Old dog teaching new tricks

Since it's the Fourth of July, I'm gonna start this post by paying tribute to an American legend: James Brown. "Mr. Please Please Please" and his 20-strong team of musicians, singers and emcees put on a fabulous show at Couleur Cafe last Friday night (preceding the equally wonderful Burning Spear on the main stage).
Brown may be in his 70s, but he still has most of his moves and all of his old charisma. Learning his trade during the 'showbusiness' era of the 50s and 60s has stood the 'Godfather of Soul' in good stead: How many other performers today would have the chutzpah to make their stage entrance 20 minutes into their show? How many others have a backing band capable of holding the audience's attention for those 20 minutes?
Once onstage, Brown and cohorts ran through most of the man's greatest hits ('Soul power', 'Sex machine', I feel good', 'It's a man's, man's, man's world', etc) as well as covers of 'Soul man'and 'Hold on, I'm coming' during a riproaring hour and three quarters. I can honestly say that I have never seen or heard a better audience reaction at any of the hundreds of concerts I have attended. Quite simply, James Brown tore the roof off the sucker.
Rock Werchter the following day could never live up to those heights, but Franz Ferdinand and Goldfrapp certainly gave it their all. Arctic Monkeys, by contrast, seemed a little jaded. And they weren't helped by playing at 3pm on a boiling hot day. Nonetheless, the band still had the audience up and frugging wildly, even if it wasn't quite the 'voice of a generation' experience the hype promised.