Show Me Where It Hurts is the hip-shakin’ new duo featuring Josh Hetherington on vocals and Fender Rhodes electric piano and Ronny Haynes on drums and vocals. Stepping out in all their finery – finest of threads, finest of tunes – Show Me Where It Hurts peddle a sweet and savoury smorgasbord of swingin’ sass and soul, and fingerpoppin’ rock-a-rolla! With a hands-on-hips line on the groove, Show Me Where It Hurts gonna make you wanna move!
As Miles Davis once said, ‘See, the Fender Rhodes has one sound and that sound is itself… You always know what it is’ – and with a love of the electric piano dating as far back as Miles’ New Directions in Music and Ray Charles’ smoking Wurlitzer assault in ‘What’d I Say?’, SMWIH’s idea of putting the Rhodes right back centrestage (or at least slightly stage right) as the driving, growling and chiming harmonic force of a straight-up, funk-fuelled rock ’n’ roll combo playing stomping, swingin’ pop songs, suddenly made the sort of sense that only the blatantly obvious suddenly will.
‘Let’s electrify!’, was the duo’s resounding consensus. ‘All we need’s a 73-key Rhodes Mark I piano cranked sweetly through a hot-rodded, silverface Fender Twin, and a chrome-encased kit beaten to a resonant lustre over lost years in preparation for (and in thrall to) its destiny. Then we’ll hit the fuckers with a tune they can hum, a sound they can’t ditch, a groove that don’t lie and a scratch they can’t itch. Soak it all up with a fat and freaky bottom end not heard since Miles ran the voodoo down, top it all off with a reckless and ill-advised line in romance, regret and redemption, and we’ll slay them in the aisles!’
Review:
“Openers, Show Me Where It Hurts, proved an inspired selection with their original and beguiling Rhodes electric piano, drums and vocals approach. The Auckland duo held it down and held their own in the face of what must well have felt an intimidating prospect, given the pedigree of the headliner [Bobby Womack, Civic Theatre, Auckland, May 18, 2013] – and for a solid, swinging 45 minutes engaged early comers, who were rewarded for their promptness with a hot and sometimes rollicking performance from singer, keyboardist Josh Hetherington and drummer Ronny Haynes. Both contrasting and complementing the main attraction, it was a performance in the true spirit of the occasion, and it ended up feeling just right.
Standout tunes ‘All You’ll Ever Need’, ‘Show Me Where It
Hurts’, and stomping Motown-tinged finalé ‘Joanee’ – alongside a
wicked and funky, yet weirdly faithful rendition of seventies Rolling Stones’
incongruity ‘Fool to Cry’ – warmed an audience who seemed as if they
didn’t quite know what they were witnessing, but somehow really liked it –
yes they did!”
Doubtful Sounds, 2013 (doubtfulsounds.net)