Carlton swings, connects

Guitar heroes come in various shades of showmanship and technique, but we're not sure where Larry Carlton really falls on that scale. Not a full-bore, standards-bound jazzer, nor really much of a heavy-artillery fusion player, and hardly a rock god, Carlton came across at his Boulder Theater appearance last Thursday as a sort of elder statesman/jack-of-all-trades, almost determined to evade an easy characterization, entirely consistent with his post session-years career.

He opened with a touching solo elegy for the recently departed Les Paul called "Goodbye", with whom he had a friendly acquaintance, and proceeded into two sets swinging from buoyant pop-jazz ("Smiles and Smiles To Go") to simmering funk-blues ("Burnable"), and even reached into his past (and present) for the Steely Dan staple "Josie", which he delivered sans vocals (comping the melody line) and after complying with an audience request (hardly unexpected) for a quick solo rendition of his famed "Kid Charlemagne" solo, which he picked off more or less note-for-note. Odd thing, recreating a solo from nearly 35 years ago, but amongst guitar aficionados, the thing remains a revered staple of post-rock era guitaring and Carlton seemed happy to peel it off.

His band consisted of his son Travis on 4 and 5-string bass, understated but flashing moments of rangy brilliance, and a very bad fellow named Gene Coy on drums, equally tough in the pocket as swinging wildly across the solo spaces. Expect to hear more from this cat.

And as for Carlton, the set seemed to serve a bit more bite than we were expecting (Carlton long ago mastered the grittier side of the Gibson 335's broad tonal character), perhaps intentionally to compensate for the lack of a keyboard player. We're not sure that Carlton plays the role of a power trio guitarist particularly well and we were sorry not to be able to enjoy a little more interplay between Carlton's gnarled harmonic wanderings and another lead player - keys, another guitar, horn, etc - but this was obviously a small-deal tour without fresh music to promote, so the three-piece configuration seemed entirely appropriate. Carlton's chops are still in evidence, although (again, as has always been his habit) he uncoils them sparingly, leaning more on nuance, shading and careful harmonic positioning. This lends itself to a better paced set and prevents the blues and fusion numbers from upstaging the lighter pop stuff.

This was, overall, a guitar lover's treat, and the guy's still got it. Catch him if you can.