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THE WORD REUNITE FOR THREE SHOWS: PHILADELPHIA, NEW YORK, and FT. LAUDERDALE

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THE WORD REUNITE FOR THREE SHOWS: PHILADELPHIA, NEW YORK, and FT. LAUDERDALE

(New York, NY) — Longtime friends and collaborators Chris Chew, Cody Dickinson & Luther Dickinson (of North Mississippi Allstars), John Medeski (of Medeski Martin & Wood), and Robert Randolph (of Robert Randolph & the Family Band) will be reforming THE WORD for three very special shows this December/January. Tickets are on sale now.

Dec 30 – Philadelphia, PA – Theatre for the Living Arts
Dec 31 – New York, NY – Terminal 5
Jan 1 – Ft. Lauderdale, FL – Culture Room

Avant-jazz keyboardist John Medeski is known for his work with improvisational trio Medeski Martin & Wood. In 2000, Medeski produced and played on the self-titled debut by The Word, a gospel-meets-rock collective with North Mississippi Allstars that introduced the secular world to pedal-steel guitar phenomenon Robert Randolph. The band released a self-titled album and toured in support. The band reunited in the summer of 2005 at the Bonnaroo Music Festival, and again briefly in 2007 for four shows in the Northeast.

“The history of The Word reached back to our early years,” says North Mississippi Allstars’ Luther Dickinson. In 1998 we toured with Medeski Martin & Wood and came up with the idea. This tour means a lot to us and we’re looking forward to getting back together with old friends.”

Medeski Martin & Wood have been diligently at work on their Radiolarian series, and will release their first ever boxed set, Radiolarians: The Evolutionary Set on Dec. 8, 2009.

Three-time Grammy nominated North Mississippi Allstars will be doing a national tour January 27 to March 6, 2010. Luther Dickinson can be seen as a member of The Black Crowes. Chris Chew and Cody Dickinson have been touring recently as part of the lauded Southern Rock band, Hill Country Revue.

Robert Randolph & The Family Band has spent the last year touring behind their album COLORBLIND, the follow-up to their 2003 Grammy-nominated debut on Warner Bros. Records, UNCLASSIFIED. They are currently completing recording for their next album, which will be released in Spring 2010 and is produced by legendary producer T-Bone Burnett.

Photo left to right: Robert Randolph, Cody Dickinson, John Medeski, Chris Chew, Luther Dickinson. Photo credit: The Word.

From Rolling Stone’s Best of Rock 2008

Robert Randolph was a star in a small world – a virtuoso of sacred-steel guitar, a wild style of Pentecostal-church music – when he was invited to play on the 2001 album The Word with organist John Medeski and the North Mississippi Allstars. “I was only supposed to do a couple of songs,” Randolph recalls. “But once we got in there. . . .” The album’s improvisations on old spirituals became the birth of a remarkable band also called the Word, with ecstatic locomotion and soloing by Randolph and guitarist Luther Dickinson. “Those guys thought they were just cutting another album,” Randolph notes. “I told them, ‘It’s going to be around for a hundred years.’ ” The Word tour infrequently (the principals have their own bands), but when they do, they don’t bother writing set lists. “It’s about translating a feeling in the room,” Randolph says. “If a set worked in Chicago, that doesn’t mean it will work in Minneapolis.” – David Fricke

From Amazon.com’s Best of 2001

Sweet surrender’s always been the subtext of gospel music, but the velvet punch of this superstar jam band will knock out secular audiences as well. The Word features John Medeski of Medeski Martin and Wood and youngblood trio the North Mississippi Allstars, but it’s star, Robert Randolph, a 23-year-old from New Jersey who is the new god of pedal-steel guitar. Randolph earned his chops in the Pentecostal church, performing the so-called “Sacred Steel” music well documented by the Arhoolie label (see Sacred Steel, Vol. 2 for a sample). He plays like an amalgamation of Duane Allman, Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck, John Coltrane, Buddy Emmons, Bo Diddley, and Mahalia Jackson. In short, he’s brilliant, so full of rock & roll energy, improvisational fire, and sonic acrobatics that the other great musicians on this disc mostly stay out of his way. Randolph has a seemingly divine gift for on-the-fly harmony as he splits the difference between Sunday tent meetings and Saturday juke crawls on “Keep Your Lamp Trimmed & Burning.” In the Allman Brothers-style jams, Randolph plays both Dickey Betts and Duane to Medeski’s organ, handling sweet, clean scales and rich, mellow slide slurs. But his vocabulary extends well beyond American-roots music. “Blood on That Rock” ends in a free-improv meltdown, and elsewhere his snaky lines sound like Middle Eastern holy singing. All of which makes The Word worth heeding. –Ted Drozdowski