★★★★★
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- www.offbeat.com
2012-04-26
★★★★★
The title of this four-song EP comes from the disc's origins. It was recorded in hotel rooms and during soundchecks while on tour this past year with Bonnie Raitt. Only the mechanical drum tracks give that away, though. The grooves may not have the fingerprints of the Absolute Monster Gentlemen, but they certainly don't sound like one musician assembling the songs layer by layer...
- www.offbeat.com
2010-11-09
★★★★★
You know exactly what to expect whenever anyone strikes up the opening riff to Professor Longhair's "Go to the Mardi Gras," right? Not quite. That riff opens Jon Cleary's first live CD, and what follows is anything but a traditional version of the song. Instead of charging into the familiar groove, his Absolute Monster Gentlemen dance around it. Their arrangement is full of spooky open spaces, and Cleary's vocal is more about longing for a celebration than being in the thick of one...
- www.offbeat.com
2010-11-02
★★★★★
A tight band turning out a mighty funkified (or "fonkified", to use local parlance) set of tunes would be a good way to describe New Orleans' pianist, singer, and multi-instrumentalist Jon Cleary's new self-titled CD. Or as a friend of mine likes to say, "They play so funky you can smell it!"While the band does not perform "jazz", their sound is straight out of the 1970's and is reminiscent of the great funky groups of the past such as Detroit's Funk Inc. and San Francisco's Tower of Power...
- www.jazzreview.com
2010-08-23
★★★★★
Track Listing: Pin Your Spin, Agent 00 Funk, Oh No No No, Ain't Nuttin Nice, Smile In A While, Doin Bad Feelin Good, Best Ain't Good Enuff, Funky Munky Biznis, Is It Any Wonder, Got Be Be More Careful, Caught Red Handed, Zulu Strut Personnel: Jon Cleary (vocals, keyboards, lead guitar, bass), Derwin Perkins (vocals, guitar), Cornell C...
- www.allaboutjazz.com
2010-08-20
★★★★★
New Orleans-based pianist and vocalist Jon Cleary and his band show us the different colors funk comes in on Pin Your Spin. While there's plenty of funky stuff on the disc-as on the title track, where a deep growling bass pattern prowls beneath the melody; "Funky Munky Biznis" is an infectious jam; and "Got to Be More Careful" recalls classic '70s hard R&B-this; album covers a lot more stylistic ground...
- www.jazztimes.com
2010-02-19
★★★★★
On one of the songs on Jon Cleary's new album, the British-born, New Orleans-based keyboardist-vocalist-multi-instrumentalist declares, "You can't make it truly funky if you ain't playing with soul." Judging from this album, Cleary and his band, the Absolute Monster Gentlemen, know a lot about both...
- www.jazztimes.com
2010-02-19
★★★★★
Singer-pianist Jon Cleary is English by birth but Dixie by nature, with a low, steamy croon and a pumping-ivory drive as funky as the city he has long called home: New Orleans. Cleary can be an absolute monster on his own; I've seen him pin a full house to the back wall at Tipitina's with an explosive solo charge through Professor Longhair's "Big Chief...
- www.rollingstone.com
2009-06-08
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