See ya later... Jools

So last friday I stayed up fairly late (seeing as we're an hour ahead of the UK) to watch Jools Holland's show on the BBC.

PJ Harvey: very good.
Lamont Dozier: very nice tune with Jools at the piano.
Some band "from the Sahara": very cool (ha ha) desert funk (sort-of).
Amp Fiddler: nice neo-soul. Cool hair, Amp.
John Martyn: okay. One amusing moment when his band was getting a little funky and he... was not. I was vaguely reminded of Nick Drake on the first song.
Kanye West: doing "All Fall Down" with a violonist, a pianist, Syleena Johnson (daughter of Syl "Is It Because I'm Black?" Johnson) on vocals and a disembodied beat. Surprisingly good for live hip-hop, even if Kanye's rapping and Johnson's singing were too much on the same level in the mix, they kind of cancelled each other out. I was reminded of Jason Moran saying, in an interview, that a really innovative jazz/hip-hop cross-over would be a rapper and a piano, say Ghostface and him. I could see it working, if they managed to rehearse a bit.

But the real reason I post this is:
Ash: crappy, what were they doing there? There always seems to be a dud on Later... I seem to remember a decent (in my distant memory) Britrock band called Ash with a blonde singer back in the mid-to-late '90s. This band seemed to be American and had a dark-haired singer. I may be mistaken, though.

I take it a lot of the blogosphere doesn't like Jools (maybe I assume too much?), but, annoying voice aside, anyone who can set up segues from PJ Harvey to the Saharan band to Amp Fiddler is cool with me. And then sitting down at the piano and accompanying a guest competently is the icing, for me.