One Day

by John Anderson

Wednesday night Matisyahu returned to the venue where he recorded his breakout, Live At Stubb’s, to see if he could catch lightning in a bottle twice. There were cameras everywhere as well as a mountain of recording equipment and the venue was as sold out as it could be.

There’s an old Chris Rock joke about how upside down the world is with a white guy, Eminem, being the best rapper and a black guy, Tiger Woods, being the best golfer. Matisyahu is a Hasidic Jew from New York, and one of the best reggae artists. Along with his band, the Dub Trio, Matisyahu spent two hours proving that, blending dub, ska, rap, hard rock, and mysticism into joy.

While he didn’t exactly shy away from his latest, Light, he didn’t focus on it either, choosing to explore his entire catalog. With just three players behind him, the sound was remarkably full as they augmented themselves with keyboards, used to create space and other effects. All eyes remained on Matisyahu, however, whose presence was riveting from the invocation of opener “Kodesh” to set-ending peace offering “One Day.”

There was shredding on “Darkness Into Light,” he showed off his skills on “Beatbox,” and offered up a new untitled tune that was light reggae-pop. While light on between song banter, perhaps because the temperature was in the high 90s, the faithful bounced throughout, especially for encore “King Without a Crown,” where thousands of arms were raised in solidarity and praise to his music and its message.