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Preacher Jack is one of the last true rock 'n' rollers. Since the 1950s, his pounding, raucous, piano-only versions of Hank Williams tunes, as well as Gospel standards and early rock 'n' roll classics, have been infused with the fervor and tortured soul of a meth-happy big-tent revivalist. Every Thursday and Friday night in the smoky, drunken lounge of a neighborhood steakhouse in Somerville, Mass., you may witness a truly wild rock 'n' roll service presided over by the good Preacher Jack. The Preacher's disconnected, deeply religious sermons are often less than p.c., a conflicted morass of born-again mania and philistine luridness; but his positively lethal left hand and overall mastery of the old styles shuts down any arguments against his somewhat circumspect personal views. Delivering originals and covers in a howling rasp that sounds like Jerry Lee Lewis on the tail end of a punishing bender, he ladles a heaping portion of boogie jam all over everything, sometimes stretching out for 30 minutes worth of balls-out, left-handed supremacy within a single song. Sit back and enjoy as the Preacher blazes his way through a list of songs that reads like something from the Library of Congress. Expect to be saved.
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