Lee & The Lovedaddies - International Pop Overthrow Liverpool (photos)

Lee & The Lovedaddies from Belgium went down very well with their hipster look and fine pop ditties.

Norman Kelsey International Pop Overthrow (Pictures)

I had to nip back to work after Honeybug, but caught Normal Kelsey ending his set with a cover of Love Train.

Honeybug - International Pop Overthrow Liverpool (Friday)

I am terribly biased about Honeybug and make no apologies about. I have now known Ni for about eight years and he is one of my favourite people on this planet. So after skipping an IPO day on Thursday due to illness it was right back into the foray on Friday including nipping out of work for a bit to go and see Honeybug.

Up until Friday morning I had seen two different three piece line ups, a four piece version of the band and a mighty seven piece Honeybug. Friday was meant to be a five piece line up, but things fell through at the very last minute so it was power trio of keyboards, drums and guitar. I doubt most people in the audience could tell that there had been such little rehearsal time in this format. I certainly wouldn't have guessed if I hadn't been told.

Oodles of old favourites, where I have come to know the acoustic versions so well over the years that when the backing vocals weren't there it  was momentarily disorientating. A new song- yay! And cracking cover of Badfinger's No Matter What. (You can't beat a bit of Badfinger, let's face it!) Fabulous!

Experimenting

If I can get a connection in the Cavern Club later I may post here direct from there later on. I'll only have my phone with me tonight so I apologise in advance for spelling mistakes etc... Big fingers on a little keyboard.

I have been trying to get emailing photos to the blog directly from my camera to work but alas it seems that it's not a very good function. (If I recall there's usually a massive delay with emailed posts on blogger)

More later!

Link to Steve Hackett at Hammersmith Review

Great review of a fab gig - they got special guests and everything! :-)

Steve Hackett : Hammersmith Apollo - Trebuchet Magazine

Rockshow on the Big Screen

I skipped day two of International Pop Overthrow Liverpool to go and see Rockshow at the pictures.

This Wings Live footage looms large in my fandom and has done since my first Beatles convention in 1990. Bootleg videos did the rounds of all the penpals getting paler and fuzzier which each copy and then even worse with rewinding favourite bits to watch over and over. There are so many things that we still inject into conversations or do at gigs that stem from this footage.

On the face of it it seems economically silly to pay a tenner to see something once that you can buy on DVD soon for about the same price and that you have already seen a million times, but it was great to see it on a big screen with a bunch of like minded people.

They have remastered the footage, although there's only so much you can do with 70s footage shot in based light with odd focussing problem, and the sound. The sound is fantastic, the instrumentation is clear and you hear things you never noticed as much before such as the sexy bassline for Let Me Roll It.

This is Wings at their peak live performance. The group dynamics mean that Paul isn't the only person to take on lead vocalist duty and I really do feel that Paul is better as part of group rather than as an artist with a backing band. The joy of playing is apparent throughout Rockshow, from everyone on the stage. It also made me realise how much Linda is missed. In the newly recorded introduction to the cinematic release Paul comments that she was very much the cheerleader of the band encouraging the audience to participate and clap along.

The set list is pretty damn perfect -a reasonable smattering of Beatles tunes including a frantic version of Lady Madonna but no Hey Jude, no Let It Be - and all cracking selection of Wings songs including Silly Love Songs which was the latest single release around the time of these shows. The final encore of Soily was worth the cinema ticket alone!

There's no fireworks, no fancy screens, in fact the light show was fairly basic by comparison to other shows of the era, so it was all about the music and that is just as it should be.

And now I'm off to preorder the DVD and gets the beers in for the inevitable Rockshow evening with my mates!

Teenage Casket Company - International Pop Overthrow Liverpool 2013

Sadly work means I don't get out to play as often at International Pop Overthrow Liverpool these days, so tonight was a quick trip down to the Cavern Pub to see one band before heading home to catch up on things and get some sleep for another busy day in work tomorrow.

I had spotted this band on the schedule and thought the name sounded brilliant so wanted to go along and see what they sounded like. I wasn't disappointed. They were brilliantly loud and simply rocked the pub. Erring towards the heavier side of powerpop the songs drove home their hooks with gusto. I was very tempted to stay out for their second set in the Cavern Club later in the evening.  I picked up a free CD so expect comments on then when I get around to playing all my IPO booty after the event is over.

Here's some links!
Official Facebook Page
Official Site
Official Twitter
ReverbNation Page
Official MySpace Page

And here's a video!


There's another video here.

Click the picture for my International Pop Overthrow 2013 Flickr set.