The Ben Harper and the Innocent Criminals show Sunday night at the Orpheum was a twisted trip back in time to the 1950s… and the ’60s . . . and the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s.
As the show began, the Innocent Criminals gathered around a single mic, dressed to mesh with the Chicago blues scene of the ’50s. And the music, reminiscent of Muddy Waters, matched perfectly. Harper played a solitary slide guitar as the Innocent Criminals performed two songs from Harper’s collaboration with gospel group The Blind Boys of Alabama, There Will Be A Light.
Minutes later, a mood change: on comes a track from Harper’s seminal Fight For Your Mind, which sounded right at home with contemporaries like Soul Coughing when it came out in the mid-90s.
The decade- and genre-jumping continued throughout the set, with songs ranging in style from ’60s Led Zeppelin, to ’70s Stevie Wonder, to ’80s R.E.M., to ’90s Counting Crows, to 21st-century Jack Johnson.
Harper and the Innocent Criminals (who really make the show) switch between innumerable styles and eras with ease. Never did they sound unnatural — even when the soft-voiced Harper took on an impromptu cover of Bob Dylan’s “Masters of War.”
But just because you can doesn’t always mean you should. The crowd registered confusion as the first two minutes or so of each song were dedicated to deciding collectively, “Should we stand up or sit down?” And often, the crowd chose wrong, and would be forced to correct the error just as the song was about to end. Then it happened again.
Harper acknowledged the musical inconsistency after the fourth encore, as he thanked the crowd for being “the bravest fans in the world” for allowing themselves to be taken to so many music places throughout the night. But it’s hard to say if the fans were brave or just resilient to being jerked around for two straight hours.
But clearly, the size of Harper’s audience stems in part from the variety of genres he explores. One the left of the audience sat a white woman with dreadlocks and a tie-dyed T-shirt, impressed with just how “nice” Harper was to his audience.
Not far from her sat the Boston College kids in their popped collars and baseball caps. And many more, all brought together by Harper and his band.
Despite the constant transformation Harper throws at his audience, it doesn’t feel forced for a second — just incredibly sincere. “Is there any symbolism behind playing the guitar so hard it makes you bleed?” he asked the crowd to wild applause. Well, Ben, we’re not sure, but if you say so, we’ll believe it. We’ve followed you this far.
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