Jaco Pastorius Trio: “Black Market” (March 1986)
In 1986, Jaco Pastorius toured Europe in a trio with guitarist Bireli Lagrene and different drummers.
While there are recordings out there documenting some of these performances (including this one), videos from that period always seemed highly unlikely – thanks to it being the mid-80’s, when technology was pretty lousy compared with today’s standards.
Thankfully someone dragged their video gear to one of the performances.
Here’s the trio, with Michael Kersting on drums, performing Weather Report’s “Black Market”. The performance took place in Kolpinghaus, Salzburg, Austria on March 14, 1986.
It is clear by his expression that Jaco was not happy of what he was playing, he was looking for something else and deeply depressed. I can say it because I have been to another concert of the same tour in Milano, Jaco arrived on the stage really hi and was unable to play anything with a sense. After a while the public began to boo him without any pity. He sat on the keyboard and began to play an ex promptu blues, the meaning of the song was: “I am a musician, not a clown”. The concert was a failure, but later the same night somebody told me that he was going to a jazz club called “Le Scimmie” on the canals, I went there and seen him playing the drums, I was standing on the stage a meter from him (the club was packed). He was much happier and played fantastically.