One of the main musical events happening in several parts of the world, specifically concerning Blues, it's the January Blues Festival, which takes place in several parts of the world, including Europe, North America and, of course, the United Kingdom.
Our website couldn't renounce to the opportunity to report about such a great Festival, especially when we were invited to watch once more one of the most experienced and exciting music collectives coming from Scandinavia to perform for the Festival in the UK capital city.
There was a great buzz, on Sunday 11th, at a fabulous venue like the 229 in London, about one of the biggest sensations coming from Denmark exclusively for the January Blues Festival, a band that has built a remarkable name for themselves through the last 2 decades as one of the hottest Blues, Rock and R&B collectives worldwide, Thorbjørn Risager & The Black Tornado.
A last minute unfortunate health issue happening to the bandleader and singer-songwriter Thorbjørn Risager (the previous night Risager had passed out while on stage) was communicated to the crowd while entering the venue, making it feel like the whole night could be off. However and thankfully, though, The Black Tornado decided otherwise, by going ahead with the show anyway, as a sign of respect for the generous amount of fans present at the venue.
For The Black Tornado, it must have been extremely challenging performing without their bandleader (who, by the way, is feeling already better and hopefully will rejoin the band soon), given the fact that this has been only the second time ever in the history of the band that Risager had to renounce to perform for the aforementioned reasons, out of more than 1200 plus shows that the band has performed all over the world.
For those many fans present in London who had been following Risager & The Black Tornado's career and know this wonderful collective by heart, it might have not been a huge surprise though, to acknowledge once again the superb skills of such a talented group of musicians like The Black Tornado, who performed two exquisitely sets of about 45 minutes each, alternating a blend of Blues classics with songs belonging to the band's vast songbook, with guitarist Joachim Svensmark taking the vocal duties in place of Risager.
Every single band member shone on stage, through their individual skills and fabulous interplay, producing a strong wall of sound that, on many occasions, got huge roars from an almost full house at the 229 in London.
Together with Svensmark, pianist Emil Balsgaard, saxophonists Kasper Wagner (alto/tenor/baritone), trumpeter Peter Kehl, bassist Søren Bøjgaard and drummer Martin Seidelin delivered big, throughout the whole night, particularly on some of the collective's own songs like Never Givin' In and Already Gone and on some superbly delivered Blues covers of epic tunes, such as Howlin' Wolf's Killing Floor, Albert King's Crosscut Saw and Ray Charles' What Would I Do Without You, among others.
Pity that Risager couldn't make it, for this Festival and for tonight's show in London, but The Black Tornado managed to deliver anyway a memorable performance. A band that never disappoints that we hope to see returning back again in London next year for the Festival, hopefully, this time with their bandleader Risager too.
