The Zombies, Liverpool, 18th May 2011

This is The Zombies’ 50th Anniversary tour, and they are essentially touring a new album. But this doesn’t mean their amazing back catalogue was ignored in anyway.
In total they performed six tracks from the newly released Breathe Out Breathe In album, and they blended very well in the set list. Sometimes new material from older bands can seem to jar against the hits or drag a bit for the audience, but the strength of these new tracks was shown by the warm and appreciative reception they all received.
Beyond the new tracks the set was a pleasant mix of Zombies songs and “solo” projects. They performed six songs from the Odessey and Oracle album explaining all the artists influenced by the songs, including most recently Dave Grohl from the Foo Fighters.
Colin Blunstone relished performing his hit version of What Becomes of The Brokenhearted as well as his solo songs and an Alan Parsons Project track.
As much as I adore The Zombies stuff the highlight for me was the Argent tracks. Hold Your Head Up featured a glorious keyboard solo that went on for quite some time, and God Gave Rock And Roll To You is a fabulous way to end a gig. (Although they did squeeze in a version of Summertime afterwards – a nice mellow track to send the audience on their way in the night.)
I left armed with signed posters, the new CD (also signed – everything was pre-done before the show) and T-Shirt.
I hope they are back round again soon as it is always a pleasure to
see this band.


More photos on flickr here.
Official Zombies Site

International Pop Overthrow Liverpool 2011 has begun!

IPO Liverpool started yesterday. It runs right through to next Tuesday if you are in the area. The event is free, but there's a door charge levied by one of the venues at peak times over the weekend.
It's all happening at the Cavern Pub and Club on Mathew Street.

I'm easing into it all slowly this year, having to get up for work means I have to curtail the late nights.

I did pop down to the Cavern Pub after work yesterday (mostly for a chance to test the latest of my little video cameras) and caught Jack Mittleman's cover of the George Harrison song Give Me Love.

Mostly Autumn, Manchester 13th May 2011

 

I am a relative newcomer to this band. It is thanks to my twitter friend Tim (check out his blog here) and my gig buddy Phil that I knew what I did of the band before I went to this concert.

I was basically armed with the knowledge of a few songs from the Pass The Clock compilation which I loved, and that the singer on those tracks was no longer with the band.

Arriving at the venue, we were told by the unusually helpful security man that he would find us in the bar when the doors were open upstairs as we wouldn’t need to queue due only around a 100 tickets being sold. However, judge by the number in there by about the third song there were plenty of people who bought tickets on the door.

Sometimes when you go to see a band that has a fan following you can feel a little isolated but I loved this audience. Everyone respected everyone else’s space and just enjoyed the music.

The band were fabulous. Olivia Sparnenn’s voice and stage presence is awesome. The blend of vocals across the board made for some very pleasurable sounds and the musicianship of the whole band was spot on! The sound was loud, but in no way distorted. And Anne-Marie Helder’s flute work was faultless. More bands should had flautists in their line-up I reckon. It works surprising well within a rock band sound.

Confession time now, I’ve had to go searching for a set list to see what was played and the best I could come up with (after a minimal search, I confess) was a list for the night after in Leicester. Thankfully it jogged the memory a bit.

Lots of stuff from the new album Go Well Diamond Heart, all of which was greeted warmly by the appreciative audience. I had bought the CD before the gig began, that’s how confident I was I would enjoy it. Before the interval I was already eager to get it on the mp3 player! I could only afford the ordinary release, but the track from the special edition that they performed did tantalise and I almost considered going over budget and getting that instead. (In the end I was sensible, I have a lot of nights out this week and need to make the pennies stretch!)

The new songs blended in well with the older stuff. As I said I’m a novice with this band, but there seemed no noticeable difference between old and new. 

The date of the gig (Friday the 13th) didn’t go unmentioned, especially as before the second song the drum kit had to be gaffer taped into place, or their was a chance the drummer would end up in the audience by the third song. And at one point one of the amps switched itself off!

Highlights – Fading Colours, Go Well Diamond Heart and the “encore” (they never left the stage) of And When The War Is Over and Heroes Never Die.

In all they were onstage from around 8.15 right through to the venue curfew of 11pm, with a 20 minute break somewhere in the middle. That’s around two and half hours of quality entertainment for under £15! Brilliant! Especially as the band appeared to be having just as good a time as the audience. I can think of a few far more expensive concerts I’ve been to that were shorter and didn’t offer any form of audience engagement.

Mostly Autumn Official Site

Facebook Page

I've stated a Facebook page for this blog. 

Not quite sure what I'll do with it. Probably feed the blog posts to it and maybe link to photos or something. 

Anyway, if you're on facebook and fancy it, check it out by clicking here!

Solid Silver 60s Show 2011, Liverpool Philharmonic Hall.

I have skipped a couple of years of Solid Silver 60s shows for various reasons, but last night my best friend Ellie and I went along to the Liverpool Philharmonic Hall for an evening of fun. Actually we started at the Philharmonic Pub for drinks with Toni from the Dakotas who is currently sitting in on keyboards with The Merseybeats. There was a fair amount of catching up to do as I'd not seen him for ages. I mustn't leave that long again!

Vanity Fare were on stage when we took our seats, we were just in time for Hitching A Ride. Vanity Fare provided the backing for all the solo artists on the bill. They are jolly good at it too.

Wayne Fontana took the stage in his white suit and cowboy hat. Still in fine voice he entertained the crowd in his own inimitable style. With classics like Um Um Um Um Um Um and Game Of Love we were already dancing in our seats and singing along.

Following Wayne was Chris Farlowe.  It had been a while since we'd seen him on a Manfreds tour. He still sounds great. The set list included Handbags and Gladrags, a rather nice new song the title of which escapes me right now and ended, of course, with Out Of Time. 

After the interval it was time for Dave Berry. Opening with Memphis Tennessee and working his way as only he can through a cover of ZZ Top's Give Me All Your Loving, Mama, Little Things (cue us joining in on the backing vocals) and The Crying Game he gave a great show. He even came back for a kind of encore, which was a version of the BeeGees' First of May. 

Next was Terry Sylvester who was in both the Escorts and the Hollies for a while. As a local lad he must have had a lot of family in judging from the reaction from the audience. Vanity Fare did a fabulous job of recreating the Hollies-esque harmonies for the set. 

The evening was rounded off by The Merseybeats. They very quickly had the crowd going and even had some up on their feet. By the end we were all on our feet actually! The band never fail to entertain. We got Wishin' And Hopin', a coupel of Everly Brothers tunes, Don't Turn Around, I Think of You, a version of Live and Let Die with pyros and strobe lights...and that was topped with a crowd pleasing rendition of Sorrow before they belted out a version of Hi Ho Silver Lining. 

The finale was Glad All Over with all the acts back on stage and the crowd clapping and stomping along. We had a fabulous night and it reminded us how much fun we have at these things. Personally I'm already eager to find out the line up for next year!

Full set of photos here at my flickr account.

Rick Wakeman - Pacific Road Arts Centre, Birkenhead

This was my first Rick Wakeman solo concert. I had seen a couple of DVDs so pretty much knew what to expect.

The format was simple. The stage was set with a piano and a microphone. Rick introduced each piece with an amusing anecdote before sitting at the piano. Lots of the stories are well known, but he does love telling them. In fact he seemed to be really enjoying himself up there.

His piano playing is quite something to watch. Luckily from where I was sat he didn't have his back completely to us and I found myself quite mesmerised by his technique.

Highlight were A Glimpse of Heaven, You And I/Wonderous Stories, Morning Has Broken, Dance of A Thousand Lights (karaoke version - he played over a recording of the orchestral bits.) and Catherine Howard which is rapidly becoming one of my favourite pieces of his music.

There was even audience participation. We all got to be birds on The Birdman of Alcatraz.

It was a fun evening all round, and really do hope the opportunity arises that I can go and see him again.

Five Songs

 

It’s quite simple – just list five songs you really into at the moment; not your five greatest songs of all time, but five songs you’ve been listening to a lot recently, for any given value of “Recently”. And give a few words explaining why.

Note - I have previously posted a Five Song thing here. But I didn’t look at it till I had finished this post.

Brandenburger – The Nice

I’ve just been reading about The Nice and filling in the gaps in my CD collection. This one particularly sticks in my head because for a few days before I acquired it on CD I had the Brandenburg Concerto playing over and over in my head (I think I’d heard it on a TV show or something.)

Friends Like These – T’Pau

It’s quite sad that this song as been applicable in my life at least twice. Still I currently don’t have any friends like these, I have fabulous, open-minded, caring, empathic friends of all kinds. And all praise to the powers that be that this is the case. Still like the song though and have done since the album came out.

Somebody Who Cares – Paul McCartney

I’ll admit it, I have a soft spot for the Tug Of War/Pipes Of Peace albums. This tune lives in my head and surfaces every now and again. Lyrically Paul captures the frustrations of life. It’s a simple analogy but effective. “Like somebody has taken the wheels off your car when you had somewhere to go” He couples this with the assurance that there’s “always someone somewhere, you should know by now there’s always somebody who cares” and he’s probably right!

Shoot To Thrill – AC/DC

The Iron Man 2 soundtrack is one that I often listen to on the way to work. It blows away the cobwebs as well as blocking out the general chatter that drives me insane at that time of day on that bus route – works on the journey back too!

My Resistance Is Low – Hoagy Carmichael

This tune is quite the earworm. And it’s well and truly stuck in my brain!

(stolen from here by the way.)