A year after concert dates that did not coincide with my schedule, or missing his show by accident after scheduling the wrong time, I finally caught up with our own Justin Nozuka’s set at The Mod Club in Toronto on Friday December 11/09. The wait was well worth it, as Justin touched the audience with his deep, deep down-in-the-soul bluesy rock that seems to have a beautiful, mystical quality to it. We got to hear some of those great songs from his CD Holly – among them, “Criminal”, “Save Him”, “Don’t Listen To A Word You’ve Heard” (with music, not spoken as on the CD), and a communal band/audience effort at my favourite “After Tonight”. His brothers Henry and Christian Bridges also collaborated with him in an acoustic jam of sorts on a new song. But the focus of this show was to give the audience a taste of his upcoming sophomore CD Gray. The bluesy rock is still there but on some songs R&B/Soul seems to be more prominent, along with the intense emotion that sounded so original on Holly. Justin’s the real deal, and at only 21 he can have as long a career as his bluesy soul is old and deep. Catch his show before you can say International Breakout 2010. Below is a highlight from his Toronto set called “I’m Free”.
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