Watch the Black Crowes’ Chris Robinson Cover the Faces with Chad Smith and Andrew Watt
As his recent work with Pearl Jam and the Rolling Stones suggests, mega-producer Andrew Watt really, really loves classic rock — and he’s clearly a little tired of being holed up in the studio. So Watt teamed up with Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith to form Smith and Watt Steakhouse, a ridiculously overqualified cover band that played for nearly three hours at New York’s Brooklyn Bowl on Sept. 18, with guest appearances by Jimmy Fallon, Black Crowes frontman Chris Robinson, the Roots’ Black Thought, guitarist Robert Randolph, and singer-songwriter Charlotte Lawrence, who happens to be Watt’s girlfriend.
Fallon, on the eve of his 50th birthday, popped up early in the show to do his best Jim Morrison on the Doors’ “Roadhouse Blues”; afterwards, the band and the sold-out crowd sang “Happy Birthday” to him. Fallon’s Late Night colleague Black Thought followed him onstage, and the band blasted through the Roots’ classic “The Seed (2.0),” with Watt taking Cody Chestnutt’s parts. Black Thought also covered Ol’ Dirty Bastard’s “Shimmy Shimmy Ya” and freestyled over the Stooges’ “I Wanna Be Your Dog.”
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The brilliant pedal steel guitarist Robert Randolph, who recently worked with Beyoncé, hung around for the whole second half of the show, starting off with reinventions of “Voodoo Chile” and “Purple Haze.” Then Chris Robinson stepped onstage. “Do you motherfuckers like the Rolling Stones?” he asked the crowd, who predictably roared. “I don’t want to disappoint you — we’re doing the Faces.” The band kicked into “Stay With Me,” which led straight into a truncated “Whole Lotta Love,” with Robinson easily stretching his voice into Robert Plant territory, a reminder of when his band played shows with Jimmy Page in the Nineties.
Watt, wearing a distinctly pajama-like red silk outfit, handled the majority of the evening’s vocals and lead guitar — and he’s good enough at both to suggest that he won’t be able to resist resuming the recording career he put aside in favor of songwriting and production. At 33, Watt is young enough not to be tired of even the most familiar rock radio warhorses. “Baba O’Riley” (with photographer and Sea.Hear.Now co-founder Danny Clinch on harmonica), “Whipping Post,” and “Ziggy Stardust” all nearly managed to seem fresh with Watt in charge.
A crew of veteran players (G.E. Smith on guitar, Ivan Bodley on bass, Ben Stivers on keyboards, plus a hot horn section) rounded out the band. Chad Smith and Watt previously played together in Eddie Vedder’s solo-tour band, the Earthlings, and the drummer’s casual virtuosity kept the whole thing from ever feeling like a wedding band. Smith, who wore an on-theme Alice Cooper T-shirt, looked overjoyed all night, especially when he got to pay homage to John Bonham with a lengthy drum solo on “Moby Dick.”
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