Review | Rebelution Brings Their Very Santa Barbara Sound to the Bowl

If you’ve never listened to Rebelution, can you really call yourself a Santa Barbara local? Even a friend of mine from my days at Santa Barbara High School couldn’t resist their homegrown magnetism. She was an international student from Kazakhstan.

The reggae rock band that was formed almost 20 years ago in Isla Vista has fostered a kindred bond with the community at large in the years since their backyard shows and breakthrough 2007 album Courage to Grow. Emanating the feel-good vibes they’ve been curating since the beginning, Rebelution’s Sunday-night performance at the Santa Barbara Bowl kicked off their two-night stay with a mutual feeling of love.

That love extended to the parking lot — kudos to the owner of the white sedan with a large Rebelution decal sticker on their bumper.

As an exciting segue to the night’s headliner, Iration, a sunshine reggae group also from Santa Barbara, closed out their set with a fun rendition of “Mary Jane’s Last Dance” by Tom Petty, and DJ Mackle followed with mixes including an eclectic mashup of “Get Up Stand Up” by Bob Marley and the Wailers with Haddaway’s “What Is Love.”

Soon after DJ Mackle left the stage, frontman Eric Rachmany’s unmistakable voice echoed out across the venue, with a “hey” and a “yeah” in his characteristic, relaxed inflection that gives Rebelution their standout vocal sound.

Opening greetings, underpinned by Rory Carey’s suspension-building keyboard, erupted into an explosion of light, iridescent bubbles, electric guitar riffs, and show-stealing horns as Rachmany burst into the drawn-out “woah” that introduces “De-Stress” from their 2014 bouncy, pop-influenced album Count Me In.

For the first song’s finale, the trumpet and saxophone players found their rightful place at the front of the stage. The trumpeter seamlessly delivered the resounding solo that gave way to a jazzy melody flying high over the band’s rhythmic marriage of drums, strings, and keys and tied the song’s bounce back to its traditional reggae roots. 

Speaking of roots, halfway through, the band paid tribute to Jamaican musician Gregory Isaacs, a godfather of reggae, by covering his hit “Night Nurse.” It came across as a nod to the genre’s origins, the evolution of which Rebelution has to thank for its inspiration. Rachmany’s smooth delivery brought the crowd back to 1980, but it’s safe to say that no one can match Isaacs’s beautiful, legendary voice.

Rachmany’s vocals might lend the band a distinctive anchor, but he didn’t even really need to sing. The crowd knew every lyric to every song. Popular tracks from their older albums — “Safe and Sound,” “Feeling Alright,” “Lazy Afternoon,” and their rarely played live “Courage to Grow” — were more like upbeat sing-alongs, with the crowd emphatically answering Rachmany’s call-and-response cues.

“Feeling Alright,” a Rebelution essential, didn’t need prompting for the crowd to fill in for Rachmany, who began the song by strumming his guitar under a solo, purple spotlight.

But the song to write home about, “Outta Control,” got right to the heart of why it’s great to see Rebelution live. With its dramatic, punchy keyboard intro, heavy bass, and intermittent, catchy guitar riffs that lend the telltale reggae tune to a flirtatious blending of horns and magnified, embellished instrumentals, the live performance is truly special and makes for an immersive experience. 

To add to that real-life Rebelution experience, smoke rings billowed from machines on stage, blowing O’s to compliment the smell of marijuana that wafted across the crowd every time the wind picked up. “Everybody here’s got the herb when I’m dry,” Rachmany said, a play on the lyrics of their song “So High.” 

Special guests Iration, The Expendables, and Passafire came on stage to lend some accompaniment to a few of the final songs in Rebelution’s setlist, adding raps or sweet harmonies to the band’s sunny amalgamations of funk, folk, and rhythm. 

They saved the best for last, though. For their encore, Rachmany and bassist Marley D. Williams brought out two stools for an incredibly in-sync and goosebump-giving solo guitar performance supplemented with one slow, echoing chorus of “Santa Barbara.”