting for Columbus” is also a reminder of how well-traveled the band’s catalog has become over the years. “Willin’ ” alone has been covered by the Byrds, Linda Ronstadt, Gregg Allman, the Black Crowes, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, and Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen.

John Sebastian, Deep Purple and Eric Church have all covered “Dixie Chicken.” “Easy to Slip,” a Little Feat classic not featured on “Columbus” but in its repertoire at the time, was featured on Bob Weir’s 1978 yacht rock classic “Heaven Help the Fool.”

In an ultimate tip of the cap, jam band legends Phish covered “Waiting for Columbus” in its entirety on Halloween night 2010 at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City.

And yet, recognition from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has proved elusive for Little Feat. The band was ranked second in a 2016 Rolling Stone readers’ poll of acts readers would like to see in the Hall, surpassed only by 2017 inductees Pearl Jam.

“People have asked me if we should be in there and I was like, ‘Ah, I don’t know. We’re fine.’ But these days I think yeah, we should be in there,” Payne said. “I mean, if Little Feat is not in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, who is? Our music is based on American music, for God’s sake. … I’m like, ‘I know it’s political guys, but wake up.’ "

Go: Little Feat with Miko Marks, 7:30 p.m. Monday, Sept. 19, Count Basie Center for the Arts, 99 Monmouth St., Red Bank, $29.50 to $79.50; thebasie.org/events/little-feat. The band also plays 8 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 20, Capitol Theatre, 149 Westchester Ave., Port Chester, New York, $45 to $95; thecapitoltheatre.com.

This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Little Feat rock band to play Count Basie in Red Bank NJ