Ten Ton Chicken & FlowMotion
Live at The Rainbow - Seattle, WA 3/16/2002
by Pat Ferris

Last night there was a happening at Seattle nightclub, The Rainbow. I was introduced to Ten Ton Chicken about a year ago via the internet, followed up with a feature on them last November, and helped with their first tour through the Northwest. I expected to see a fantastic show based on Bay Area reviews, and their pick for opening band, Seattle's jamaholic funksters, FlowMotion. What I didn't expect to see was a standing room only show; the largest crowd I've seen at The Rainbow in recent memory.

Every great band has a great road story, and I'm sure this will go down in Chicken history as the tour of endurance! TTC has been on tour since the end of last week, playing seven cities in twelve days. After playing in Missoula, their van broke down and had to be flat-hauled to get a new radiator hose. The road-worthiness of the band showed with the foresight that this might happen (since it had on several other occasions), leaving Missoula at 6:30am for the nine hour drive to Seattle, and still making it to the show on time in spite of the delay!

I arrived at The Rainbow about 10pm to a line of people in front of an already packed nightclub. Opening band, FlowMotion is one of the larger draws in the Seattle area with their own blend of reggae, bluegrass, and rock driven funk. Being out of the Seattle area for the last several years meant I missed out on seeing a lot of great bands. FlowMotion was a band that I heard about while living in Texas, but I hadn't had the opportunity to see until last night. FlowMotion was nothing short of incredible, bringing the crowd to a pitched frenzy; a frothing sea of sweaty bodies, dancing with nobody in particular. African and Latin influences, complete with ethnic drums and percussion, make FlowMotion one of the bands that make you want to dance.

Ten Ton Chicken took the stage at 11:30, and from the first note held the audience, as the sea of sweating bodies swelled into an ocean. It literally looked like water from a distance...moving, flowing, ebbing. At the bottom of this mayhem is drummer Rich DiBenedetto, and bassist, Tom Fejes, laying down the groove and foundation for two incredible walls of sound...one created by guitarist, Gary Morell, an obvious Jerry Garcia disciple, and the other by Nick Peck with his multiple keyboards. On top of this, the flitting, darting, dancing sound of Jamison Reed's crunching alto sax.

A jam band as the definition goes, couldn't better describe these guys. If you could imagine Phish with a psychotic saxophone prodigy with too many effect pedals near his feet....you get the idea!. Their well thought out arrangements of be-bop riffs between sax and keys, can make even the most hardened critic appreciate the talent and work that it takes to play at their level. Their cover of Average White Band's Pick up the Pieces was right in there as far as being a representative sound of Ten Ton Chicken, but their jams, improvisation and ability to create energy from sound was what TTC is about.

At the end of the evening, percussion and drum wielding members of FlowMotion joined TTC on stage, in a jam free-for-all, bringing the evening to a crescendo. I think you would be hard pressed to find a single person that didn't get their money's worth at this show!

After the show, Rich and Jamison stopped by my house for a night cap, and I had the opportunity to hang out with a couple of down to earth, humble, intelligent guys. After getting them good and liquored up, I put them behind the wheel and sent them on their way back to their hotel at nearly 5am, but not before they gave me the latest show (last week) on CD for inspiration to write a good review.

All I can say is the CD is killer...awesome...but Ten Ton Chicken is a happening...a scene. It's something you have to experience live.

For more information on Ten Ton Chicken, CLICK HERE

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